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Media Release : Election offers golden opportunity to transform UK homecare - 15/04/2010

The UK’s leading professional association for homecare providers today called on election candidates to seize the opportunity to transform the care available to older and vulnerable people.

With three weeks to both General and local elections, and on the eve of the party leaders’ first live television debate, the United Kingdom Homecare Association, is calling on candidates to pledge their support for the independent homecare sector in its role as prime deliverer of home-based care across the UK.

Setting out the central role played by homecare agencies and their 324,000 strong workforce, and the impact that cost cutting commissioning is having on its services amongst a tidal wave of additional regulation and cost burdens in 2010, UKHCA is calling on national politicians to make a ten-point pledge.

It includes commitments to urgently address the way social care is resourced both nationally and locally. The pledge also commits them to reviewing wasteful duplication between councils and arms-length bodies, as well as the costly vetting and barring scheme.

Local politicians are being asked to pledge to protect frontline independent homecare services, treat providers as partners in the development of cost effective services and recognise them as local businesses, providing a vital source of employment for local people and pumping money into the local economy. It also urges politicians to make greater use of the independent sector’s knowledge and experience.

Mike Padgham, UKHCA’s Chair, said:

“We have written the pledge because we want politicians, at all levels, to demonstrate their commitment to a vibrant and sustainable independent homecare sector. Social care is now in the spotlight. This is a golden opportunity, and one that does not come every day. Now is the time for the social care sector’s voice to be heard at its loudest.

He continued:

Homecare provides a vital service, offering millions of hours of help and support to some of the UK’s most vulnerable people. It also plays a very important economic role, employing thousands across the country.

Concluding, Padgham said:

Today we are challenging all the prospective candidates at national and local level to visit local independent sector homecare providers, talk to careworkers and managers to see the vital role that the sector performs. We need to take an altogether different view on the way we treat social care. Providers are keen to hear what politicians can do for social care, and the pledge is one such way that new commitments can be forged”.

Ends.

Notes for Editors

  1. The United Kingdom Homecare Association (UKHCA) is the professional association for over 1,800 domiciliary care providers in Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The mission of UKHCA is to represent its members and to promote and support the sustainable provision of high standard homecare.
  2. UKHCA represents 33% of independent and voluntary sector providers across the UK. Its member organisations are estimated to provide 1.7 million hours of care each week, valued at £1.08 billion per year, and delivered to 115,000 service users at any one time.
  3. Homecare is the provision of personal social care services to people in their own homes. For many, homecare is the alternative of choice for people who would otherwise need to move into residential accommodation.
  4. The majority of homecare is funded by the state (usually by local council social services departments or through a Primary Care Trust or Health and Social Care Trust in Northern Ireland), but across the UK independent sector homecare agencies deliver the majority of this homecare, as much as 81% in England. See UKHCA’s overview of the homecare sector for more statistics on delivery: www.ukhca.co.uk/researchers.aspx
  5. “The homecare pledge: a challenge to national and local politicians” can be found at: www.ukhca.co.uk/pdfs/thehomecarepledge.pdf
  6. A high resolution royalty-free image of Mike Padgham, who is quoted in this release is available from: www.ukhca.co.uk/images/highres/mikepadghamhires1.jpg
  7. UKHCA’s website and resources can be found at www.ukhca.co.uk.
  8. For further information please contact:
    Colin Angel, Head of Policy and Communication, UKHCA
    Direct Line: 020 8288 5297
    Mobile: 07920 788993
    E-mail: colin.angel@ukhca.co.uk

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