Budget are being cut across the board.
We have just seen the full Isle of Wight council cut proposals which have just been outlined in preparation of the December Cabinet Meeting.
Here’s what they say about Adult Social Care …
The Coalition Government has just published “Think Local, Act Personal” which is the next stage of the agenda to transform adult social care.
The new policy broadly reflects the direction of travel previously launched by the previous government but places an increased focus on local authorities working in a more integrated way with the NHS and other partners; councils working with individuals and communities to promote their own capacity to support and care and thereby reduce or defer the need for health and adult social care services, and finally, a continued drive to put customers in the driving seat of determining how they are supported through the use of personal budgets.
The savings identified in this paper reflect that agenda and in particular start to recognise that as customers become more aware of what the actual costs of delivery of services are, they will be less likely to choose in-house services unless these can significantly reduce their unit costs.
In addition, the Coalition Government has announced that from April 2011, hospitals will take responsibility for patients’ care for the first 30 days following discharge.
The exact meaning and consequences of this remain to be clarified but at this stage we are assuming that a hospital care management service will only be provided if funded by the NHS and that care costs for at least a proportion of people following discharge will also fall to the NHS.
In line with the principles identified in paragraph 9 it is proposed that the Council ceases direct provision of adult social care services during the course of 2011, looks to identify appropriate partners for the delivery of the more specialist care services and reduces care management costs (with a saving of £405,000 in 2011/12 and £1.631m in 2012/13).
There will be an opportunity for public consultation during 2011 on the detail of these proposals.
Subject to the outcome of the current consultations on the application of the threshold on the eligibility criteria and the introduction of a charging policy, £2.7m in 2011/12 and £3.6m in a full year (2012/13) may be saved from these areas.
