Written report and presentation – Graham Hodkinson.

The Board considered a report of Graham Hodkinson, Director of Adult Social Services that highlighted the key changes that would have a significant impact on Wirral Council from April 2015. It built upon the earlier Cabinet report and previous papers to CESG that set out the key legislative changes that the Act brought by setting out emerging plans based on capacity requirements to meet the increased demand anticipated as a result of these changes.

The Director of Adult Social Services also shared a short animation presentation with the Board http://www.skillsforcare.org.uk/Standards/Care-Act/Care-Act.aspx that linked with the report and gave a summary of the key elements of the implementation of the Care Act.

It was reported that on 14 May 2014, the Care Bill had received Royal Assent and become the Care Act 2014 (“Care Act”). This would come into effect on 1 April 2015 apart from the funding reform elements, which were scheduled to come into effect on 1 April 2016. Implementation depended heavily upon regulations and guidance for detail. The 2015 regulations and guidance had now been published along with cost estimates from the new burdens associated with the Care Act. These needed to be understood and provision needed to be put in place to meet the new demands. Consultation on the 2016 regulations and guidance was scheduled to take place at a later stage.

The Care Act legislated to provide social care protection and support to the people who needed it most, and took forward elements of the government’s initial response to the Francis Inquiry, to give people peace of mind that they would be treated with compassion when in hospital, care homes or their own home. The Care Act brought together existing care and support legislation into a new, modern set of laws which would build the system around people’s outcomes and wellbeing.

The Care Act aimed to reform the care and support system into one that:

×  Focused on people’s wellbeing and support to help them remain independent for as long as possible.

×  Introduced greater national consistency in access to care and support.

×  Provided better information to help people make choices about their care.

×  Would give people more control over their care.

×  Improved support for carers.

×  Improved the quality of care and support.

×  Improved the integration of different services.

The Care Act aimed to establish a new legal framework for Adult Social Care, putting the wellbeing of individuals at the heart of care and support service.  The Government believed that the Care Act marked the biggest transformation to care and support law in over 60 years. It was intended to replace over a dozen separate pieces of legislation relating to Adult Social Care with a single modern law. It aimed to put people more in control of their own lives and to reform the funding of care and support to ensure that:

×  Everyone would receive the care they needed and that more support would go to those in the greatest need.

×  The unfairness and fear caused by unlimited care costs would be ended.

×  People were protected from having to sell their home in ‘their lifetime’ to pay for care.

Given these changes, it was reported that the Care Act outlined the most significant change in Adult Social Care in decades with changes to underpinning legislation, eligibility criteria, funding, changes to the status of Adult Safeguarding and a host of other associated areas.

The report also set out the implications for Wirral regarding capacity. The Director reported that the Council would need to consider the implications of the changes arising from the new legislation.  Some of the key issues that the Council would need to address were set out as:

×  Understanding the implications for the Council of a national eligibility framework.

×  The implications for assessment and care management staff with a move to proportionate assessments with an ‘asset based’ approach i.e. enabling people to determine the best way in which their needs can be met utilising their own resources, with any additional support being provided via the Local Authority.

×  The need for clear information about self-funders; not just in care homes but also those with eligible needs who were purchasing community based support services, who would be entitled to an assessment of need, support plan and annual review.

×  Increased demand for assessment relating to full fee payers could lead to some delays in placement depending upon frequency of that demand.

×  Gaining an understanding of the new processes that will need to be put in place for the provision of ‘care accounts’ including:

-  Financial assessments of self-funders

-  The monitoring of self-funders’ eligible care costs, based on what the Local Authority would pay for the care i.e. ‘reasonable cost’, not on the amount the self-funder was paying

-  Production and provision of ‘care account’ statements for self-funders

×  Assessing the financial implications of the cap on care costs and of an increase in the upper threshold for financial support from the Local Authority.

×  Awareness of those people, including carers, who had unmet needs who would be eligible for social care services.

×  An understanding of the numbers of carers who would be entitled to an assessment, to support planning where relevant.

×  The financial implications of extended carers’ support services – which will be non-chargeable.

×  The implications arising from the responsibility of ensuring there were sufficient preventative services which delay people’s need for long term care and support.

×  The development of processes to recover costs for meeting a person’s eligible needs where funding responsibility lay with another Local Authority.

×  The resource implications of extended responsibilities in relation to transitions from children to adult services.

×  The implication of extended responsibilities to provide written information and advice to people with non-eligible needs on what could be done to prevent or delay the need for care and support.

The Director of Adult Social Services commented that the emphasis would be on people finding out for themselves and the Council would therefore need to find new ways of reaching out to people.

There was also an expectation set out in the Care Act that adult social care wouldl increasingly integrate services with local health partners.  This had been considered alongside the Better Care Fund (BCF). There was a requirement for this to be fully reflected in the Section 75 Pooled Budget with the Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) for 2015/16.

The report also outlined resource implications for the Council and an appendix to the report set out Wirral Council Funding allocations for the Care Act and a further appendix set out the initial Care Act Programme board profile.

Resolved – That;

1.  the appointment of a programme lead using the implementation grant be supported.

2.  the principle of using new responsibilities funding in the manner outlined in the report be noted and supported.

3.  the level-off risk to the Council be noted and the programme governance framework as suggested in the report be supported.

4.  the Director of Adult Social Services be thanked for the report.