Care England has called out the government for its failure to mention social care in this year’s Queen’s Speech.
This omission, says the largest representative body for independent providers of adult social care, clearly indicates that social care is not a high priority for the government despite the important role social care has to play in economic regeneration and levelling up.
According to Care England, the government needs to connect its various strategies, and social care should be a theme that runs through its recovery agenda.
The chief executive of Care England, Professor Martin Green OBE, said: “The Queen’s Speech was an opportunity for the government to set out the plan for further social care reform, and to offer additional resources for a sector that needs further government support in order to build back sustainability and capacity after the COVID pandemic. The lack of mention or reference to adult social care in this year’s state opening of parliament leaves a bitter taste for the care sector. The government has set out its plan to fix social care, but with no mention of continued reform or additional financial support for adult social care, the government has turned its back on a sector it promised in their manifesto. By failing to directly commit to supporting the sector, care providers are left unsure of how they will manage this current wave of inflation and additional pressures they are under, whilst the NHS will continue to suffer.
“Government has overlooked an opportunity to invest in the future sustainability of the sector which supports some of society’s most vulnerable. The current plan for reform leaves care providers unsure of the financial security of their sector. Adult social care must return to the government’s policy agenda to renew its commitments to ‘fix social care’. If this is not achieved, then the government risks allowing the care sector to continue to walk precariously into a future at risk of collapse.”
