Response to £240m winter fund

Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, Matt Hancock, has today (1 October 2018) pledged a £240m cash fund for social care this winter.

In response, Rick Wright, Policy Manager for England at Marie Curie, said:

Today’s announcement of a £240 million funding injection into social care over Winter is a welcome recognition that the sector is in crisis, however the scale of the problems faced by social care means that this can only be considered a sticking plaster.

With a predicted funding gap of £2.5 billion in social care by 2020, placing these services on solid footing will require a much more comprehensive and substantial plan of action than this emergency funding represents.

The long-awaited Green Paper on social care represents an opportunity for Government to take a strong stance on social care and make real commitments to improving the state of the sector through concerted investment. With social care already at breaking point, we simply can’t afford to let this opportunity pass us by.