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CARE CAMPAIGN FOR THE VULNERABLE COMMENTS IN THE DAILY EXPRESS ON ''PAYING £4,000 ON YOUR CARE''

Read article here https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1120237/Old-age-crisis-Plan-force-over-50s-top-up-NI

CARE CAMPAIGN FOR THE VULNERABLE STATEMENT

Care Campaign For The Vulnerable recognises - as do many other advocacy groups - that social care delivery in its current form is not a long term possibility given the ever-increasing demand for care by vulnerable elderly people. Issues around the supply of care homes, availability of care personnel (both trained and untrained) in the long term have been well publicised, as has the ever-increasing incidence of dementia that will mean that by 2050 those needing some form of care will have doubled from present levels.

Whilst we are not hopeful a solution will be found on this occasion - given this issue has repeatedly been ‘kicked into the long grass by successive governments - we would nevertheless urge Damian Green MP and all politicians with an interest in the welfare of elderly people to wider the discussion and to think outside the box. Yes of course a fair and equitable funding solution needs to be found to ensure bed supply grows in line with emerging demand, but more importantly, it is essential that vulnerable people as a result of organic brain disease such as dementia don’t continue to be unfairly punished by having to pay for their own care from their own resources when those with a physical illness are treated in hospital without personal cost.

New financing and cost models are all well and good, but they won’t for example in the short to medium term address the issues such as the lack of trained staff nationally and the declining pool of untrained staff available to work in care homes. For years whilst the issue of social care, affordability has been debated and shelved repeatedly, many of those living in care homes have continued to suffer as a result of inconsistent and poor care delivery. Regulation has tightened over those years and yet, safeguarding events have only increased, reportable abuses appear to be on the rise and families remain concerned and anxious about the lottery that is ‘choosing a good care home. It is a damning indictment of our society that we continue to accept older vulnerable people are stripped of all their hard-earned assets to pay for care that ‘well' people freely access.

CCFTV will welcome this report if it in the end brings the change necessary to ensure older people receive the consistent, accessible high-quality care they so richly deserve when their moment of need arises.