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?

Wait until the energy bills go up in October - which will hit care homes! I doubt very much they will be able absorb these costs? They are going to have to recoup these costs, through fee increases to local authorities and CCGs, who can’t afford increases on this scale?

If you carry on reading , you'll find that there can be exceptions in some cases. In my case there was no one available to provide the lever of care needed and the only alternative was her stationing in hospital and bed blocking

Who decides who is worthy of keeping alive and who should be sentenced to death?

At what age should we euthanize? Should we just have a cut off point of 80 years old, ? What happens if the elderly person wants to live, do we just cart them off anyway?

I was paid via direct payments for my mil who lived with us under the exceptional circumstances rule. Neither us or them could find anyone else to do the care.
It took a lot of negotiating and I took it right to the top of social services in our area, but it was approved

The person concerned? My DH would opt for euthanasia any day rather than being incapable of even going to the loo alone if I die before him. We’re of an age where we have discussed death, he came very close to it years ago and we had a conversation about it then.

If people make a decision when they are of sound mind, similar to a DNR, then why not? We do it for beloved pets to stop them suffering.

Rich people need to pay more tax. Whether that is via income tax, CGT or inheritance tax.
The problem is that the tories aren't going to put taxes up for the rich on ideological grounds. Also it would affect them and their mates.
(NB I am a well off higher rate tax payer and would happily pay more. I think the low rates of tax for the rich is a scandal.)

Community care companies receive £23ph per person. But only pay their staff around £9.50p/h (low wages)
so a person receiving say 8 hours of care per day would be 8x7= 56 hours x £23 = £1288 per week or £66,976 per annum.
the median salary in this country is below £66k therefore don’t even earn enough never mind pay enough tax to cover this one individuals care. But there is so much more than 1 person requiring care, so raising tax still won’t make a dent in this cost. And it won’t get any better as more people will require care. They pay £9.50 to staff but expect a £23 per hour service, therefore their will always be a high turnover of staff.
The only solution would be for working people to be earning at least £100k per annum but that’s never going to happen so the problem will only get worse. I think things need to go back to the way they were before, when families looked after their own. And care only given to those who have no family. Not ideal but the money isn’t there.

This

Euthanasia or more tax. Personally, I'd prefer the latter. Those are the only 2 possible answers. Family care isn't possible as it takes earners out of the economy.

All of this.

A young relative has recently gone to a residential care home. The cost per week is absolutely eye watering, nearly £5k per week due to very high support needs. The package is bespoke. Talking to his mum she said that if they paid her even half of that she could make the necessary adjustments to the house, give up work or employ care workers herself and keep him at home. However she does need to work and carers allowance just isn’t enough for her to care for him herself.

I’ve just posted much the same. My nephews fees are around £5k per week in residential care. His mum could do it for less than half of that, make the house bigger, employ carers herself or give up work. M

"Talking to his mum she said that if they paid her even half of that she could make the necessary adjustments to the house, give up work or employ care workers herself and keep him at home."

It can be difficult to find carers who will work in a family home setting for people with very high support needs. Also although it is personal choice, a younger adult remaining at home until the parents are no longer able to cope is not always the best thing for the young adult.

All of the above suggestions can only be funded by tax increases. How its distributed is another thing.

The solution in times past was for women to offer unpaid care for their own relatives at home. Now women don’t want to do that any more, they want to work instead - which is fair enough but then leaves the state with the burden of care. That includes childcare as well as care for the elderly and disabled.

The only solution is for taxes to go up. Families have doubled their income because women are working - a chunk of that will have to be funnelled back into paying for the care that women are no longer doing. Probably a much larger chunk than people want to sacrifice! Another solution would be to make it financially viable for women to stay at home and offer care again. I would have been more than happy to look after my Gran for half the money the government was paying for her to be in a home.

More funding is essential, probably through taxation.

But there is no point just pumping more and money into a broken system. There is so much inefficiency in social care, extortionate amounts paid to private providers and money paid for the wrong provision because the right provision isn’t available.

The infrastructure needs to be rebuilt within Councils so that the money is used effectively.

After a year of dealing with Adult Services I offered to do some free consultancy work for them around efficiency planning and process analysis on the basis of the utter shitshow I had witnessed but they declined my kind offer!

Also whilst a family member might care for someone on their own,if employing care workers two people will be needed to do the same role.
I look after my son on my own when my partner is working but if we had carers he would need 2 or 3:1 support all the time. Having carers support at home isn't cheap.

We need to look at where the money is going, as well as where it's coming from.

