Ahead of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-budget announcement today (Friday) the Cabinet member for Adult Social Care and Public Health, Karl Love, shares his view on what’s happening within Adult Social Care (ASC) on the Isle of Wight.
It’s been well-reported that there’s been a crisis within the care sector for sometime. Cllr Karl Love questions whether the announcement of an extra £500m for ASC across the country, “is nothing more than a fantasy”.
Love: Becoming ever more difficult with broken and false promises
He told News OnTheWight,
“I remain confident that our staff will do their best to balance the books, but it’s becoming ever more difficult with broken and false promises from the Government.
“Our government’s additional £500m, announced yesterday, to be given out to Adult Social Care (ASC) is welcome, but will it be nothing more than a fantasy, as they promised in previous years?”
Love: One year on and we have received not one penny of that promised funding
Cllr Love went on to add,
“The fact remains, our government promised to reform and fix Adult Social Care. In September 2021 they said that they would substantially increase funding for health and social care through a new tax, the Health and Social Care Levy.
“Here we are in September 2022, one year on and we in ASC on our Island have received not one penny of that promised funding. Our government is full of empty, fanciful promises and outright lies.”
Love: Indebted to paid and unpaid carers
The Cabinet member goes on to explain that the council is battling to keep its ASC services moving, whilst supporting the NHS Trust.
He says,
“The truth is we’re running services on empty cash fuel tanks and our staff who have worked so hard are exhausted. I’m so grateful for their commitment both as paid workers, but also to the overwhelming majority of carers who are unpaid or volunteers.
“We would not of been able to cope in the last year and during Covid without their help and support which I and our Island people are indebted to.”
Love: Still waiting to receive so much is a penny from this government promise
Cllr Love goes on to explain that in September 2021 the Government stated £5.4 billion of revenue would be used to support ASC reforms in England over the following three years (2022 to 2025). He added that it was claimed £3.6 billion was to be used to fund reforms to how people pay for social care, and £1.7 billion would be used to support the wider reform in the sector.
Details of the plans for wider reform were set out in a white paper published in December 2021. Cllr Love claims that this trickle down system from Government has resulted in “zero additional funding to our Island ASC system so far”.
“We are still waiting to receive so much is a penny from this government promise and we have reached breaking point.”
ASC budget being cut by £1.7m
He goes on to explain that the council are already preparing to cut the ASC budget by an additional £1.7 million due to lack of funds from the Government.
He said,
“With increasing costs across-the-board we’re anticipating that we could actually end up with an ASC debt from this year’s slippage and cost of living crisis alone, creating a shortfall running into millions.
“We do not have capacity to raise funds to cover these costs and I suspect that the Government will state that we are to increase council tax next year to cover the shortfall! That is impossible with a small working population who are already facing a cost of living crisis.”
Love: We cannot do the impossible
Cllr Love says he’s at his “wit’s end trying to balance the books” but goes on to praise the council staff who “have done an amazing job”.
He added that “we are trying hard to keep things going, but we cannot do the impossible”.
Discharge delays
One of the issues that has arisen in recent months is the delays in patients being discharged from hospital back home or into residential care.
Cllr Love explains the problem,
“We do not have the staff to implement the issues of hospital discharge to home care. It’s not just about staff, we must provide training and ongoing support to our care home providers who do not have sufficient beds available.
“We are still waiting for our Island’s NHS Trust to sort out its response to its dementia support and mental health services, having closed its dementia ward some time ago.
“We do not have the right kind of care provision in the right place and this means people will have to be placed on the mainland, as we don’t have the specialist care provision here on the Island.”
Love: Gov set up GPs to fail
On Thursday, Therese Coffey, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, announced that citizens should not have to wait longer than two weeks for a GP appointment.
Cllr Love responded,
“The Government has also suggested that doctors will have to see people within two weeks after making a self referral.
“It’s a wonderful aspiration by Government, but we simply don’t have enough doctors or care staff across the UK (and Island) to deliver this target. All our Government has done, by introducing this target, is set our NHS Doctors and primary care workforce up to fail.
“We are already stretched to the limit and anyone who believes the doctors and our NHS staff don’t want to see people in a timely way is just kidding themselves. You cannot squeeze more people into the system when there are few people who actually qualified unable to deliver the system.”
Love: Incompetence, dithering and broken promises
Cllr Love finished by saying,
“I want the Government to fix ASC as they have promised, but they have not. All they create is more questions than answers and it’s becoming a critical problem.
“If the funding had been allocated at the time when it was announced, we might be a much better position than we are now. The issues which we are now faced with are a direct result of incompetence, dithering and broken promises.
“I can assure you that we will do our best to work with what we’ve got and we truly value our care workers paid and unpaid and only wish that we could do more to support them.
“What I do say to you thank you for all that you do and for continuing to work for your community in very testing times.”
Image: Shane Rounce under CC BY 2.0
