ADASS Autumn Survey published
The ADASS Autumn Survey report on Adult Social Care Budgets and Waiting Times has also recently been published, highlighting the tough decisions required of social care leaders and the struggles faced by people needing care and support.
It shows at least a third of adult social care leaders in England need to find another £83.7 million of cuts, on top of the £806 million in savings directors across England committed to make in their budgets this year.
The true cost of social care for local councils is likely to be even higher, because the cost of providing care to all of those people who need it is not included in the current projections. At present there are nearly a quarter of a million people waiting for their care needs to be assessed and a significant number of them are likely to be entitled to some form of council funded social care, whether short-term support or long-term care.
The survey also reveals an 8% increase to waiting lists with 470,000 older and disabled people waiting for care to start, direct payments or their care needs assessed. While this is down 20,000 since last autumn, it is still unacceptably high and reflects the continuing challenges around recruitment and retention of care staff.
All council services are under pressure to find savings as costs and demand pressures continue to rise – analysis from the Local Government Association (LGA) found that councils in England face a funding gap of £4 billion over the next two years, which is a £1 billion increase since their initial analysis in July. It also shows that by 2024/25 cost and demand pressures will have added £15 billion (almost 29 per cent) to the cost of delivering council services since 2021/22.
Clearly, the numbers don’t add up to a bright future unless things change.
Also relating to this topic, Beverley Tarka, president of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS), has suggested that the sector is not perceived as a core public service because it is too fragmented.
Her solution is for commissioners, providers and service users to pool their efforts and campaign together for the funding and wholesale change required.
Speaking at the National Children and Adult Services Conference (NCASC) last week, she said:
“Maybe part of the reason why social care hasn’t secured either that funding or that change for the past 25 years – and is still not seen by policymakers as a core public service – is that we have been too fragmented.”