Care Act costing £9 million to implement in York

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The York Council says that around £9 million is required to fully implement the new Care Act in the city.

1637 people with care needs who are currenty self funded are expected to apply to the Council for an assessment of their needs

The Council admits that currently there are no Joint Commissioning arrangements in place for the commissioning of health and social care in adult residential care placements in York

The Care Act 2014 brings together existing care and support legislation into a new, modern set of laws and aims to build a care and support system based on people’s well-being, needs and goals.

The Act sets out new rights for carers, emphases the need to prevent and reduce care and support needs, and introduces a national eligibility threshold for care and support.

It introduces a cap on the costs that people will have to pay for care and sets out a universal deferred payment scheme.

Click on the links below to find out about the key changes included in the Act.

Anger as Labour scrap Gale Farm Court window improvement plans

Vulnerable elderly residents face another drafty winter

Gale Farm Court sheltered accommodation

Gale Farm Court sheltered accommodation

Only weeks before new UPVC windows and doors were due to be installed, residents at Gale Farm Court sheltered accommodation on Front Street have been told that the improvements have been shelved.

Complaints about poor insulation had grown over the years before the late Cllr Lynn Jeffries – working with Andrew Waller – managed to secure an assurance from the Council that new windows would be fitted.

It was hoped that the work would be done last year, but it was late summer before the Council moved to get planning permission to undertake the work.

Residents were expecting to have new windows and doors long before the start of the next cold spell.

The reasons for the U turn have not been made clear, there has been no consultation and there has been no public decision meeting at which residents, and opposition Councillors, could make representations.

Many blame Cllr Simpson Laing who has been in charge of housing decisions for the last 4 years. She was also heavily criticised last week for failing to prevent the visits of skips, to places like the Carr and Kingsway estates, from being scrapped.

It seems increasingly likely that Labour will lose control of the York Council on May 7th and essential improvements like these, aimed at helping elderly people, will be reinstated.

NB.The York housing revenue account shows a budget surplus of £15 million

Council briefing minutes cast new light on care homes fiasco

The minutes of a private briefing session for senior Labour Councillors (James Alexander and Tracey Simpson Laing)  confirm that they knew in April 2013 that the Care Village project at Lowfields was doomed.

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Cllr Simpson Laing told officers that the Lowfields site could sell (for housing) for more than valuers had estimated.

Cllr Alexander’s solution was to borrow more but the note says

“borrowing ££ from Economic Infrastructure Fund/new homes bonus (?) to plug gaps – I struggled to follow and got lost!”

Councillors seemed keen to deflect criticism onto the Joseph Rowntree Foundation for the projects escalating costs.

The information has come to light via the Council’s new “open data” web site.

A large amount of information has been published there in response to Freedom of Information requests on the failed £1 million project.

All the background documents can be found by clicking here

Care reform begins on 1st April in York …. more rights for carers and clients

Health and social care partners across York are asking people to find out what the new national care reforms will mean for them as the significant reform across social care – the first in over 60 years – comes into effect from 1st April.

The key changes are:

1.   Carers will have expanded rights to assessment and to council support. This change puts carers on the same footing as those they care for, allowing them to get the support they need for themselves. This could be practical support like being able to take a break from caring responsibilities or they may be entitled to a direct payment to spend on things that will make it easier to carry on caring.

2.   The changes will introduce a new national eligibility threshold, providing peace of mind that wherever you live in the country, or plan to move to within England, if your needs meet the threshold, you will be eligible for support. This new eligibility threshold has already been adapted in York.

3.   Deferred payment agreements will become available across the country meaning that people should not have to sell their home in their lifetime to fund their care costs. In York, the new legislation will strengthen the existing arrangements.

Guy Van Dichele, Director of Adult Social Care, City of York Council says: “We are committed to working with partners to support local people with their needs for care and support. We’re confident that the changes we are making will enable more people to get the help they need, whether that’s a carer who needs a break from caring or someone who may be able to move to a care home without having to undergo the stress of selling their home.”

A Department of Health spokesperson says: “Care and support is something that nearly everyone in this country will experience at some point in their lives. These changes – the most significant in over 60 years – will make the system fairer by putting the needs, wishes and goals of people, and their carers, at the heart of every care decision.”

