The health and social care tax

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The treasury to decide how much of social care levy goes to NHS after 2025

In first three years, less than one pound in six will go to social care sector, then the chancellor will allocate

The chancellor will decide what proportion of the £12bn annual proceeds from the health and social care levy will go to the NHS after 2025, legislation published by the government confirms.

Just £5.4bn will go to the social care sector over the next three years – less than one pound in six of the revenue from the new tax.

After that, the bill says the proceeds of the levy will be allocated “in such shares as between health care and social care, and in such shares as between England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, as the Treasury may determine”.
But the government has not published any modelling of how rapidly the proportion devoted to social care will rise – and the health secretary, Sajid Javid, has declined to set out any details.
Social care leaders are concerned that the NHS will continue to absorb the vast majority of the proceeds from the new tax.
Nadra Ahmed, the executive chairman of the National Care Association, which represents independent care operators, said:

“This is a recovery plan for the NHS and that is very obvious. The funding pot being talked about for social care is not sufficient to even address the issues of today.”

The prime minister’s official spokesman has insisted the proportion going to social care will increase over time, saying the NHS is currently facing a short-term “bow wave” of pressure, caused by the estimated 8 million people who did not come forward for treatment during the pandemic.

But Javid has declined to say whether the backlog can be cleared in three years, and cutting NHS funding after 2025 could prove politically challenging.

The care minister, Helen Whatley, was challenged about the issue in interviews on Thursday. She insisted extra resources were already going into the creaking social care system.

“Over the pandemic, an extra £6bn has gone to local authorities, which they have been able to use for social care. We have directed £2bn specifically into the extra infection control costs for social care during the pandemic,” she said.

“We are directly actively supporting social care right now. But what this is about is those big reforms to social care that everyone has been calling for so long.”

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I understand that there is a long waiting list for treatment because of Covid.

However, I also know that if Social Care was improved, many elderly people could be saved the trauma of going to hospital in the first place, if their health issue which temporarily made them unable to live safely at home, could be resolved at home.

When my mum was ill, her GP said that she would have to go to hospital unless I stayed with her one night.
I didn’t stay, due to my family situation, but paid for one of her usual carers to stay overnight.

Later, after another admission from the nursing home, mum told the GP that whatever happened, she never ever wanted to go to hospital again. Her experience of the “assessment ward” was dreadful, and also for me, when I visited. No one knew mum, understood her many health issues which would never get better.

I believe that either people need to be cared for more at home, or cottage hospitals need to be reopened for those with long term health conditions which will never get better, but deserve peace, kindness, dignity as they are in the final stage of their lives.

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Trouble is I’m not sure it is in the Tory Government’s interests to actually improve Social Care.

If they don’t improve it, it will continue to fall on unpaid carers to prop up the system.

Exactly what they want.

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From my experience, the very idea that Social Services are public SERVANTS there to help the disadvantaged is fundamentally flawed. They really don’t care either, the aim is to ignore needs as long and as much as possible.
They forget that without those in need, they would be out of a job!

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BB I so agree with you about cottage hospitals. Many years ago hubby had a parachuting accident. He was taken to a cottage hospital and they were absolutely wonderful. Extremely caring, not just to him but to my daughters and myself. Wonder whether the care would be the same now. Somehow being cynical I doubt it!

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In the New Forest, they’ve all been closed.
Of course, the community was told that the services they provided would not be lost, but provided in a different way in the community.
When mum was very ill, but still at home, I asked a number of people in SSD and the NHS about these additional services, everyone looked at me blankly.
There was a large infirmary in town, highly regarded, and at least 3 more in the area, perfect for a top heavy elderly population, one of the highest in the whole country. Most modern general hospitals are aimed at making younger people with a specific problem better again.

Not for elderly or disabled people who can just about manage at home with support until they get ill with a chest or urinary infection, who just need gentle old fashioned nursing until they recover sufficiently well to go home. So often the forum has examples of people discharged too soon from a major hospital without sufficient time for recovery.

During the Covid crisis at least one hotel in the south west was reported to have been turned into a makeshift hospital.

I’ve read about other areas having a cross between hotel and hospital. In my area, two nursing homes have a few small bungalows adjacent to it. The residents can eat in the home, and enjoy the same social facilities, at a cost, but sleep in their own bungalows at night. If they become too frail to live at home, they get priority for beds in the home. Is this the way forward?

Maybe have more warden assisted housing where there is an actual warden on site to check residents, not someone the other end of a telephone line 200 miles away?!