The pressures on the funding of Social Care in the year are stated bluntly in the latest annual Budget Survey from The Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) – published at the end of June.
Please read this this press release from ADASS which summarises the result of the survey.
The depressing fact is that “… less than 7 per cent of Directors feel at all optimistic about the future financial state of the local health and care economy in their own area”. It is not surprising Directors are “finding it increasingly hard to implement planned cuts in practice”.
Last minute changes to Better Care Fund guidance, announced this week by minister Jeremy Hunt, saw the Department of Health insert a threat to review funding allocations for councils that fail to meet targets to cut delayed discharges. ADASS reacted angrily, accusing the government of imposing “completely unacceptable” conditions on councils getting a share of £2bn of extra social care funding and saying that the new conditions damaged the ability of councils to plan for the future. This development is described in detail in an article in Community Care online entitled “Government changes to care funding guidance ‘unacceptable’”.
There are sure to be further developments around social care funding in the coming months, and Rescare will keep you updated…