Local Government Association

The Supported Housing Network brings together councils and partners to share learning, shape policy, and respond to the evolving challenges facing the supported housing sector.

The insights and learning contributed not only shaped the outcomes achieved but is informing future efforts to drive improvement across the sector. The collaboration and dedication of colleagues to making a difference is appreciated and has left a lasting impact.

In 2022/23, 543,000 older people and 293,000 working-age adults received publicly funded long-term social care in England. An additional 225,000 episodes of care were provided on a short-term basis. On an average day in the NHS in 2023, 275,000 people attended an outpatient appointment, and 44,000 would attend a major A&E department. This care is made possible by the hard work of 1.2 million social care staff and 1.3 million NHS staff (The King's Fund, 2024).

We have learnt that while individual, short term support initiatives can be highly valuable to health and social care systems, lasting improvement depends on systems that learn, adapt and grow over time. The following joint partner proposals focus on embedding improvement into daily practice, ensuring that better outcomes are achieved continuously.

This section shares key insights and learning gained from the delivery of the Support Programme. It reflects on what worked well, the conditions that enabled progress and the challenges encountered and resolved. The aim is to support continuous improvement by informing future practice both within participating systems and more broadly across the sector.

This section will outline a model of ‘systems thinking’ which we are recommending is adapted for use as part of delivering support and embedding improvements in health and social care systems, and complements the findings presented in the following section.

The Better Care Fund Support Programme 2023-25 developed an efficient, transparent and cost-effective method of delivering, quality assuring and evaluating improvement support, and introducing expert input judiciously.