building pride in cumbriacouncilportal.cumbria.gov.uk/documents/s1000008862/copy... ·...

Building pride in Cumbria

National Social Care Reform


Three strands – one aim

• White Paper - Caring for our Future

• Draft Bill (Care and Support Bill)

• Progress report on social care funding reform

• All aim to support people to live active and independent lives


White Paper: Caring for our

Future

White papers are documents produced by the Government

setting out details of future policy on a particular subject. A

White Paper will often be the basis for a Bill to be put before

Parliament


White Paper: Caring for our

FutureThere are a number of areas where change is

proposed – quite a lot is about developing things we

are doing now like:

• Independence and wellbeing (through information

and advice)

• low-level needs (support in communities, for carers,

better housing options etc)

• crisis needs (through reablement and promoting

independence)


White Paper: principles

• Health, wellbeing and independence;

• dignity and respect;

• choice and control;

• good use of skills, resources and networks;

• recognition of carers;

• valuing the workforce



• The Government, communities and individuals

should do everything they can to prevent,

postpone and minimise people’s need for formal

care and support by a simple system of

promoting independence and wellbeing.



• people should be in control of their own care and

support using things like personal budgets and direct

payments.

• this should be backed by good quality, and

consistent, information which helps people to make

the right choices for them


Draft Care and Support Bill

Bills and Legislation sets out the proposals for new laws, and plans

to change existing laws, that are presented for debate before

Parliament


Draft Care and Support Bill

• Creates a single law for adult care and

support

• Replaces more than a dozen different pieces

of legislation.

• Provides the legal framework for putting into

action some of the main principles of the

White Paper


Draft Care and Support BillIt proposes:

• Individual wellbeing be at the heart of the provision of care and support;

• Local authorities should provide information, advice, preventative service and ensure there are enough providers of these, and care and support services. And promote co-operation and integration to help organisations work together better;

• There is a clear legal entitlement to care and support, for everyone including carers


Draft Care and Support Bill• Everyone entitled to care and support, including carers, has a personal budget. And that they can ask for this to be a ‘direct payment’ if they want;

• No-one’s care and support should be interrupted when they move home from one local authority area to another

• A new statutory framework for adult safeguarding, setting out the responsibilities of local authorities and their partners, and creating Safeguarding Adults Boards in every area


Progress report on Funding

Reform

The Commission on Funding of Care and Support was an

independent body asked by Government to review how care

and support in England is funded.


Progress Report on funding reform

Commission’s report Fairer Funding for All (Dilnot report) was published in July 2011 and proposed:

• there should be a set maximum amount of money that people would be expected to pay for their care in their lifetime.

• increase the amount of money people can have (the threshold) before they start having to pay for their care

• everyone in residential care should have access to deferred payments so that no-one will be forced to sell their home, in their lifetime or their spouses, to pay for care


Progress Report on funding reform

The Government agrees that the funding

model the report suggested is the right

one to use.

There are still some important issues to be

considered about how a model like this would work in

practice. The Government is unable to introduce the

new system at the moment.


Progress report: further exploration

• Key issues to explore further:

– the level of cap: some people have argued for a cap within the range suggested by the Commission (£25k to £50 with £35k proposed as appropriate and fair), and others have argued that a higher cap would deliver the same peace of mind benefits

– who benefits and who should pay: many people have suggested that those who benefit most from the changes should be asked to meet the cost of them.


Progress report: further exploration

The Government intends to explore these issues

further, alongside others as set out in the detail of the

report, to ensure they have sufficient information and

evidence to make final decisions at the next

Spending Review.

A Spending Review is the process used to allocate resources

across all government departments, including health and social

care


Progress Report: interim measures

While these issues are explored the Government has proposed some temporary measures and is:

• Introducing a national eligibility threshold for adult

care and support (April 2015) so that entitlement to

for care and support will be the same regardless of

where a person lives in England.



While these issues are explored the Government has proposed some temporary measures and is:

• Providing a clear, universal and authoritative

source of national information about the health

and care and support system. This will include

information on how the care and support system

works locally, how to access it, how much care costs

and who might be eligible for financial support. This

information will be available to everyone regardless

of their eligibility.



• Legislating in the draft Care and Support Bill to ensure that people get access to, better information to help them understand the care and support system and the options available to them, and to plan and prepare for their care cost

• extending and increasing the legal rights of carers by legislating for the right to an assessment equal to that for people using services for the first time. Requiring local authorities, NHS and carers organisations to agree plans and budgets to better support carers



• Publishing a framework for improved integration

between health and social care. Including a duty on

local authorities to promote co-operation and improve

the way organisations work together

• Consulting on closure of the Independent Living Fund

(ILF) and asking whether the funding for this should

transfer to local authorities to use to pay for care and

support for disabled people. Local Authorities would

continue to have a duty to assess people’s care and

support needs



• Introducing a universal system of deferred

payments for residential care so that no one will be

forced to sell their home to pay for care in their

lifetime (or their spouses lifetime). Implementation in

England from April 2015.

• Setting up a group to ensure that the right information

and specialist financial advice is available to help

people plan ahead for things like pensions, benefits,

wider services and to clarify the tax treatment of

disability-linked annuities.


Implementation

• Once the Bill has gone through parliament any

agreed changes will need to be put in place by April

2015

• There will be lots of work for Local Authorities and

other organisations to do updating systems, ways of

working, and training the workforce so we can put the

changes in place

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