The Report stage of the Personal Care at Home Bill is tabled for debate next Wednesday. I wonder how long the Government can hold on to it in the face of cross-party opposition. We have all been cheered by the perceptive ‘Third Report of the Commons Health Select Committee’ criticism of the bill published this last week, at http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmselect/cmhealth/22/2202.htm which surely will help to dissuade the Government to proceed. The summary says “We have strong misgivings about the Free Personal Care at Home Bill, which smacks of policy-making on the hoof. This piecemeal reform risks creating perverse incentives and introducing unanticipated consequences. Estimates of demand and cost appear low, and the reform risks being substantially under-funded. The DH has yet to clarify how it will find its share of the funding, except to say some money will come from public health and research budgets, which could be detrimental to the long-term interests of NHS patients.”
Labour rebels Lords Warner and Lipsey, and the opposition Health spokesmen conservative Earl Howe and Lib Dem Baroness Barker, with Lord Best and I for the crossbenchers have jointly tabled a group of amendments which if carried would delay the implementation until after the election to give more time for working out what really needs to be done in practice for such a bill to work well and give time for serious reconsideration. If we win the votes then the government will have to do some serious rethinking.
We must develop a cross party consensus on how to fund social care which has the support of most people. It is too important an issue to be shuffled around as a political football. It must feel fair and it must be comprehensive. As a baby boomer I’m all too conscious that when my generation enters our 80s and 90s we’ll pose quite a challenge!
And here are pics of the delightful and clever Earl Howe and the unnervingly knowledgable Baroness Barker.
Baroness Barker
Earl Howe
My Lady it appears one of your pics or perhaps both are too large for the blog.
Alternately it maybe the link is too long. Try coding it here with no spaces.
Is the Personal Care at Home Bill likely to be killed by the wash-up. Is Earl Howe’s position personal or party – as if the latter the bill would seem blockable until after the election via their wash-up ‘veto’?
I don’t have the pleasure of being acquainted with either of the two models!
I have looked at the report headings, and the
experience of one’s own nearest and dearest in their last days of life, with unused care services, and resistance to using them, for the sake of remaining independent, must be of some value.
Peripatetic staff are expensive if “qualified” and “trained” people are used, however footling it is.
The principal purpose of the bill must surely be to deal with the increasing numbers
of old people, starting soon with the post war bulge, and some must be ‘behaving old’ by now!
The cost of in-patient care is much much higher than visiting care at home, which is the purpose of the bill. some people get very comfortable in hospital beds, the ones who are the scourge of the NHS hospital.
Personal care at home might only take a few minutes from a visitor, but to have tabs on all possible such patients is useful.
The families of people, who have lost their legacies, thanks to the requirements of in-patient charges for the frail, must think that Home care would have been much better!
But then it might also be better to charge for the home visiting privilege too.
The agency fees for home private visiting are huge, but why not a means test to see who really can afford to pay for it.
This is an incredibly complex issue and any sudden leap in any direction is likely to have detrimental effects. It is essentially all about costs,departments and how those costs could be foisted from one to another. Also about raising the necessary funding, either taxation, private insurance or direct charges which could be put against property where applicable.
I haven`t looked in any great depth at the bill, just really the conclusions of the report. Due to the complexity, the issues raised by the report and the fact we are still in recession no matter what the media/government depts., states this is possibly the worst time to be going forward with this bill.
It appears the issues have not been looked at with great scrutiny of all the departments involved. Costings appear to not have been calculated to any great depth and the ability of one authority to pass over to another costs/patients appears not to have any type of regulation.
I have great concerns that such a bill at the end of a term of Government are being put, especially when something so undemocratic as the “wash-up” maybe involved. This bill affects all the frail of our society, the old, infirmed and ill. It also could put local departments, LA`s and NHS at odds with each other.
Costings during a time of war, uncertainty and recession cannot have been given the correct necessary scrutiny.
I do not think anyone should be asked to vote on such a complex issue without a serious study of the matters involved. Those who do should take into account the report stage conclusions from those who have studied it to a degree.
Carl H your views are broadly supported by most of the Lib Dems, rebel Labour abd some crossbenchers. Conservatives (Croft, Earl Howe is acting in his party capacity but I believe is personally very committed to a more considered approach too).
We have all been sent a letter urging us not to oppose the Bill by ministers Phil Hope MP and Baroness Thornton, a sure sign we;ve got them on the run!
Ah and you’ll all be pleased to know Hansard soc are trying to make it easier for us to put pictures in!