Extra £25m for West Sussex social care services in Chancellor's Budget

An extra £25m has been provided for social care services in West Sussex in the Chancellor's Spring Budget.
Louise  Goldsmith, leader West Sussex County Council (photo submitted). SUS-150813-103444001Louise  Goldsmith, leader West Sussex County Council (photo submitted). SUS-150813-103444001
Louise Goldsmith, leader West Sussex County Council (photo submitted). SUS-150813-103444001

Philip Hammond unveiled the extra £2bn in grant funding nationally over the next three years.

This follows lobbying from West Sussex County Council including two letters sent to Communities Secretary Sajid Javid calling for action to address funding shortfalls.

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The county council’s share includes £11.3m, £9.3m and £4.6m over the next three years, totalling more than £25m.

Louise Goldsmith, leader of the county council, said: “We welcome this additional, much needed £25million funding for adult social care.

“The county council united collectively across all political parties to ask the Government to recognise the growing social care challenges being faced in our community and the Government has listened.”

The county council has called on the Government to set up a task force to look at adult social care pressures.

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Plans for a new local adult social care taskforce to look at closer working between health and social care providers are also moving forward.

Council services support around 13,000 elderly residents of whom 8,000 are eligible for financial support. The number of people over 75 will increase by 2,200 people each year until 2021 and then a further rise of 4,400 will be seen every year.

Mrs Goldsmith added: “This additional funding will not solve the long term challenges we face at a national and local level but it will ensure that we are able to now spend time looking for longer terms solutions as we are able to deal with the immediate financial pressures we face.

“Without doubt we face enormous challenges in the delivery of frontline services but we will continue to work closely with partners in the NHS and voluntary sector to deliver high quality, sustainable services.

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“We will continue to innovate and improve to support older and vulnerable people to live well and independently in their communities for as long as possible.”

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