SAVE THE DAY CARE CENTRES

Day Care Services are a lifeline to hundreds of older people throughout Northumberland, giving them a chance to take part in group activities with people of the same age.  In many cases a visit to the Day Centre is the only contact an elderly person has with others during the week.  The proposals being considered by Northumberland Council will close ALL SEVEN DAY CENTRES, and encourage users to use self-directed support and personal budgets, and put our members out of work and on the dole!    

Who Will Care for Older and Vulnerable People?

As our population ages, more and more people will need care - in residential and supported homes, at day centres or through home visits.

A legacy of under-funding and a wave of cut-price privatisation has left us ill-prepared for the challenge of an aging population.  We all need to turn this around urgently.

The growing need for social care:

Almost 2 million adults across the UK currently rely on social care services.

In just three years the total number of older people has increased by 400,000.

Over the next thirty years it is expected that we will see a 180% increase in people over 85, and the number of people with dementia will double.

Who provides the care?

Around 1½ million people work in adult social care in the UK - more than in the NHS.

About 80% of the care workforce are women, many of them working part-time.

A million care workers will be needed by 2025 to meet growing needs.

The real cost of under-funding:

UK public spending on personal care for older people amounts to around 1% of our national income.  It is now widely recognised that this is not enough.

"Pocket money pay" and minimal levels of training and support mean staff struggle to provide the reliable, high quality care that people deserve.

In England an estimated 370,000 older people are now going without the care they need because local authorities are restricting care to the most urgent cases.

As well as causing immediate difficulty and distress, inadequate care ends up with greater demands on the NHS due to accidents and declining health.

The damage of privatisation:

Privatisation of 90% of the sector since the 1990s has made things worse.

Home care has become, in the words of the Regulator, a fragmented "cottage industry" which is "struggling to provide services of sufficiently high quality".

Official data shows private care homes are less likely to meet National Minimum Standards in areas like privacy, hygiene, staff training, and quality assurance.

Larger care providers have been subject to speculative take-overs by the private equity industry, leaving them highly indebted and exposed to financially instability.

The Challenge of Personalisation:

It is important that care services are responsive to individual needs and give people as much control over their lives as possible.  But against a background of under-funding and fragmented private provision, plans to replace direct provision with "personal budgets" risk exposing users and staff to greater exploitation and abuse.

What Needs to Change?

We need a fair funding system that ensures high quality care is accessible to all on the basis of need, not ability to pay - which Scotland has moved towards.

Pay and training must be improved - raising public sector standards and using "two-tier" and "fair wages" rules to ensure independent providers match up and don't exploit staff.

In-house and public sector provision needs to be rebuilt.  Investing in publicly accountable social services is the best way to guarantee quality care for all.