To ask what we do to help with the cost of social care?

[AdultsSocialCare]

Adult and childrens social care takes up the majority of all council tax spend. This leaves a small amount for everything else that councils do.

What is the solution?

I feel like ultimately the central government need to give more money to councils but the chance of that has to be next to nil.

So, what else?

Onlyfools - i agree. And they should remove the loophole that allows people to pass on their estates so they dont have to pay this - currently i think its seven years before you pass. I know two people who have used this loophole recently

It could have a lot of benefits as an early intervention measure. Also perhaps it would help better people's attitudes towards older people. Of course it wouldn't solve the crisis in social care. At this point I am beginning to think it's unsolvable.

I keep hearing social care is on the verge of collapse. Its not. Its collapsed.

Also perhaps it would help better people's attitudes towards older people are you kidding? This country is in awe of the elderly, the idea they fought in the war- which at this point would be very old. Funding care of people that had every opportunity from free uni to cheap housing to good pensions to child benefit for all- whilst they keep their homes ! Yet early years funding is looked at as your kids your problem!

We need to start taxing house price gains. Many other countries do.

If this thread reaches 300 posts count how many times euthanasia comes up vs nationalising social care. Then come back to me.

Do those countries have stamp duty- I’ve often thought that what you propose makes more sense than stamp duty which should be scraped

Because how will those people pay for their care if they haven't got a house to sell to fund it 🤔

Don't forget adults with additional needs. They too are part of ASC

@PhoenixReincarnated

Yes them too.

And foster children and anyone else that falls within adult and children social care.

Would it be a mean suggestion for council run homes for foster children or is that backwards and inhumane?

A befriending service would go some way to helping, as would running errands such as getting basic provisions from the local shop. These are things teenagers could help out with. I would be happy for my teens to do this.

Using private domiciliary care providers where the focus is more on profit doesn't help. It would be good to move away from this to in house provision.

A lot of money does also gets wasted when care providers won't do 15 minute care calls, often the minimum they will do is 30 mins when only 15 minutes are needed. They used to do 15 minute calls, but that was a long time ago, in my experience anyway.

Making services less top heavy with management. Slimming this down would help save costs.

Volunteering to drive the community bus, getting older people out of their homes and socialising at lunch clubs, day centres and getting where they need to go. There's a shortage of volunteers where I am which means big expenditure on the council commissioning taxi transport.

Slimming back vastly overpaid and somewhat useless HR services in councils. A vast amount of money is poured into these areas with little meaningful return.

Getting back to the big community where neighbors are willing to do shopping and simple tasks for those who are struggling. It does happen sometimes. But really as a society we've moved far away from the idea of helping vulnerable neighbours out was standard practice. People don't want to do anything without payment. But really these simple acts of generosity towards eachother go a long way and help society as a whole. We started to see how people were happy to help each other out in the height of covid crises. But that has started to fade away now.

why should people who will never afford a house pay higher taxes? Indeed. High time people with houses or savings pay for their own healthcare. After all, most social care needs arise from a medical problem, so what’s the difference?

www.gov.uk/government/publications/build-back-better-our-plan-for-health-and-social-care/adult-social-care-charging-reform-further-details

The amount people have to pay for themselves is being capped.

Private CSC should not be in the business of making profit. Everything should come back under LA control. Both fostering and children's homes.

If everything coming back into council control / nationalisation would stop people making a profit from social care and allow the local government to control their own costs, why isn't this being done?

We could never have this. It eoykd eventually be offered up to the highest bidder and then we'll get the equivalent of the kids in prisons thing.

meredintof - interesting suggestion ref healthcare. Wouldnt that mean a lot of people having to use all their savings/house equity in their sixties though when they may live another 25 years? And having spent 40 years working their guts out want to enjoy life a little with some of their savings first.

I was thinking more in terms of why my son who lives in one room of a shared house with no hope of buying anywhere, should pay higher tax. so that someone can pass on their 5 bed house to someone rather than paying for care home fees.

Money. People are making money. The people making money have influence.

A lot of care services are own by private equity firms. These firms have very close links with politicians, they either fund them, bribe them, hire them or in some cases literally are them.

Yes. That ls the system Boris just announced and nobody batted an eyelid.

We need a cultural change with regards to our attitude to social care.

I work for Adult Social Services. Too many times I see cases where an elderly person has declined a care package because us "robbing bastards" want them to pay for it, arguing that they shouldn't have to because they've "paid the stamp" etc.

The truth is, that unless you are a higher rate tax payer your entire life it's unlikely that you've paid enough taxes etc to cover all of the services that you have benefited from. And before you argue that you personally have never used the NHS blah blah blah, try to remember that you've also benefited from our police and security forces keeping you safe, the council and highways agency keeping you moving, the council and other agencies keeping your environment clean, etc.

The result is that people carry on without care until their case becomes more complex, requiring greater intervention (more ££), which perhaps could have been avoided if they had taken the initial package.

We therefore need to rethink how we regard care. We put money aside for rainy days, for when our houses need repairs etc. We need to put money aside to pay for our care or we need to agree to pay more taxes. Whether those taxes come from individual workers or companies etc is another debate, but we can't expect to be able to have a good quality care system if we're not prepared to pay for it somehow.

That way, we can spend more money attracting good quality workers into the profession, instead of paying minimum wage for back breaking work and being shocked when people quit and recruitment is difficult. Training needs to improve so that there is the availablity of career progression if you want to attract more young people into the roles.

@AdultsSocialCare elders in care have paid a lifelong of taxes. Generally they only spend the last 18 months of their life in a facility. That care when delivered costs approximately the equivalent to their monthly pension. There is a healthy profit margin.
remember they are not paying heating for the entire facility alone all costs once divided is not really over the money they collect.

Agreed. Panorama showed big profits going to companies registered overseas whilst care homes being run on as few staff as possible on minimum wage.

"Would it be a mean suggestion for council run homes for foster children or is that backwards and inhumane?"

Children who do not live with foster carers will have specific needs. They are in privately run residential accommodation because the council doesn't have anything to meet their needs. It's the same reason why independent special schools exist frequently with attached care homes.

The councils aren't supposed to have anything to meet their needs. Their job is to foster a private market not directly support people.

And if that sounds like a terrible idea that will surely lead to disaster... yes. Yes it is.

I remember during school we would visit residents in care homes, they had some stories.

But like everyone even the government only have a certain amount of money in the pot to go round and IMO it doesn't always go to the right places.

Bordem got the better of me last week and I Googled how much is the government's expenditure it's a massive amount and rising year on year.
Unfortunately it'll be the working tax payer that'll have to suffer if more money needs to be found, and for some it'll only be a matter of time before they realise the'd probably be better off not working....
But that's another thread.

Care costs. If you need care then your savings account and house should be exempt up to a certain value. I think 100k but maybe more.
Then you fund with any assets you gave over that.
Much fairer than the tory proposal that you pay the first 100k and your family get whats left - so in north often nothing much as houses worth alot less. And better than the current situation where everything over 25k is used up.

Care for adults and children should be run by local authorities with no place for people to make any profit.

As should health

And schools for that matter!