Trustees wanted at Independent Age

We are looking for two new Trustees, covering the areas of Volunteering and Corporate Relations. Trustees will serve a three-year term starting in May 2011, and applications are due by 31 January. Click here to apply or to learn more about the posts.

Lancashire county council publishes scary details of cuts to its care services

by Simon Bottery, Director of Fundraising, Policy and Communications

Lancashire county council has just published its budget, outlining in detail how it plans to cut a quarter of its spending - £179m - over the next three years. For older people using care services it makes scary reading.

The direct savings for 2011 alone include:

• £2.5m by raising the eligibility threshold for adult social care from 'moderate' to 'substantial'. The council has 3,900 people currently assessed as 'moderate' so their care is now at risk.
  
• £1.5m in reducing spending on non-residential social care - a cut of up to 20% in spending on domiciliary care, day care and personal budget. Instead there will be 'greater reliance on universal, preventative and low-level initiatives', 'greater use of telecare' and more focus on 'rehabilitation, reablement and recovery services'
  
• £1.5m cuts in its Supporting People programme of housing support for vulnerable adults


• £1.85m cuts in social-care assessment and management staff costs, leading to a 'delay in non-urgent social work assessments'
  
• £4.2m in increased charges for non-residential care services meaning that some people will pay between £30.75 and £53.80 per day for services that are currently costing them £5. The council estimates that the largest group of users affected will be 5,000 who will pay £11.63 more each week.
  

There are other savings that will have less obvious but potentially drastic effects on services too:

• £1.5m cut from social care training


• £7m saved by reducing the fees paid by the council to care providers. This means organisations providing social care will see their fees cut by 2 percent in 2010. The council says, surely optimistically, that this 'should not affect overall levels of service'.

The council is making cuts across the board, from environment to children's services. You can read its plans in full at http://council.lancashire.gov.uk/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=1051

Across the country, other councils are gearing up to do similar things to Lancashire. Hackney Council in London, for example, is cutting £46m over the next two years. Adult Social Care is being hit by cutting drop-in centres and residential units, and day care is being reduced. Contracts for outsourced services are also being reduced. Staffing levels are being reviewed.

Not all these changes are necessarily bad. The emphasis on reablement and preventative work is welcome, while telecare has potential if the need for social contact is met in other ways. Nonetheless, it has been hard to see this as anything but a major reduction in service provision. For all the coalition government's statements that councils have been funded to maintain social care funding, this is the reality of the average 27% cuts they face over the next four years

Happy New Year.