Last September, the PM announced a brand-new health and social care tax to be levied across the UK. This manifesto-breaking tax, said Johnson, would raise £36 billion over three years, tackle the backlog in the NHS caused by COVID-19, and pay for reforms in social care.
Raising taxes at a time of soaring inflation when the cost-of-living crisis is squeezing household incomes to breaking point was a hugely controversial move and was fiercely resisted by many, especially by organisations such as ours which are at the sharp edge of the social care sector. But regardless of objections, at the start of this month the Health and Social Care Levy arrived with a 1.25 per cent increase in National Insurance payments.
Has the Government managed to solve the crisis in the health and social care sectors at a stroke? Sadly, we don’t think so, and by assuming everything has been fixed, we are just storing up greater problems in the future.
When it comes to adult social care, the Government has allocated less than £2 billion of new money per year for the next three years into health and social care reform. This is woefully inadequate. The Health Foundation estimates that in the next financial year, the sector will need an additional £3.7bn just to meet demand and improve access, while an additional £7.9bn will be needed to ensure everyone has the social care they so desperately need.
Worryingly, the Government is relying on outdated figures when it comes to allocating spending in this vital sector. Without an up-to-date understanding of how much needs investing into social care, the Government is flying blind. Effective and efficient policymaking will be impossible.
It all feels like an opportunity missed. To implement social care reforms, more social care workers are needed, but there is already a significant shortage. Many workers, though still passionate about their work, are facing no choice but to leave for unskilled roles in sectors such as retail which pay more competitively, because the lack of funding from the Government makes it extremely difficult for providers to raise wages.
At Revitalise, we have been able to respond by increasing pay this year but like most in the sector, we cannot continue doing so without the sector receiving far more funding. Social care must be placed on an equal footing with the NHS so that workers feel valued in the same way we value our doctors and nurses.
We also urgently need to know how NI revenue will be split between the NHS and social care. The current lack of clarity has given rise to fears that the NHS will receive the majority to offset the huge COVID backlog, whilst social care will be left under resourced and ignored.
This must not happen. Figures from the TUC show that annual adult social care spending in England is still £600 million lower than in 2010, with 112 of 150 local authorities spending less per head than a decade ago. If the sector is squeezed even further, we expect a huge rise in safeguarding issues, hospital admissions and vulnerable people being left to fend for themselves. Unless adult social care funding is given the priority and protection that it so desperately needs, we will be facing a far worse situation in the years to come.
