Allocating social care funds: difficult decisions ahead Talented but troubled footballer George Best once reminisced, ‘I spent a lot of money on booze, birds, and fast cars. The rest I just squandered.’ The choices facing local councils in how to use the extra £2 billion for adult social care announced in the Spring Budget are somewhat starker.
The £1 billion available next year would, said the Chancellor, ‘enable councils to take immediate action to fund care packages for more people, support social care providers and relieve pressure on the NHS locally’. NHS leaders, having altruistically championed the case for any new money to go to social care and not into their own coffers, were quick to stake their claim. A key component of the Next steps on the NHS five year forward view delivery plan is that part of the money will be used to free up 2,000–3,000 hospital beds. So it was inevitable that there would be strings attached to the new grant, fuelled by suspicions that with councils facing monumental pressures from other services – from potholes to parks – it might not end up in adult social care. The King's Fund
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