Stop allowing private companies to provide the least they're allowed to get away with, pay staff the legal minimum, train them to the legal minimum and treat them badly (while they wring their hands about not being able to recruit or retain staff 🙄) while making profits, while society decries bad care. There's no legal minimum staffing ratio's - the care provider decides that and when another carer or two eats into profit, and they're not made to provide it, then they're going to take the cheapest option.

Care staff are subsidising social care, providing their own equipment to enable them to do the job, free overtime to get paperwork done, pay for their own training, paying for a proportion of fuel/travel expenses between calls for domiciliary care, working through breaks - all this serves to add to profit of those companies, and they're getting paid the minimum you're legally allowed to pay someone (and sometimes less with unpaid overtime and training). They're also viewed as not being able to do better and uninspired because they don't have a better job, suggesting teenagers, the unemployed etc do the job for free shows the level that this job is regarded - yet everyone wants their family members cared for with dignity, compassion and understanding. The two don't match.

That's in addition to the fact that funding is not adequate, but what is being provided isn't going to the right places.

But people would rather suggest teenagers providing care for free or euthanasia than look at the actual issues within the sector.

I agree that euthanasia has a place to be discussed because we seem to keep people alive for the sake of keeping them alive in some cases, disregarding suffering, but that should be the motivation for the discussion, not money.

Stop treating the people doing the job like they're a necessary evil and start treating them with a bit of respect and dignity. And stop treating the service users like a cash cow there to turn a profit.

That'd be a start. Won't happen though because business is everything.

Personally, I'd remove funding for elderly care (with a few exceptions i.e., those who have always required care) and redirect it towards other social care.

The generation that are reaching the point of needing old age care are the same generation who have allowed the system to deteriorate to this point, have allowed a small percent to hoard ridiculous wealth, and have been very, very clear about the need for personal responsibility when it comes to life over the past few decades.

When younger generations have expressed worry or concern over their future, their job security, the cost of raising a family, or their ability to buy a home they have been repeatedly told to just get on with it, get a second job, work harder, or to stop buying avocado and coffee. Well that logic surely has to apply to them too when it comes to their old age care.

If they reach the point of needing care then they should personally have the funds and provisions to provide it. If they can't afford it, there's nothing available in their area, or it's not to their desired standard, then they'll just have to get back to work, move, or stop buying the daily mail and steak. If they can't do any of that then in true boomer fashion we can say "Well it's not our problem, you figure it out".

Apparently more than half the total costs of adult social care is for those over 65+ so the above plan should free up a chunk of cash to help others in need.

Mandatory social care insurance we all pay into during our working lives. Stop over medicalising very old people, everyone to have a health will. I am very clear that I don’t want eg antibiotics if I have severe dementia. Plenty of people are, some are not.
Anyone with assets including homes to be sold for care. Yes it is tough but I don’t see why the state should pay for those who have the means. Also don’t see why old people should live in huge houses etc - plenty among my parents generation - basically all their friends.
Many more elderly villages like in some countries with modern homes and help on site - so people can live and age gracefully.

As regards care for those with severe disabilities, all you can do is better antenatal tests and better maternity care/delivery . Best possible help in early years and education etc

As regards drug addicts and those with severe mental health issues having children- I don’t have an answer.

Remove care for older people who can't afford it? That's a disgusting comment.

By your reckoning, then how about we just stop paying into anything we don't want to. For example the NHS, the benefits system, education, child benefit / housing benefit /people who were furloughed can pay back those debts themselves, anyone that comes to the country who needs housing / education / health care. The list is endless. Right. Give it all up and we all just pay our own way. Or sink of we can't... No?

I really hope you are trolling thebestwaytoscareatory, I am not a Tory but you are scaring me with your odious views. A universal social care system funded by a tax on everyone’s estate pooling risk is what I would choose as I said earlier on.

bestwaytoscare is crazy. people like my IL's who have voted labour all their lives dont have the cash to pay for care. And my MIL can hardly get out the door so how is she going to work? Whilst husband and I are tory voters and fully expect to pay for our care, as well as poorer people's (through the tax system). Having a mortgage with a 15% interest rate was no fun - starting off in life is always hard.

A universal social care system funded by a tax on everyone’s estate pooling risk is what I would choose as I said earlier on.
I think you would find that a lot of people would develop a “I’m paying for it so I’m using it” attitude, and would suddenly need someone to come out and do their cleaning and laundry etc because they can’t manage. Care needs would skyrocket and so would the cost of providing care.

Then people would start quietly disposing of their estate to avoid the tax - so the rich wouldn’t pay it, the poor wouldn’t have any estate so also wouldn’t pay it, and yet again it would fall on the shoulders of the squeezed middle classes.

My nephew does too. She already has an agency that do it already a few times per week. It would cost a lot but not £5k per week. It might be putting off the inevitable but she’s happy to do it for a few more years but can’t afford to.