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Social Care: Big Costs, Poor Service

Sarah Whitebloom

Whose voices are among the loudest demanding extra Government funding for social care? Surprise, surprise it’s private sector social care providers, licking their lips at the prospect of yet more cash for poor service.

Don’t get me wrong, you would have to be crazy not to see there is a crisis in social care. But just throwing more cash at the situation would be like throwing good money after bad. It is true, many people are not receiving the care they need. But elderly and vulnerable people would still suffer from neglect, indignity and abuse however much money is shovelled the care providers’ way. How do I know this? Because it is also true that many elderly people already pay good money for care and do not receive it.

Care providers up and down the land already give shocking levels of service to people paying top dollar – whether it is for care homes or for domiciliary care. The nursing home with the worst reputation in my home town, charges the most – a staggering £1,400 a week. Families pay this outrageous sum in the belief they are buying a personalised, deluxe service for their relations. They are not. They are simply boosting the owner’s profits while they have set the daily food budget at £5 and their minimum wage staff, on zero hours contracts, cannot be bothered.

And it’s not just in care homes that the problems exist. Families pay good money for care to be provided in their parents’ homes and they get anything but ‘care’. We know about hard cases, where carers steal, abuse and humiliate their elderly charges. But ask anyone paying for such care and they will tell you about missed appointments, hours waiting and poor service.

You don’t have to be George Soros to see that it’s not the lack of money, it’s the profits that are the problem. And anytime that the Government purse is opened, the vultures circle. They want

money, they just don’t want to provide the service.

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