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National care crisis piles on the budget pressures

by Ian Shires on 5 December, 2016

Image result for social careLocal Councils have been put on high alert over a deepening crisis within the care homes sector reports Liberal Democrat Health spokesperson on Walsall’s Health and Wellbeing Board Cllr Ian Shires.

The warning came after Department of Health ordered the sector watchdog to monitor the finances of leading care home companies. Any insolvencies could cause services to stop.

Any hope of a helping hand to local councils from Chancellor Philip Hammond’s first Autumn Statement last month evaporated as he ignored pleas for an easing of austerity measures in the face of ever more demands on social care and health services which have risen by around a third over the past decade.

It had been hoped that the Chancellor would relent and ease up on cuts to local council support grants. In Walsall, this means that council budgets face further cuts to the money it receives from Central Government in the region of £86 million over the next four years. Social Care in the town is facing £18 million cuts. All this adds pressure on other services such as Clean and Green, leisure local libraries, and the Art Gallery.

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