For more information on the Care Act visit www/york.gov.uk/careact

Looked After Children get new interactive web tool to help shape their care

Children and young people who are being ‘Looked After’ by City of York Council will find it even easier to make their views and wishes known in the future thanks to a new interactive web tool.

Childrens Ipad

The council is using a web-based consultation tool called ‘Viewpoint’ to help children and young people express their wishes, feelings and experiences during their time in care. Viewpoint uses questionnaires with graphics and games to help young people aged five and over to answer questions and think about what they might want to change about their care and support. The tool will also collate and compare the child’s answer to previous responses, highlighting any particularly positive or worrying changes to social care staff.

Nik Flavell, Principal Advisor, Children’s Social Care, City of York Council, said: “Viewpoint represents a significant improvement in consulting with children and young people. While an electronic tool can never take away the importance of face-to-face contact, the interactive nature of the site will help children and young people to consider their care in their own time and in private, helping them to express what is concerning or worrying them, as well as things that are working well. It is part of a real drive to put the voice of the child and young person, their views, wishes and feelings, at the heart of all that is done to care and support them.”

Payments for adults social care get simpler

City of York Council Adult Social Care customers will find it simpler and easier to pay for their care and support services in the future.

In line with new social care legislation – The Care Act 2014 – which becomes law on 1 April, the council has made some changes to the way that it supports people with the funds they receive for care and support.

Residents who receive direct payments – money from the council that they use to pay for their care and support directly – will have it paid into a prepaid account called Cash Plus from 1 April. They can then use the Cash Plus account like a normal current account to pay for the support they need.

The new arrangements mean that the vast majority of social care customers receiving direct payments will use the Cash Plus account, rationalising previous arrangements, though some flexibility will still be available.

Michael Melvin, Interim Assistant Director of Adult Social Care, City of York Council, said: “Directs Payments help to give people more control over their care and support and the new arrangements will make the system simpler and easier for them to use.”

Lowfields – Labour refuse to consult local residents on future of site

Behind closed doors logoLabour Councillors continued to obstruct attempts to get at the truth behind the Lowfields Care village fiasco when the Council held a review meeting last night.

Despite revelations yesterday that senior Councillors have known for at least a year that the planned scheme was “unaffordable”, the Labour Council leadership continues to be in a  state of denial.

Meeting minutes revealed that official had blamed “gold plated” building standards for the failure of the project. They had been reluctant to admit the failures because it “could have affected the credibility of the Councils flagship rewiring project”.

The plan had been to keep the mistakes under wraps until after the Council election in May.  But sustained questioning by Opposition Councillors, coupled with the need to respond to Freedom of Information requests, finally forced the public admission last month.

They now hope to sell the site (a valuation of £2 million has been put on it) but appear to have already decided that 100 homes will be built there.

Other than the normal planning application consultation, residents will have no opportunity to influence this decision.

The present Council now only has about 6 weeks to run. Hopefully a more enlightened regime will take over after May 7th.

Only then is the real truth about the fiasco – which is set to cost taxpayers around £1 million – likely to emerge.

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Major revelations as Lowfields care village plans set for review later today

Leading Labour Councillors knew 12 months ago that project was “unaffordable”

 Minutes of the Council EPH project board meetings are beginning to emerge into the public light. They reveal that the Councils requirements for the Lowfields care village and a similar facility at Burnholme School were described by Council officials as “gold plated”.

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A review meeting of the decision is set to start at 5:00pm today in the Councils West Offices.

As long ago as April 2014 negotiations with the only two remaining bidders for the project had revealed a £17 million gap in funding.

6 weeks later one of the bidders had dropped out, apparently leaving the board with no option but to abandon the project and find another way of dealing with the demand for care places.

At that time, closing all the Councils care homes and buying in all provision from the private sector was the tabled alternative.

The minutes reveal that both Leader James Alexander and Cllr Cunningham (Cross) were briefed that the project was failing. Despite this Cllr Cunningham maintained, in response to Council questions, that negotiations were still ongoing and claimed that procurement rules prevent other Councillors being updated.

