'More and better' funding needed to fix broken social care system

The report – Time to act: a roadmap for reforming care and support in England – said the adult social care system in England was broken after years of being underfunded and stretched to breaking point. While there was a shared vision for what sort of care and support system was needed, there had been a lack of political or collective will over decades to make it happen.

‘In recent years we have seen small-scale injections of funding into social care, usually in the form of time-limited and use-restricted pots, such as the better care fund or winter pressures funding,’ the report said. But this had proved ineffective in delivering sustained long-term change.

Instead, the service needed more and better investment. This should not be seen as just a cost as the funding would help to keep people economically active and reduce geographical economic inequalities.

The investment was needed in the short- to medium-term. Initially funding was needed to improve pay and prevent further reductions in available support. But further investment was needed to create the capacity and capabilities for transformation and to develop community capacity.

Beyond the short-term, a step change would be needed in how much society invests in social care. Widening eligibility criteria and improving affordability would ‘require radically different levels of funding’, the report said.

Calling for a ‘resetting’ of the social care contract, the report said that long-term change would require an open dialogue about the ‘options for extending entitlement and changing the balance between individual, family, communities and the state both for providing and paying for care’.

Specifically the report called for a ‘substantial uplift’ in the next local government settlement. In the medium term, a new allocation formula would be needed to ensure local government had enough funding to match need in their areas, meeting cost of care rates for providers and covering a mandated pay uplift. In the medium to long-term, local government would need a multi-year settlement aligned to the funding commitments made to the NHS and integrated care boards.

The report identifies 10 broad areas for action, again broken down into those that need to taken in the short, medium (two to five years) and long term (six to 10 years). These areas include getting more people to live at home or in a place they call home, harnessing the potential of digital technology and redesigning and rewarding the workforce.

2022/23 ADASS president, Sarah McClinton (pictured), who commissioned the report, said the adult care system was close to breaking point. ‘Millions of people are in pain or distress because they aren’t getting the care they need and family and friends picking up the pieces are being pushed to the edge.’

“We’ve been trying to patch-up social care for years, but we’ve run out of road,’ she said. ‘We need to act now to save social care.’

Report author Anna Dixon said: ‘The good news is this report shows that when it comes to care and support, we all want the same thing: a fair system that enables everyone to live in the place we call home, with the people and things that we love, in communities where we look out for one another, doing what matters to us.’