Thursday, November 10th, 2011

Taking care over reform

Minister for care services Paul Burstow wants people to have greater choice and greater control over the care they receive. He calls for input from service users and providers to help government decide the priorities for reform

During my time as an MP, and more recently as minister for care services, I have heard a number of things from those who receive care. Whether in residential care or at home, the vast majority of people feel they have fantastic care and support from dedicated staff. However, I also hear how people feel that the current system doesn't always meet their preferences about the care they want to receive.

This is one of the main reasons why I am committed to reforming adult social care – to give people more control over the care they receive. The coalition government has already made steps in this direction. The Open Public Services White Paper demonstrated our commitment to devolve power from government and institutions to communities and individuals. In addition, last year's Vision for Adult Social Care set out our principles for a modern system of care and support, personalised care, high quality providers, increased choice, active and strong communities, a skilled workforce and protection against poor standards and abuse.

Services are already changing to reflect these principles. I am heartened when I see examples of services being redesigned in partnership with the people who use them and their carers, improving the results for individuals as well as making every pound spent deliver more. But while some local authorities are leading the way on transformation, others lack the vision or leadership to change and move instead to crude salami slicing of budgets. We need local authorities to learn lessons from the best of their peers.

Our approach to social care reform also needs to respond to wider change – within 20 years the number of over-85s will double. We must celebrate the fact that people are living longer, but this demographic change means that as a society we will need to spend more on care and support. As a country we expect better standards of care, but we often fail to think about how we might meet the costs of care in later life. Polls suggest that nearly eight out of 10 of us assume that social care will be provided free at the point of need – that has never been true.

When this government came into power, it acted quickly to establish an independent Commission on Funding and Support, chaired by Andrew Dilnot, to make recommendations on how to achieve an affordable and sustainable funding system for care and support for all adults in England. Dilnot delivered his report in July.

Earlier this year the Law Commission also made recommendations to update and simplify the laws relating to social care. Their report aims to make sense of the current confused tangle of legislation to deliver a social care statute that will allow individuals, carers, families and local authorities to understand more clearly when care and support will be provided.

Both reports contain important and valuable proposals to help us decide our approach to reforming the care system for service users and the hard-working staff who work within it.

In addition, we know there are real economic and social benefits that could flow from reforming care and support. We want to make sure our reforms make the most of those opportunities – be that to support people who use care to be more active members of their community, or to help carers to balance their caring responsibilities with paid employment, should they wish.

Reform of adult social care is not straightforward – difficult choices will have to be made. That is why we have launched Caring for our Future to help inform government as it decides its priorities for reform that we will set out in our white paper.

We want to hear people's views on what the priorities are for the six key areas where we believe there is the biggest potential to make improvements in the system:

• Improving the quality of care and support – and supporting the care workforce to do this
• Maximise personalisation – and giving people choice and control over their care
• Having a vibrant care market that is responsive to different people's needs
• Supporting more effective prevention and early intervention
• Improving integration between the NHS and other care services (in partnership with the NHS Future Forum)
• Considering the role of financial services in supporting care users.

We also want to hear what people think about the recommendations which the Commission on Funding of Care and Support made in its report, Fairer Care Funding. You can have your say at events, or via our website caringforourfuture.dh.gov.uk.

Early in 2012 we will publish a white paper that will set out how we plan to reform adult social care, accompanied by a progress report on funding reform. We have a real opportunity to make the system better for those who need it, and to help those who work within it to bring about long-lasting and sustainable change.

From the website PublicServices.co.uk. To view please follow this link: http://www.publicservice.co.uk/feature_story.asp?id=18081

Topics: General, Health, Care