Jewish charities sound alarm on three-year wait on social care reform

The community’s leading social care charities have expressed concern about the extended time period set by the government to address the need for significant reforms in the sector.

Health secretary Wes Streeting last week announced the launch of a historic independent commission to reform adult social care, warning older people could be left without vital help and the NHS overwhelmed unless a “national consensus” was reached on fixing a “failing” system.

An interim report will be delivered in 2026, but he final report is not expected until 2028.

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Norwood’s chief executive, Naomi Dickson, responded to the government’s announcement, telling Jewish News: “While we welcome the renewed commitment by the government to addressing the significant challenges in the social care sector, most notably the real cost of funding care now and in the future, we are concerned about the protracted timeline for further reviewing where the issues lie.

“Social care providers such as Norwood are under more pressure than ever, and the prospect of another distant report provides little clarity or direction for us as we look to pivot to ensure we can continue to provide quality care for the people we support, while faced with meeting increased costs of up to £2m a year as a result of National Insurance rises.”

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Dickson added: “We add our voices to calls from the sector for the commission to engage all stakeholders in swiftly developing decisive and purposeful recommendations that can help realise the government’s hopes to make lasting and impactful change a reality.

“We hope this will translate into a firm commitment to providing appropriate funding that meets the cost of care and ensures that, as a specialist provider, our doors can remain open to the growing numbers of adults, children, young people and their families – with and without a diagnosis – in our community who rely on our support.”

Jewish Care’s chief executive, Daniel Carmel-Brown, told Jewish News: “It’s imperative the Government garners cross-party support for long-term change and the commission is a vehicle to do this, and therefore avoids successive governments abandoning policies. A plan for social care reform has been a concern for the whole sector and for wider society for many years. We had hoped to see national consensus on the issue of long-term funding for social care and the provision of additional funding to local authorities for adult and children’s social care for many years.

“Jewish Care believe that we have created a model that demonstrates how a partnership between the state, communities and families can work successfully. We have offered to be part of any future discussions on models of social care and funding to share our model and expertise in this area with decision-makers on how to resolve the growing crisis in social care, with increasing costs for providers. It is currently unsustainable.”

A task force, led by the cross-bench peer Louise Casey, will now be charged with developing plans for a new national care service.