MPs warn elderly are to suffer from care cuts

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Older people are suffering a lower quality of life because social care funding pressures mean services are being reduced, a group of MPs has warned.

The House of Commons health committee called for the government to press ahead with the £1bn long-term care funding reforms proposed by the Dilnot Commission, led by Andrew Dilnot.

The committee also claimed cuts in support are driving increased demands on the NHS and called for overhaul of the system.

In its report today, the cross-party group of MP recommended that elderly care, health and housing services are joined up to stop patients being "passed like a parcel" from one service to another.

The MPs suggested that failure to link up commissioning and provision across the services leads to more hospital admissions, later discharge and poorer outcomes.

However, it warned the consequences for providers are "no less stark" as the NHS will fail to meet its efficiency saving targets of 4 per cent every year over the next four years, it added.

The committee welcomed the extra £2bn a year funding pledged by the government for social care by 2014/15, but warned "it is not sufficient to maintain adequate levels of service quality and efficiency".

MPs also said the large bills pensioners are left with for services such as home help come as a "shock" to many.

The health committee called on the government to accept the "principle" of a cap in costs following the recommendation last year by the Dilnot Commission for the state to step in when bills rise above £35,000 for any individual.

Committee chair and former health secretary Stephen Dorrell said: "This government, like its predecessors going back to the 1960s, has stressed the importance it attaches to joined-up services.

"Growing demand, coupled with an unprecedented efficiency challenge, makes it more urgent than ever before to convert these fine words into fine deeds.

"We look to the government to set out in its Social Care White Paper how this vital objective will be met."

He added: "We recommend that the government should place a duty on the new clinical commissioning groups and local councils to create a single commissioning

process, with a single accounting officer, and a single outcomes framework for older people's health, care and housing services in their area."

For the government, care services minister Paul Burstow said the government would respond to the report and the Dilnot Commission in the spring, with its full proposals for reform of adult social care in a White Paper. He said there will also be a progress report published on funding reform.

The minister said: "Integrated care should be the norm. That's why we asked the NHS Future Forum to specifically work on this issue.

"They told us there is no single silver bullet when it comes to integration. What we have already done and continue to do is create the legal and financial conditions for more integration.

"The committee's report is an important contribution to the debate."

Richard Humphries, senior fellow at the King's Fund said: "Successive governments have talked about the need to integrate health and social care but have failed to make it happen. The time for warm words and good intentions has passed - delivering integrated care must assume the same priority over the next decade as reducing waiting times was given over the last."

Age UK director general Michelle Mitchell said: "The government should act urgently on its findings and implement the Dilnot funding reforms, update social care law, and put in place the incentives the committee proposes to bring health and social care much closer together.

"I am sure the committee is right to say all three actions are necessary, not either/or, and that together they can transform social care and begin to bridge the gap in terms of need."

Richard Hawkes, chief executive of disability charity Scope, said: "The Health Select Committee has rightly drawn attention to the fact that care services are letting down vulnerable groups. However, we would like to remind the committee that care services are not just used by older people.

"For disabled people, social care is critical. It gives people the support they need to get up, dressed and in many cases out of the house and to work. Yet disabled people already struggle to get this support. Without this support, disabled people cannot play an active part in the local community and could be left isolated at home.

Nick Kirwan, assistant director, health and protection at the Association of British Insurers said: "We all need to get to grips with the challenge of how we will pay for the care needs of an ageing population. The Select Committee's report is an important contribution to this debate as it looks at how the future of care funding could work in practice.

"We need to make sure we give people clear information about their options so that they can plan and prepare. We want to make sure people can approach older age with the security of knowing they will get the care they need."

The government is due to publish its Social Care White Paper this Easter.

Report:

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201012/cmselect/cmhealth/1583/158302.htm