Labour announces new plan to support older people with care needs and those living with dementia

Friday, 26 April 2019 00:01

The Labour Party has announced new plans for a major increase in the number of home care packages for older people and people living with dementia, to ensure older people and younger adults with disabilities are properly cared for. This would reverse the reductions made by the Tories in Government since 2015 and the party estimates could provide support to over 160,000 older people who currently get no help at all, including 50,000 people with dementia. ...Request free trial

This would reverse the reductions made by the Tories in Government since 2015 and the party estimates could provide support to over 160,000 older people who currently get no help at all, including 50,000 people with dementia.

The new proposals include:

£2.8 billion to increase the number of home care packages for vulnerable people and people with dementia.
£350 million of investment in training to develop the Social Care workforce.
Ensuring that the earnings threshold for carers allowance rises year on year, in line with the National Living Wage.
£350 million per year to help people with autism and learning disabilities move back into the community from inappropriate inpatient units.

Home care packages support people to live independently in their own home by providing help with daily tasks such as getting in and out of bed, bathing and washing, and preparing meals.

Labour has said that people with dementia are “unfairly punished” by having to pay for social care when people with other conditions often receive care through ‘NHS continuing care’.

Labour’s pledge to help people with autism and learning disabilities move back into the community aims to stop children and adults being unnecessarily detained in mental health hospitals.

Age UK has estimated that 1,000 older people a day are being admitted to hospital needlessly amid a crisis in social care.

Barbara Keeley MP, Labour’s Shadow Minister for Mental Health, said:

“This Tory Government has shamefully abandoned older people and young adults with care needs.

“There is still no sign of their Social Care Green Paper which was promised over two years ago, and vulnerable older people have needlessly suffered as a result of the Government’s failure.

“People with dementia are unfairly punished when it comes to paying for their care needs so Labour will correct this injustice in government.

“We want care staff to be properly paid and trained, so that they can provide the kind of compassionate care that they want to give.

“We must offer dignity and security to all vulnerable people.”

Ends

Notes to editors

Labour’s fully-costed 2017 manifesto committed to increase social care spending by £8 billion over the lifetime of the next Parliament, including an additional £1 billion for the first year, covered by tax increases that protected 95% of earners: page 71 https://labour.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/labour-manifesto-2017.pdf

Official NHS data show that the total number of people receiving local authority funded social care has fallen by 104,000 since 2015 https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/shocking-nhs-figures-reveal-90-13791144

Almost 1,000 older people a day are needlessly admitted to hospital amid the social care crisis https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/09/04/almost-1000-elderly-people-day-needlessly-admitted-hospital/

Increasing the number of home care packages for people in need of care and people with dementia who have care needs

We recognise that people with dementia are unfairly punished by having to pay for social care when people with other conditions often receive care through NHS Continuing Care. That is why a portion of our overall funding will be used to secure over 50,000 extra packages of support each year for people with dementia.
UK Home Care Association recommends that the minimum rate for UK Living Wage packages until the end of October 2019 should be set at £20.75 per hour. This includes travel time. https://www.ukhca.co.uk/downloads.aspx?ID=434&dm_i=1DVI,63H0Q,7HD23Q,NXWVN,1#bk1
One year of home care for people in need of home care for three activities of daily living, paying staff at the UK Living Wage, will cost £574m per year. Over five years this would cost £2.8 billion in total, with nearly £1 billion allocated to those with dementia.
These packages will ensure that everyone gets good quality care and an end to 15 minute care visits. These packages will aim to be preventative, reducing the need for more costly care in the future.

Supporting Working Age Adults with Care Needs

2,295 people with learning disabilities and/or autism are still being held in inpatient care settings inappropriately, despite repeated Government commitments to end and, later, merely reduce these placements. https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/learning-disability-services-statistics/provisional-statistics-at-february-2019-mhsds-december-2018-final
Labour will invest £350 million per year in community support to remove people from inpatient care and place them back in the community, where they belong (based on the cost per person (£150,000) multiplied by the number of people to be moved (2,295) - National Audit Office (2017) Local support for people with a learning disability, p38:https://www.nao.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Local-support-for-people-with-a-learning-disability.pdf

Supporting Care Staff

Care staff do some of the most valuable, high-skilled work anywhere in the country, giving compassionate care to vulnerable people. However, conditions for staff working in social care have worsened dramatically since 2010.
Care staff are currently paid rock-bottom wages, the median pay being £7.89 per hour. Skills for Care, The State of the Adult Social Care Sector and Workforce in England (2018), p.69: https://www.skillsforcare.org.uk/NMDS-SC-intelligence/Workforce-intelligence/documents/State-of-the-adult-social-care-sector/The-state-of-the-adult-social-care-sector-and-workforce-2018.pdf
Most care staff are employed by private sector care providers who seek to enlarge their shrinking profit margins by reducing opportunities for training, taking on greater numbers of clients or not paying staff for travel time, eroding their wages even further.
Care worker recruitment and retention is flatlining at a time when care staff have never been more needed: local authorities receive on average more than 5,000 new requests for support per day (https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/adult-social-care-activity-and-finance-report/2017-18) but the number of social care role vacancies now numbers 110,000 and the turnover rate is now 30%. (p. 50: https://www.skillsforcare.org.uk/NMDS-SC-intelligence/Workforce-intelligence/documents/State-of-the-adult-social-care-sector/The-state-of-the-adult-social-care-sector-and-workforce-2018.pdf)
To prepare for Labour’s National Care Service, we need to drastically reshape the social care workforce, attracting more recruits with the right values and ensuring that they have opportunities for training and development.
Labour will begin the process of professionalising the social care workforce. We will invest £350 million over the course of the Parliament in training, development and measures to begin to professionally register an enlarged social care workforce.
This will begin by the professional registration of Registered Managers of care services, who already play an important role in leading the culture of care provider organisations.

Supporting Carers

6.5 million people care for family or friends unpaid and their care is currently worth £132bn to the economy each year.Carers UK, Valuing Carers, 2015: https://www.carersuk.org/for-professionals/policy/policy-library/valuing-carers-2015
But carers are under pressure as never before because of the damage done to social care. Carers suffer from significant mental and physical health problems. In a survey by Carers UK, over half of carers (57%) said they expect their mental health to get worse in the next two years and only 4% said they expect it to improve. https://www.carersuk.org/for-professionals/policy/policy-library/house-of-lords-economic-affairs-committee-inquiry-2018
Labour believes that those who provide unpaid care for their relatives and friends, day-in day-out, should be given more support. That is why Labour will up-rate the Carers’ Allowance in line with job seeker’s allowance and ensure that the earnings threshold for Carer’s Allowance rises year on year, in line with the National Living Wage.