Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he has made an assessment of trends in the level of change in demand for at home social care since 2019.

The number of local authority-funded social care users in community care settings has risen by approximately 5% between 2019/20 and 2023/24, according to a 2024 National Health Service publication produced in conjunction with the Department. However, this publication only includes those care users who are funded by their local authority, and does not include those who may fund their own care.

The Department utilises projections of the future demand for care, including community care, published by the Care Policy and Evaluation Centre at the London School of Economics. These projections inform decisions about funding requirements made at fiscal events such as the Local Government Finance Settlement and the Spending Review.