Sharp Divide In Social Care, Says CSCI

People not receiving support from councils are struggling with a poor quality of life, says the third report on the State of Social Care in England published today by the social care watchdog, CSCI.
 
{mosimage}Commission Chair, Dame Denise Platt said: “Our report is in two parts. On the one hand we show that those who qualify for council support are having a better experience than before. On the other hand those people who fall outside the system, including self funders, have a poor quality experience that can leave them struggling to cope. People who only five years ago qualified for council-arranged help are today excluded by the system and left to fend for themselves. The poor experiences of people and their carers trying and failing to get sufficient help contrast starkly with those people who do qualify for council arranged care.”
 
Following concerns raised by the Commission last year, the third State of Social Care in England report for the first time explores the experiences of people not deemed eligible for state-supported social care. It shows that many younger disabled people and frail older people are being ‘signposted’ to voluntary services. Many are forced to rely on help from family and informal arrangements which can break down at short notice. People unable to rely on families or friends and unable to pay for care services themselves are simply left to cope with everyday life, while some become virtually trapped in their own home.
 
Local councils increasingly only help those with ‘substantial’ or ‘critical’ needs. Although councils use a national set of rules (called Fair Access to Care Services – FACS) to decide who is eligible for support, today’s report shows that who does or doesn’t get help varies not only between but also within the same council. In practice the criteria can be interpreted in different ways by local staff. Many people who pay for their own care can also be ‘lost to the system’. They get little by way of information or advice about their different care options. As a result some people end up inappropriately in residential care.
 
There are clear improvements in the range and variety of services for those who do qualify for council-arranged care. Performance ratings of councils have improved for the fifth consecutive year. The number of people using Direct Payments to manage their own care has grown significantly. Individual budget pilots have been set up. Councils are placing a greater emphasis on helping people to remain in their own homes and the number of carers receiving an assessment has increased. There are also examples of people who have been helped through the Government funded ‘Partnerships for Older People Projects’. At present, however, these projects are not widespread.
 
CSCI Chief Inspector Paul Snell said: “More people are now controlling their own care through the use of direct payments and some through individual budgets. The advice and assistance which supports them to do this needs to be available to all people seeking care, including those who are self funders. People tell us they want good information, advice, an assessment of their circumstances and confidence in the quality of the available services. They also want control over the nature of the care they receive. Achieving this for everyone is the vision outlined by the Government in their transformation programme ‘Putting People First’.”
 
There has also been improvement, for the fourth consecutive year, in the average percentage of national minimum standards met by all care services, but this rate of improvement has slowed.
 
Paul Snell continued: “Too many services are still not meeting the minimum standards, five years after their introduction. Where services show a major shortfall in meeting the standards they will be given specific attention by our new regional enforcement teams.”
 
Dame Denise Platt added: “This, our third report, provides further convincing evidence about the very variable experiences which people have when they are seeking care, particularly those outside the formal public care system. There is now an urgent need to create a fair and equitable social care system, which is sustainable and affordable.”