The Care And Support Alliance…….

The Care And Support Alliance describes itself as follows:

The Care & Support Alliance was set up in July 2009. The Care & Support Alliance represents over 75 of Britain?s leading charities campaigning alongside the millions of older people, disabled people and their carers who deserve decent care.

Case for Change

The social care system is broken and seriously underfunded. It cannot cope with a rapidly ageing population and people living longer with illness and disability. Urgent reform is essential, together with sufficient extra money to put it into effect and to close the big and growing funding gap.

There is a real public appetite for reform. Families will no longer tolerate a social care system which leaves many with no support and others with poor quality services. The public are angry that they can face huge care charges, and end up losing all their savings or being forced to sell their homes.

The Care Bill significantly improves the legal and policy framework. The Care Bill helpfully updates the law and sets out a positive vision for social care, based on the principle of wellbeing. Its provisions could generate real and lasting improvements ? but only if the money is there.

The Government?s acceptance of ?the Dilnot approach? is welcome, but both funding and implementation are concerns. It?s good that the Government is implementing a version of the Dilnot principles to end the fear of endlessly spiralling care costs, but it is doing so on a minimal basis. As a result, the Government?s scheme will not ?cap? all care costs, some people may still have to sell their homes, and there are major worries about introducing and running a complex new system in a fair and efficient way.

It?s time to act. The Care Act is a once in a generation opportunity to make social care better, but there is a huge gulf between its aspirations and the reality as experienced by millions of older and disabled people each day. The Care Act?s vision is the right one: now politicians on all sides must step up and commit to the funding to bring it about. Together we can build a fair and sustainable care system which delivers dignity, independence and peace of mind for older and disabled people and their families. But failure to act would continue a cycle of cuts, neglect and abuse in social care, at great cost to our economy, public services and society ? a tragic lost opportunity.

They have some graphics available from here showing the need for social care in each constituency (click to enlarge)

Hat-tip: Julian Ware-Lane