Category: Community Care- Adults
Social care’s “increasingly unsustainable reliance” on agency staff needs urgent government intervention, a provider body has warned. Research by Care England found almost eight in 10 providers (78%) were using more, or significantly more, agency staff in May and June this year than they had been in April 2021, found the survey, answered by 95 care home, […]
A social care staffing ‘crisis’ is putting patient safety at risk and undermining NHS efforts to clear backlogs and relieve record A&E pressures. That was the verdict from health leaders in response to a survey by umbrella body the NHS Confederation, which said the government needed to make bolstering social care its “top priority”, including through […]
The government has selected a sixth authority to trial its social care funding reforms, including the cap on care costs, before their full implementation next year. Oxfordshire council will join Blackpool, Cheshire East, the London Borough of Newham North Yorkshire and Wolverhampton as trailblazers for the reforms. The changes, under the Care Act 2014, involve […]
Updated 25 July 2022 The number of job vacancies in adult social care in England rose by 52% last year, while the number of filled posts dropped for the first time since records began, official figures show. There were 165,000 vacant posts as of March 2022, up 55,000 on the year before, and representing just […]
Story updated 22 July 2022 Most directors of adult social services lack confidence they will meet their legal duties this year because of inadequate funds, a survey has found. Just 12% said they were fully confident their budgets would be sufficient to meet their duties under the Care Act 2014 and other frameworks, such as […]
Council and NHS limits on how much people can pay personal assistants are leading to “severe shortages” of PAs that are undermining personalisation and quality of care. That was the warning from a survey of almost 1,000 people supported by PAs carried out by the Local Government Association (LGA) and Think Local Act Personal (TLAP), […]
The government has delayed giving all self-funders the right to take advantage of, typically lower, council care home rates, following concerns authorities would lack the workforce to implement the change. Minister for care and mental health Gillian Keegan announced today that the government had dropped its initial plan to extend the right to have your council […]
Story updated 7 July 2022 Boris Johnson’s resignation has raised questions over the delivery of key social care policies. The slew of government resignations since Tuesday (5 July) has left the children’s minister post vacant and new ministerial leadership for both children’s and adult social care. Before Johnson decided to stand down as Tory leader […]
Aside from the war in Ukraine, no subject has dominated the news in 2022 more than the cost of living crisis. Soaring costs for energy, fuel and food – driven in part by the war, as well as other factors such as supply-chain issues – are forcing households across the UK to cut back on spending. […]
Carers are more stressed, less able to take breaks and less supported by paid services, a survey of over 40,000 has found. They are also also less involved in their loved-ones’ care, less satisfied with the services they receive and less socially connected, found NHS Digital’s 2021-22 study into the lives of unpaid carers, a […]