"It is great news that delayed transfers of care attributable to social care have continued to decrease, and testament to the huge ongoing efforts by councils to get people out of hospital and back into the community, close to their loved ones."
Responding to the latest delayed transfers of care figures, which shows that delays attributable to social care have continued to fall, Cllr Izzi Seccombe, Chairman of the Local Government Association’s Community Wellbeing Board, said:
“It is great news that delayed transfers of care attributable to social care have continued to decrease, and testament to the huge ongoing efforts by councils to get people out of hospital and back into the community, close to their loved ones.
“Councils have reduced the number of delayed days since July, when their targets were set by government, by 12 per cent. This compares to the NHS reducing delays by 4 per cent.
“But councils aren’t complacent and we know more needs to be done in close collaboration with NHS partners locally to ensure everyone gets the care they need in their own home wherever possible.
“It is vital that government and NHS England work with councils to make sure we all make the best use of our scarce resources.
“Social care needs long-term sustainable funding, and it was hugely disappointing that the Chancellor found money for the NHS but nothing for adult social care in the Autumn Budget. Spending plans for the new NHS funding should be agreed with local government to ensure its most effective use locally.
“We estimate adult social care faces an annual funding gap of £2.3 billion by 2020 and the Government needs to address this in the upcoming Local Government Finance Settlement.
“As we enter a challenging winter period, which has already seen care staff in the last week perform an admirable job battling against snow and torrid weather conditions to support older and disabled people, an immediate injection of genuinely new money is absolutely vital.”
Notes to editors
Latest delayed transfers of care figures for October published by NHS England