In April 2014 the Council were still describing the two site project in glowing terms,

“It will deliver facilities that are light years ahead of our current care homes and ‘raise the bar’ of care provision in the city. The provider should have no difficulty in attracting self-funders into such facilities”.

“The project’s engagement of residents, relatives, staff, older people, voluntary sector partners, and other key stakeholders, in the vision and design of the care home modernisation programme was hailed at the time, and is a blueprint for our current re-wiring approach”.

“The timing of this decision is crucial too coming, as it does, at a point when we are about to publically launch a ‘re-wiring public services programme’ founded on transforming services and doing things differently, based on co-production with our staff, Trade Unions, York’s residents and other key stakeholders. Given the significant public consultation and co-production involved in getting the EPH project this far, if we were to back-track now our credibility would be questioned”

 By February of 2015, the Council was describing the project as outdated with more modest localised facilities said to be an “exciting opportunity“.

The April meeting concluded with the warning “there is still a considerable risk of the procurement falling over (because of affordability issues, the Burnholme site issues, etc.”

A developing sense of crisis is evident in the June 2014 board minutes with a July meeting arranged to formally wrap up the care village option. It would be over 6 months before theist decision was made public.

Opposition Councillors are calling for the minutes of all the project board meetings to be made public.

It still likely that the project floundered as a result of the Burnholme school requirement being added to an already expensive project. In 2012 the Lowfields scheme had been declared financially viable following a “soft marketing” exercise.

It emerged that in 2013 officials had talked of fudging the financial aspects of the project

There is a lot more to come out about this scandal which has already cost taxpayers around £500,000 in abortive costs with promised annual savings of £500,000 a year also jeopardised.

Lib Dems to “call-in” Labour’s Lowfields Care Village U-turn for further scrutiny

Liberal Democrats say Labour run City of York Council should consult local residents on the future of the Lowfields site in Acomb.

Lowfields school site derelict for 4 years

Lowfields school site derelict for 4 years

A new Care Village was due to be built on the site, but last month it was confirmed that the multi-million pound scheme had collapsed. A new plan for housing on the former school site was backed by the Labour Cabinet last night. However, Lib Dems are calling-in the proposals for review saying local residents should be consulted and a range of proposals put forward.

The Lib Dems are also asking for further information on why Labour’s original projects at Lowfield and Burnholme collapsed, how much the overall scheme has cost to date, and a full explanation for an internal report which said that the council could consider “fudging” the financial case for the project.

Cllr Ann Reid, Deputy Leader of the Liberal Democrat Group, criticised Labour’s handling of the care homes project at last night’s Cabinet:

“To have spent four years developing proposals that have come to nothing defies belief. At various meetings the Labour Cabinet Member has said that progress was being made, but this was clearly not the case.

“Unfortunately, it has become symptomatic of this Labour administration that no details are provided (in the report) as to how residents’ money has been spent. The lack of accountability on such a large and important project is astonishing. We need transparency on the project and a full explanation of what has gone wrong.”

Cllr Andrew Waller, Liberal Democrat Councillor for Westfield, commented:

“Local residents have generally welcomed the proposals to use the former Lowfield School site for a Care Village. However, despite the embarrassing collapse of this project, Labour has given very few details on what went wrong or why housing is now their preferred option for the site.

“We are calling for answers and a proper consultation with local residents. A full range of options should then be presented, including whether a different provider could deliver a Care Village at Lowfields.”

Liberal Democrat Councillors Keith Aspden, Carol Runciman and Andrew Waller are calling in the Labour Cabinet’s decision from last night for the following reasons:

The report from Cabinet should provide:

  1.  A full assessment of the reasons for the failure of the EPH project, the decision-making timeline, and a detailed analysis of the costs incurred.
  2.  A comprehensive explanation for why the Lowfield Care Village proposal has been abandoned.
  3.  A commitment to investigate and publish a report on the governance and management of the overall project, including the suggestion that finances be “fudged”.
  4.  A commitment to carry out a full consultation with local residents on the future of the Lowfields site (including the playing fields).
  5.  Following this, a commitment to present to members a range of options (with business cases) for the future of the site including an assessment of whether a different provider could deliver a Care Village at Lowfields.

Further details of Labour’s plans can be found here: http://democracy.york.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=733&MId=8334