Agenda item

10:15

The Director for Social & Community Services will give an oral update on key issues.

The Director for Social & Community Services gave an oral update on key issues. The main points are listed below:

New Appointments

·        Andrew Lansley CBE is now the Secretary of State for Health. Mr Lansley had previously served as the Shadow Health Secretary since 2003;

·        Paul Burstow MP is now the Minister of State for Care Services. Mr Burstow, formerly the Liberal Democrats' chief whip, has a long record of interest in social care issues including adult protection, dementia and social care funding. He had previously been a member of the all-party parliamentary group on dementia and the health select committee and had held the post of Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary.

• Anne Milton MP is now the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Public Health. A qualified nurse, Anne worked for the NHS for 25 years and has a wide range of experience within the NHS, including district nursing, in hospital, working in research and supporting GPs and nurses working in palliative care. She also pioneered a scheme to look after people who were sent home early from hospital. Her last job in the NHS was to give medical advice to councils and housing associations. Ms Milton has been a shadow health minister since 2007 and was a member of the health committee from 2005 to 2006.

·        Simon Burns MP is now the Minister of State for Health. Previous positions include Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health 1996-97; Opposition Spokesperson for: Social Security 1997-1998, Environment, Transport and the Regions (Planning, Housing and Construction) 1998-99, Health 2001-05; Shadow Minister for: Health and Education 2001-04, Health 2004-05; Opposition Whip 2005-10.

·        Earl Howe MP is now the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Quality. He was opposition spokesman for Health and Social Services in the House of Lords since 1997. He is an elected hereditary peer under the provisions of the House of Lords Act 1999.  Apart from his frontbench responsibilities, Earl Howe has previously been a member of the all-party groups on penal affairs, abuse investigations, pharmaceuticals, adoption, mental health and epilepsy.

Early government pronouncements relating to Adult Social Care

·        Personal Care at Home Act2010 – The government had made it explicit that this would not be implemented. They had raised the possibility that some of the resources that it had set aside might be used for re-ablement;

·        Government Commission on the funding of long term care – this would look at the funding of long term care and would report within a year. The expectation was that legislation would then follow.

·        The Secretary of State for Health had highlighted the importance of joint working with Health and the importance of public health. The Directorate welcomed both. The Health White Paper was due in July, followed by a second White Paper on Public Health in the autumn. The Strategic Health Authority would be abolished on 1 April 2012.

Local Key Issues

·        Cost of the Directorate’s internal services – work was underway looking at this, as the Council had agreed that £1m savings could be made from internal home support and further £1m savings from internal services for adults with learning disabilities;

·        Financial outturn for adult social care – the overspend was approximately £400,000, which out of a total budget of £200m was extremely close to the budget. The main overspend was in relation to the older people’s pooled budget.  Thjs would have to be carried forward as a pressure to be met during the current financial year.

·        The savings requirements set out in Annex 3 of the budget papers would be achieved by the end of the financial year. The unidentified savings line for future years in Annex 3 was relatively small in 2011/12 but did build up to £17m by 2014/15. Some of the savings would be made through the introduction of the Resource Allocation Policy and officers were working on how to make the savings through previously identified means, ie price increases which are below the prevailing inflation rate, prevention etc;

·        Carers Services – Officers had put a specification for carers’ services to the market last year but had aborted it for a number of reasons; including the fact that more carers needed to access services. It is estimated that currently only 15% of carers in Oxfordshire take advantage of existing carers’ services.  In addition, officers wanted to consider the implications of the development of the new Customer Service Centre. Therefore, the existing contracts to the carers’ centres had been extended for a year. In due course a revised specification would be put out to the market and providers would be asked to put forward proposals;

·        Dementia Awareness Day (23 May 2010) – 250 people had attended. The event had cost almost nothing to run - as the Ashmolean Museum and the Randolph Hotel had provided their facilities for free - just the cost of carers’ expenses.