The overwhelming majority of MPs and peers agree that additional funding should go to councils’ adult social care budgets to tackle the funding crisis facing services caring for older and disabled people, a new poll published today shows.
The survey carried out by ComRes and commissioned by the Local Government Association shows that the overwhelming majority of MPs (84 per cent) and peers (76 per cent) agree that funding for adult social care should increase.
Following the delay to the Government’s adult social care green paper, the LGA has launched its own nationwide consultation to kick-start a desperately-needed debate on how to pay for adult social care and rescue the services caring for older and disabled people from collapse.
Social care and support is about helping people to live the lives they want to lead. It binds our communities, supports our NHS and makes an essential contribution to our national economy. However, years of significant underfunding of councils, coupled with rising demand and costs for care and support, have combined to push adult social care services to breaking point.
The LGA estimates that adult social care services face a £3.5 billion funding gap by 2025, just to maintain existing standards of care, while latest figures show that councils in England receive 1.8 million new requests for adult social care a year – the equivalent of nearly 5,000 a day.
Increased spend on adult social care – which now accounts for nearly 40 per cent of total council budgets - is threatening the future of other vital council services, such as parks, leisure centres and libraries, which help to keep people well and from needing care and support and hospital treatment.
The new poll information shows that there is far reaching cross-party support for additional funding for adult social care and the LGA is urging the Government to act now before it is too late.
Cllr Izzi Seccombe, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board, said:
“Councils, care workers, health professionals and now even MPs and peers agree that social care funding to councils must be increased.
“Work to find a long-term funding solution for adult social care and support has been kicked into the long grass by successive governments for the past two decades and has brought these services to breaking point.
“The Government cannot duck this issue any longer. It must make genuinely new resources available urgently to plug the short-term funding gap of £3.5 billion as well as set out its plans to secure the longer-term future.
“The LGA’s green paper is the start of a nationwide public debate about the future of care for all adults, and how best to support their wellbeing, and we encourage as many people and organisations – including MPs and peers - to have their say on how we pay for it and the responsibilities of citizens, families and communities.
- The poll was commissioned by the LGA and was carried out by ComRes. ComRes is a member of the British Polling Council and abides by its rules. Full data tables are available.
- ComRes interviewed 150 MPs between 4th June and 11th July 2018 and 101 Peers between 11th June and 9th July. Fieldwork was completed using a combination of paper and online surveys.
- Data has been weighted by party and region to be representative of the House of Commons and by party to be representative House of Lords.
- Read LGA’s green paper 'The lives we want ot lead ' .
- The consultation will run until 26 September 2018. The LGA will respond to the findings in a further publication in the autumn, which will be used to influence the Government’s own expected green paper, forthcoming Autumn Budget for 2019/20 and Spending Review.
- Recent surveys by the LGA show that 96 per cent of councils and lead members believe there is a major funding problem with adult social care; 89 per cent said taxation must be part of the long-term solution to funding it, and that 87 per cent of the public support more funding to plug the significant funding gap in the sector.
'The lives we want to lead'
The LGA green paper for adult social care and wellbeing
Adult social care and support matters. High quality social care and support helps people live the life they want to live. It helps bind our communities, it sustains our NHS and it provides essential economic value to our country.