Government accused of burying its head in the sand after Paul Burstow says funding shortfall should have been closed
By David Brindle
Paul Burstow said there 'need not be a gap' in social care funding. Photograph: Martin Argles for the Guardian
Charities and council leaders have reacted with disbelief after a government minister said there was no crisis of funding in the social caresystem and no identifiable gap between the needs of elderly and disabled people and what the state provides.
Paul Burstow, the care services minister, told the Commons health select committee that the government had taken sufficient steps to ensure that a funding shortfall inherited by the coalition had been closed.
"There is no gap in the current spending review period on the basis of the money that we are putting in plus efficiency gains through local authorities redesigning services," the minister said. If councils failed to pass on the money or to make efficiency gains, that was their choice, he said.
Burstow's comments appear to fly in the face of a widely held assumption that the social care system in England is underfunded and in urgent need of radical reform that would bring in more resources, both from state funding and private savings or insurance.
Cross-party talks on reform have reopened and the government is due to publish in the spring a progress report on its thinking, including a response to the Dilnot commission, which last year called for extra state spending of an initial £1.7bn to help underwrite a revamped system based on a cap of £35,000 on individual lifetime care costs.
Burstow, who arrived at the select committee fresh from the cross-party talks, seemed anxious to play down expectations. He maintained that Dilnot was "not about levering in more state resources" but about "enabling more private wealth to be levered into the system".
The minister agreed that the current system was a "broken model" and unfit for the future, but he denied it was in crisis. After identifying a funding gap, he said, ministers had committed an additional £7.2bn for councils over the next four years. In addition, councils were expected to make efficiency savings of up to 3%. Taken together, the two measures had closed the gap, he said.
Asked about unmet need for care and support, Burstow said there was no reliable or agreed way of calculating numbers of people who could benefit from services but were not getting them. It was "territory to be explored".
Pressed several times by members of the committee, the minister adjusted his position only slightly. He said initially that there "need not be a gap", and later that there "should not be a gap", adding: "But then there is a decision that all local authorities have to make."
Several recent reports have pointed to a continuing shortfall in funding of the social care system, under which most councils restrict services to people whose needs are judged to be "substantial" or "critical".
Independent research for the care services provider Bupa suggested there would be a £286m funding gap in 2012-13.
Oliver Thomas, the UK director of Bupa care homes, said: "We don't see any sign of additional government funding coming through – in fact, some local authorities are pushing to cut fees by as much as 20%."
Carers UK put the funding gap nearer £1bn. Emily Holzhausen, the charity's director of policy, said: "If we had sufficient money in the system we would not be seeing families struggling without basic services."
The Local Government Association, representing councils, accused the government of burying its head in the sand. David Rogers, chairman of its community wellbeing board, said: "It is deeply worrying that despite the best efforts of councils, leading charities and the government's own experts, the message that we are facing a financial crisis still doesn't seem to be getting through."
- © 2012 Guardian News and Media Limited ____________________________________________________________
Seniors World Chronicle, a not-for-profit, serves to chronicle and widen their reach.
