I so agree Jacqui I am a former family carer and in 1984 joined my wife’s single-parent family of 2 daughters the elder had multiple physical disabilities, a sensory disability and severe learning disabilities and was much later found to be autistic. Before my meeting, the younger daughter helped her mother look after her just elder sister, so there was some element of Younger carer involvement. With my involvement, the younger daughter could to some extent have her own life back. But I found out much later after the death of my wife in September 2020 that there was a little resentment with my younger daughter toward her mother due to the lack of attention she was receiving during the time before I joined the family. However, she never expressed such to her mother as she appreciated it was no fault of her mother and her elder sister, just how it was.

My wife and I continued to manage the care between us, my wife already giving up paid work to be a full-time family carer claiming the very insufficient Carers Allowance, but supplemented by my own income. The health of my wife and my own was then fairly good, but my wife’s health started to deteriorate and I was still working full-time, so in 2008 we applied for some home care and were granted 6 hours per day from Monday to Friday, which I extended to 6.5 hours by including an unpaid half-hour lunch break. A few years later my wife’s health had continued to deteriorate and my own started to so we applied for more care and got similar for Saturdays and Sundays. Over the next few years, both our health continued to deteriorate and I reduced my 5 working days to 3 days, but after some years it became clear that more home care was required and in 2015 we asked for more and to our surprise was offered 24/7 care.

With the initial 6 hours of home care through Monday to Friday we were granted a Direct Payment which I managed myself and not through a Managed Account. But with the Saturday, Sunday and the eventual 24/7 care minus the 6.5 hours Monday to Friday the Direct Payment was extended to include payments to a care provider. After one poor care provider, we found another that was excellent and so were the carers they provided. After the death of my wife and previously taking early retirement for health reasons, I eventually decided in 2021 that I could no longer manage the Direct Payment and the employment of the 2 carers Monday to Friday so the 2 carers were Tuped into the care provider and after much discussions the Care provider did take over management of the Direct Payment.

But as I said I am a former family carer as my daughter eventually succumbed to her disabilities and she died in October 2022.

All this time I extended my involvement in adult social care by offering my experience to the local authority and to this day I am extensively involved in many working groups endeavouring to improve the systems, but also I am involved with my Local Healthwatch, a number of disability charities and whenever possible the health authorities and university research.

So I have extensive experience on the shortages of funding for social care generally, including insufficient funding for social workers as well as paid family carers. While social workers are so overworked and paid insufficiently, this is similar to that of paid carers in all aspects of care, especially within home care, where many are only on the National Living Wage, currently £10.42. let alone the Real Living Wage of £10.90 per hour or perhaps slightly more, but still way insufficient and the resulting so shortages of carers, even with the little influx of non-UK care workers who have to be sponsored to the degree of £10,000 I believe by their care provider and their work visas are nowhere long enough.

Social care has been on its knees for years and those knees are so well wornout now, that the existence of social care in any real form is really not possible, which will have great implications for the NHS for one can’t exist without the other.

So, this so-called great funding of £8 billion is ‘chicken feed’ to what is really required and to have it shared between children’s and adult social care is so ridiculous, for Adult social care needs at least £8 billion itself and children also. But even £8 billion is nowhere sufficient and it should be £12 billion just for adult social care and not just for this year but many subsequent years and increasing in line with real inflation. To not do so will see the decline of social care not gradularily but significantly until there is no real social care for anyone and that is not far off and really surprised it hasn’t already.

One of the reasons is the significant contribution of family carers which in 2021 was over £193 billion and more than likely increasing and if not not decreasing. Family carers are human also and in providing care their own health deteriorates as I know from my own family and the sad death of my wife in September 2020 and maybe mine sooner than later.

So the health of both persons in need of care and their families will continue decline requiring much more social care and then resulting in much more NHS care and so the insufficiencies continue to escalate, just because government won’t sufficiently fund social care let alone the NHS. We can’t all afford private health like many in the government can and that is also why there are staff deficiencies in the NHS as they go to the private sector or away from the UK completely for ever.

This government and most before have been incapable of looking after social care and I so fear so will future governments.