Social Care

Debate between Yasmin Qureshi and Barbara Keeley

Wednesday 25th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Barbara Keeley]

It tends to be outstanding in the independent sector. Charities in particular can be outstanding, although they are not always so.

The care sector’s funding crisis also has an impact on the growing number of people who need care but are given none at all. More than 1.2 million people are now living with unmet care needs, many of them isolated and lonely, and that number rises to 1.5 million with the addition of people who need assistance with taking medication. Unmet needs can lead to people being forced to wear incontinence pads overnight because there is no one to help them to get to the toilet, which takes away their dignity. The number of older people living with unmet care needs will inevitably rise without an injection of new funding, because of the growing demand for care in our ageing population.

It is clear that the social care system needs sustainable funding from central Government, but the Government’s response to the crisis so far has been to push the funding problem on to hard-pressed councils and council tax payers through the social care levy. The only increase in Government funding has been the paltry £150 million extra for social care in the local government finance settlement. That is nowhere near enough to avert the crisis that the Government have created in social care. Moreover, it was not the new money that councils desperately needed. The Government admitted that the increase would be funded through an expected underspend in existing departmental budgets.

It is clear that local authorities are now facing some of their greatest challenges just to make ends meet. I want to highlight the heroic efforts of Labour councils to protect adult social care in the face of swingeing budget cuts from the Government.

[Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend has referred to Labour councils. In each of the last two years, my local authority, Bolton Council, has had to increase its council tax rates by 3% and 2% respectively in order to fund social care, and it will have to increase them next year as well. It has had a shortfall of £6 million, and has been able to cover it only by increasing council tax, which is really not acceptable.

[Barbara Keeley]

Indeed. As I have said, the Government have pushed the problem on to councils, which have been forced to use their reserves, and pushed the council on to council tax payers, who have had to pay the levy.

I was talking about the heroic efforts of some councils. Despite budget cuts, which are now running at between 40% and 50%, my local authority, Salford City Council, and neighbouring Manchester City Council have acted to ensure that care providers with which they contract will pay care staff a real living wage, and I know that Labour councils in Lambeth, Southwark and many other London boroughs have committed themselves to paying their care staff the London living wage.