Agincare at the UKHCA Conference

Attendees at the UK Home Care Association conference at the Birmingham NEC on Wednesday 26th October were keen to hear direct from the Dept. of Health about progress towards some clarity regarding the funding of care and to share views on all sorts of sector issues and concerns. Here are the personal notes/thoughts of Agincare Live-in Care’s MD...

Mike Padgham (Chair UKHCA) mentioned Agincare (one of just 3 providers he mentioned) in his opening welcome. I had to wave. He went on to summarise the key aspects of the Dilnott and law commission reports (elsewhere on this site if you’d like to read them) and gave advice to Home Care providers as to how best deal with the implications of the current funding issues and drive by Council’s to save money. He recommended moving away from Council contracts (unless Companies could afford the lower margins), good credit/cost control, more exploration of 'supporting people' style work.

David Behan, Director General Social Care, Dept of Health
Complimented the UKHCA for its representation of the sector before explaining that dept Health were 'engaging with sector via UKHCA to get views.

A White Paper and update on funding progress regarding Care and support is due Apr '12. There is no timescale as yet for progressing to legislation and as the next CSR (Government’s Comprehensive Spending Review) isn’t due until 2014 then the social care budget allocation won't change before then. Therefore the recommendations of Dilnott are unlikely to feed through the system until after 2014.

David Behan went on to summarise the Dilnott commission paper eg the proposed cap on care fees that individuals would have to pay, raising of the means test amount/rules and the MORI survey that was conducted eg 4% of people would use social care in the next year whereas 96% will see their GP in next 12 months and that care is largely a 'distress purchase'; the average length of Care Home stays for people in receipt of public funding is 23months/£60k, about 10% spend more than £100k. (Interestingly the average stay for self funders is 4yrs, suggesting that when people have the financial choice they obtain care sooner)

David went on to say that he believes the personalisation agenda will continue to be a priority for government/s

Nothing new in this from the published reports, but interesting to hear it ‘from the horse’s mouth’

William Vineall, Dep Dir Social Care Policy, DH
William is especially interested in feedback on quality, personalisation, prevention, shaping local care service, integration.

-Ibsen survey by NAO (National Audit Office) has started to give some outcome evidence/statistics of Personal Budgets.

Peter Hay, President of Directors of Adult Social Services
I found this to be a fantastic and interesting presentation. Peter talked about how to achieve a more holistic (funding, governance etc) single, simple and personalised care system offering peace of mind through dignity and safety-worth downloading his presentation from the UKHCA website if you're interested.

In the Q+A he made a couple of memorable comments:
‘I wish Council's behaved as if adult social was at least half its budget' and
(re Southern Cross/Castlebeck) 'social care sometimes goes missing'

Amongst a lot of questions about funding and the role of local authorities I asked 'how could funding information be better collated and communicated to enable people/families to be partners in the funding of care (eg some areas of the country don't allow people to ‘top up’ their public funding which if they were allowed to and could afford to would help them have a wider choice of care available to them)

The panel agreed there were some potential quick wins here as it wouldn't require any new legislation to achieve this.

The Dep. Dir. Social Policy at DH (dept. Of Health) spoke to me over lunch about the question I raised and I invited him to visit Agincare to see it 'real life'.

Overall, although there was very little new information and it was disappointing to hear that the earliest any changes to funding arrangements was likely to be made was 2014, it is a complex area and Government did seem to be trying to listen to the wide range of views on the topic of how to ensure adequate care and support sustainably into the future. As many people have said, it is not that we can’t afford to do these things it is simply that we prioritise other things. The care sector, people who use care services and who will need care services in the future need to ensure Government hears what priority we put on it.

S Leskinen-Keel
MD Agincare Live in Care