Health and Social Care

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Thursday 12th October 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord O'Shaughnessy]

I join the noble Baroness in paying tribute to voluntary sector providers and volunteers, whether family members or others, who support care throughout the NHS and social care. There need to be more paid staff to meet the needs of our growing and ageing population, which is why the Secretary of State announced a 25% increase in the number of training places and more nursing associates. That is being put in place to make sure that the system, which is described in the report as stretched, has the capacity it needs to meet patients’ needs.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords—

[Lord Davies of Stamford (Lab)]

I shall give the Minister another chance. He did not even begin to answer the question from my noble friend Lord Hunt. Why did the Government drop Dilnot?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Brinton]

My Lords, the CQC report has shown that over the past two years there has been a reduction in beds in nursing and care homes, while the Lancet published the results of a research project in the summer showing that we will need an extra 9,000 beds per annum by 2025—that is more than 70,000 beds. What are the Government proposing to do to make it easier for more homes to be set up and run and to fund the beds we clearly need urgently, not just in 2025 but from now on?

[Lord O'Shaughnessy]

The noble Baroness will know that there has been a small reduction in the total number of residential nursing home beds, although it is a fairly flat picture over a long period of time. We have also seen an increase in the amount of domiciliary care. One of the things we need to get to the bottom of, and this is what the consultation will look at, is the imbalances that exist between the funding regimes for residential and domiciliary care. We have to get to the bottom of it, because it creates an imbalance on the provider side as well, so that we can have proper funding for the kind of care that people need regardless of whether it is in a residential nursing setting or at home.