LGA: Public will not recieve old age care they expect

Nine out of ten adults expect subsidised care from their council in old age, new research published today reveals. These figures come at the same time as new analysis of the Comprehensive Spending Review shows that from 2009 councils will receive very little additional funding to meet the needs of the growing numbers of older people.

The LGA’s analysis on the Comprehensive Spending Review has shown that very little additional funding has been made available to councils to deal with the hundreds and thousands of older people in the future.

An LGA commissioned Ipsos MORI poll reveals a startling disparity between people's expected level of service from their council and the reality they will face in old age, with only five per cent of respondents said they would expect to pay for all their basic care.

Addressing over 2000 delegates at the Local Government Association adult and children services conference, Sir Simon Milton, chairman of the LGA will say:

“There is a startling gulf between the type of care people expect when they reach old age and the reality of what they will receive. This research is particularly timely given the extent to which government has failed to provide any money for the 400,000 more older people expected to need care in the next three years.”

"A poor funding settlement, an ageing population and a lack of progress on any long term solution to the financial pressures on social services means that local government will face a situation, by as early as April 2009, where it cannot afford to provide services to the hundreds of thousands of elderly people whose independence relies on them.”