Bradford's care system in danger of meltdown, senior councillor warns

The cash-strapped authority faces an overspend on its adult social services in this financial year and warns that the situation will worsen in years to come, with an ageing population and a growing number of disabled adults who need hugely expensive care.

Adult Services is the Council's biggest-spending department, with its £156 million annual budget accounting for nearly a third of all its spending.

The department is grappling with an expected overspend of £2.5m for 2014/15, according to a report going before the Council's health and social care overview and scrutiny committee on Thursday.

And next year, the Council's Labour leaders are proposing to invest an extra £3.1m in adult social care.

Councillor Amir Hussain, executive member for adult services at the Labour-run authority , said: "It's a double whammy in terms of costs."

He called for more Government money for social care, saying the situation was "desperate".

He said: "Bradford is not unique - authorities up and down the country are in the same position. To be honest with you, the reality is that governments of all colours in the past have kicked this issue into the long grass.

"All political parties are, to an extent, to blame for this."

With people living longer, the number of over-65s in the district is expected to increase by 9,000, or 12 per cent, by the end of the decade.

But the number of adults with disabilities is also increasing. The district has a growing number of disabled children, so as they reach adulthood, the demand on adult social care is expected to rise.

COMMENT: RESOURCES FOR SOCIAL CARE HAVE TO BE FOUND

By 2020, the Council expects there to be 180 more adults with learning disabilities and nearly 350 more adults with physical disabilities.

At the same time, the costs of the care that many of these people will need is also rising.

Residential and nursing care, in particular, can be hugely expensive - the Council has 89 high-cost placements which between them cost more than £7.7m a year.

This growing pressure, when coupled with dwindling budgets, is pushing the Council's social care services closer and closer to collapse, according to the Labour-led authority.

A statement accompanying the Labour group's latest budget proposals warns: "Without a radically different approach to resources and services, we will only be able to sustain social care service over the short-term through even greater cuts to other Council services, many of which have a positive effect on people's health and well being.

"Even then the demographic pressures suggest that, without change, the social care system will collapse over the longer term, with significant adverse impact on health services in the form of increased hospital admissions, longer hospital stays and higher numbers of people going back into hospital after being discharged."

Cllr Hussain said the authority had been lobbying the Government for more money, but it couldn't just "sit still" and assume the funds would come.

He said: "We are reviewing people's care packages systematically to make sure the support in place is value for money, and we are looking at contracts and trying to get more out of these contracts. That is our main focus at the moment.

"We are also looking at our high-cost placements - do people really need to be in residential homes, or could they be better supported in their own houses?"

Councillor Jackie Whiteley, the Conservative group spokesman for adult services, acknowledged the pressures the department was under.

But she asked why it was overspending on its budget, when the Council had recently decided to raise its threshold for home care from 'moderate' to 'substantial', and had also opted to close some of its residential homes.

She said: "That was supposed to deliver savings, and why hasn't it?"

Cllr Whiteley called for the department to work more closely with the private sector.

She said: "The private sector are often very competitive with their rates and what they can offer."

But Cllr Hussain said the £2.5m overspend was what they had been expecting back in September, and the situation was now "much improved".

On the raising of the threshold for home care, Cllr Hussain said: "If we hadn't made that decision, we as a local authority would have been in a much worse position."

Local Government Minister and Keighley MP Kris Hopkins insisted the coalition Government had taken steps to protect social care services.

"From April this year we will be going further with our £5.3bn Better Care Fund for health and social care, which will help more people live independently at home for longer and save an estimated £500m in its first year alone.

"There is far more scope for councils to make further savings and keep council tax down by merging back office services, doing more joint working, getting more for less through smart procurement, tackling local fraud and council tax arrears, or utilising their reserves and surplus property."

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