We can help tackle the social care crisis by keeping carers in work and plugging the funding gap, says Marc Woolfson
It has become an unfortunate truism that the adult social care funding gap is one of the great unresolved political issues of recent times. Our rapidly ageing society is creating unsustainable demand for care services, outstripping funding, and forcing carers out of the workplace to look after relatives. But with progress stalling on the implementation of the Dilnot Commission, and household incomes under more pressure than at any time since the 1970s, this is an issue that cannot be ignored for much longer.
It is not just a matter of more funding for local authority social care services. There is a pressing need to take the issue out of the narrow confines of a minority debate about the needs of ‘vulnerable people’ and recognise that the ‘care agenda’ will impact on every family, and is an obstacle to economic recovery.
A key area of focus must be the support available to keep carers in the workplace. Caring is widely recognised as a cause of forced early retirement – 80 per cent of carers aged between 50 and 60 are forced to give up work in order to care. Three in five people will care for someone during their lives.
In the current economic climate forward-thinking employers are focusing on retaining their skilled workers rather than incurring the costs of recruiting new staff. However, despite evidence proving that juggling work and caring can cause real health and employment problems, carers of elderly or disabled dependents are not provided the same support at work as parents of young children.
One solution would be to extend the popular Employer Supported Childcare scheme to apply to carers of adults. This would allow for care services to be purchased via a salary sacrifice, free of PAYE or national insurance contributions. With such incentives in place, funding could be used to access a range of support services including home care, assistive technology and other preventative services.
This would mean that carers would be able to stay in paid employment for longer while continuing their caring roles. The additional support provided could help older or disabled people maintain their independence in their own homes rather than entering costly residential care.
An initial cost analysis of this proposal by the London School of Economics revealed that for a £37m investment from government, £83m could be generated for care services. This could provide an extra 5.5 million hours of care at home for elderly or disabled people.
This is an inherently political issue. As Liz Kendall states in The Purple Book, despite the last government’s achievements, ‘too many families at the last election felt we were out of touch with the reality of their daily lives.’ It is already clear that at the next election family policy and its impact on household incomes will again be a key battleground. As we begin to move towards an election manifesto process, innovative, empowering ideas must be developed to connect with the real concerns faced by families. Supporting carers in the workplace is a good place to start.
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Marc Woolfson is a director at Westminster Advisers
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