Government face demands from Labour and Tory MPs for extra social care cash

Ministers came under pressure to increase social care funding, as both Tory and Labour MPs demanded a cash boost.

Conservative former cabinet minister Sir John Redwood said it is “obvious” the Government has to find more cash for future budgets, with backbench colleague Maria Caulfield (Lewes) suggesting a “social care premium” system should be considered.

For Labour, shadow communities secretary Andrew Gwynne warned councils are facing a “cliff edge” and that unless there is a fundamental change of approach towards social care services “we are not going to be able to solve the crisis in local government”.

Their remarks came in a Labour-led debate in which the Opposition tabled a motion calling for the Government to ensure local authorities and social care are “properly and sustainably” funded.

Speaking in the Commons, Tory Sir John said: “I think it’s obvious this Government has to find more money for social care for future year budgets and it needs to go to my area and some areas represented opposite, and it needs to be done fairly.”

But he asked Labour to explain how much it thinks families and individuals should contribute, noting: “In social care one of the big issues is how much of the family asset and income is at risk.”

Mr Gwynne said individuals and families are “taking the hit” from the cuts and are having to “step in”, adding a “sensible discussion” is needed about how to fund social care.

Ms Caulfield also called for greater funding for social care when the next Queen’s Speech is introduced.

She added: “There is cross-party support for looking at a social care premium system like they have in Germany.

“We have to be honest with the British public. There will need to be funding for social care, rather than people who have worked hard all of their lives having to sell their homes, not realising that is what they will have to do for social care or refusing social care until they absolutely reach a crisis point and have to pay for it.”

Clive Betts, Labour chairman of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee, said: “People are seeing their council tax bills rise and what they get from them fall.

“I think that is a real challenge and a real problem for the whole issue of local democracy. People will see they are getting less and paying more and I think it is something we should be very concerned about.”

Opening the debate, Mr Gwynne said people are “paying the price for Tory mismanagement” before adding: “This is what happens when the Tories don’t fund local government and are in charge of the town hall. Austerity is not over.”

The Government, he added, had reached the “fifth missed deadline” on its social care green paper and at the local elections on May 2 there was a clear choice between “continued austerity with the Tories or proper investment, fairness and a real change”.

He said: “We have to keep going on until this Government wakes up, smells the coffee and understands the damage that they are doing to the fabric of so many communities in England through cutting our local neighbourhood services and depriving people-based services, adult social care and children’s services of the resources they need.”

Communities Secretary James Brokenshire (pictured) insisted there had been a real-terms increase in funding, with deprived authorities helped.

He said: “This year we have given our local authorities access to £46.4 billion pounds, a cash increase of 2.8% and a real-terms increase in funding and the settlement includes extra funding for local services with a strong focus on supporting some of our most vulnerable groups and it is part of a four-year settlement accepted by 97% of local authorities that gives so many of our areas access to substantially more funding than the least.

“Average spending power per dwelling for the 10% most deprived authorities is around 22% more than for the least deprived, 10% in 2019/20.”

On devolution, he added: “I look forward to finding new ways in which we can see services equally delivered in that sense of devolution and that sense of how services are most effectively delivered closer to where they are provided.”

Copyright (c) Press Association Ltd. 2019, All Rights Reserved. Picture (c) Yui Mok / PA Wire.