Government must take urgent action to reform adult social care

Responding to the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) report, Reforming adult social care in England, Saffron Cordery, deputy chief executive at NHS Providers said: 

"This report shines a much-needed light on the urgent need to reform adult social care, which has been severely under-resourced for years.

"Successive governments' failure to tackle deep-rooted challenges across the sector must be redressed. National action is needed to address the growing levels of unmet and under-met need, improve quality of care and fix the 150,000-plus workforce shortages.

"The prolonged absence of meaningful reform of adult social care is taking a huge toll on those who give and receive care, the economy and the wider health and care system. The NHS and social care are two sides of the same coin. As such, an NHS fit for the future needs a healthy social care sector alongside it.

"Ahead of a general election, this report must be a wake-up call for the government - and indeed all political parties - to commit to a fully funded long-term workforce plan and a clear strategy to implement the 10-year vision for social care, which was published three years ago.

"We need an ambitious vision to ensure the sector is sustainable both now and in the future."