Response to Opposition Day Debate: Local Authority Social Care Funding

Today I would like to update the House on local authority social care funding following the Opposition day debate of 24 April 2019.

Our local authorities and the people who work for them are delivering essential services and changing lives and it is right we support them to succeed. This is why this Government have given our local authorities in England access to £46.4 billion in 2019-20. This represents a real-terms increase and a cash increase of 2.8%.

The four-year settlement, accepted by 97% of local authorities, gives our most deprived areas access to substantially more funding than the least. The average core spending power per dwelling for the 10% most deprived authorities is around 22% more than for the least deprived 10% in 2019-20.

The settlement this year includes extra funding for local services with a strong focus on supporting some of our most vulnerable groups.

The Government are committed to person-centred integrated care, with health, social care, housing and other public services working together seamlessly to provide better care. The better care fund, introduced in 2015, is our national policy driving forward the integration of health and social care in England.

In every year of the fund, local areas have voluntarily pooled more than the minimum required taking the total to £7.7 billion in 2018-19. We know that this is having a positive impact locally with 90% of local health and care system leaders saying that the better care fund had a positive impact on integration locally (2018-19), and levels of delayed transfers of care which have reduced since February 2017, with more than 2,000 beds per day being freed up.

We announced at last year’s autumn Budget more than £1 billion of extra funding for councils, with £650 million going towards adult and children’s social care in 2019-20. Of that, £410 million can be spent on adult or children’s social care and, where necessary, take the pressure off the NHS, meeting requests from local authorities for greater flexibility.

The remaining £240 million has been allocated to ease pressures on the NHS. This is on top of the £240 million announced in October which allowed councils to provide additional care to over 35,000 people, delivering four million hours of homecare in 2018-19.

Taken together with the adult social care precept and the improved better care fund, the Government have given councils access to around £10 billion in dedicated funding which can be used for adult social care in the three-year period from 2017-18 to 2019-20.

A further £145 million capital funding has been given to hospitals to provide winter improvements such as upgrading wards and redeveloping A&Es and an additional £36.3 million has been invested into the ambulance services for new vehicles and “make-ready hubs”. This is on top of the additional £1.6 billion for the NHS in 2018-19 to support A&E and elective care performance.