Care Sector Reacts To Chancellor Rachel Reeves Autumn Budget
The residential and nursing care sector has voiced alarm at Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ Autumn Budget today, warning that the financial package offers insufficient support to offset the mounting cost pressures threatening the viability of hundreds of care homes across the UK.
Rachel Dodgson, Chief Executive of Dimensions, said:
“Today’s Budget says nothing about adult social care.
“The government has effectively abdicated its responsibility for reforming adult social care in this parliament. Instead, the government is waiting for the Casey Commission to release its findings, with the final report not due until 2028.
“Yet adults with learning disabilities and autistic people who draw on support cannot wait that long. Neither can the 1.5 million people working in social care.
The government’s September announcement of £500 million for the Fair Pay Agreement for social care – which like the Casey Commission, won’t be implemented before 2028 – is nowhere near enough.
“This Budget both could and should have ring-fenced money to invest in the social care workforce in advance of the first Fair Pay Agreement for social care in 2028.
“We need faster action and appropriate funding – and recognition for the social care workforce to support recruitment, retention, and consistent, high-quality support for those who rely on it. The time to act is now.”
Vic Rayner, CEO of NCF commented:
“Far from acknowledging a sector where, as reported by ADASS in its Autumn Survey, pressures are intensifying, the Chancellor’s second Budget seems to overlook the financial support desperately needed by care and support providers. Social care is a public service and much of it is commissioned by the state yet unlike last year where the Chancellor announced dedicated funding to be made available in the Local Government Finance Settlement to cover both wage and structural changes for adult social care, this year she was silent.
“We know that social care needs to change – so how does this budget move forward social care?
“Getting apprenticeships right for social care would be a significant step change to bridge the gap in UK national workforce. The devil is in the detail, but an initiative that created free training for social care apprentices for SMEs would support a core part of the sector under pressure and strengthen local delivery. However, there was no explicit reference to the vital need for a social care workforce strategy. This is particularly important as the Home Office’s plans to introduce more stringent settlement conditions for migrant care workers already in the UK is likely to drive many away at a time when recruitment of domestic workers continues to fall.
“This budget has strengthened the national agenda to grow health tech, whilst ignoring the reality that millions of people receive social care behind closed doors, in their own homes – where flexible responsive data driven technological solutions can augment and support the care that people need. Upgrading the focus on innovation and technology in social care is not a ‘nice to have’ it is an essential plank in addressing the changing needs and demography that must drive forward change.
“It appears that the government continues to step back from the difficult decisions about social care – leaving Baroness Casey to speak truth to power. However, if the truth is that the cupboard is bare – then a budget which neither recognises the contribution or the real cost of adult social care will feel like a missed opportunity – one that we will all be paying for long into the future.”
Helen Walker, Chief Executive of Carers UK, said:
“The Chancellor has earmarked £75 million over the next three years to put right the failures that led to the Carer’s Allowance overpayments scandal. Yesterday’s commitment to reassess cases where averaging of earnings could have reduced overpayments is a vital step towards addressing the injustices carers have faced for far too long. In the coming days, we will be examining how much of this funding will directly benefit carers and how much will be used to implement the new systems and processes that are so urgently needed to prevent this happening again.
“In April this year we also welcomed measures to increase the earnings limit on Carer’s Allowance from £151 to £196 per week, the equivalent of 16 hours at the National Living Wage. Today the Government committed to a further increase in the National Living Wage, and it has previously said that the earnings limit will keep pace with this – to avoid a situation where carers must reduce the hours they work every time there is an increase in the National Living Wage. We will look forward to seeing the details of this shortly.
“It is deeply disappointing that social care was once again missing from today’s Budget. 65% of unpaid carers say that they feel overwhelmed because they can’t take time away from their caring roles. Many are unable to access respite or even a short break, due to chronic underfunding, placing immense pressure on their health and wellbeing. We urgently need decisive action to strengthen the social care system so carers can get the support they so desperately need.
“We welcome the Chancellor’s acknowledgement of the financial strain families are under, but unpaid carers are being hit especially hard. They already face additional costs linked to their caring roles, and 1.2 million are living in poverty. Our research shows that nearly half (49%) of carers have cut back on essentials such as food, heating, clothing and transport, while a third (32%) have turned to loans, credit cards or overdrafts. Measures announced today to reduce day-to-day costs are helpful, but support for unpaid carers must go further.”
Responding to the Autumn Budget, Nuffield Trust Senior Policy Analyst Sally Gainsbury said:
“Under today’s Budget, day-to-day NHS spending is set to rise 2.2% next year, and while it has escaped cuts, this harks back to the slow growth we saw under 2010s austerity. There are some small boosts to pay for redundancies and new NHS tech. But with this now set to be one of the tougher periods for funding in the NHS’s history, an awful lot is being asked from this modest increase – from improving access to GPs in poorer areas, to totemic pledges like reducing hospital waiting lists.
“As the OBR warns, the unresolved dispute between government and the pharmaceutical industry is still looming large. If the government concedes to pay higher prices for the same drugs, that will either eat into today’s settlement or divert funding away from more cost-effective care like GP appointments, which give patients much greater health benefit for every pound spent.
“Meanwhile, today’s Budget has boosted the National Living Wage – which will come as welcome news to the many social care workers on low wages – but there’s no new money to help the care sector with the impact. With almost a quarter of the 1.5 million strong care workforce paid within 10 pence of the Living Wage in 2024, even small increases can have a big impact on the cost of delivering care. We estimate that this increase could cost the sector around £1.2 billion. It is difficult to see how current levels of investment will stretch to deliver even the planned social care workforce reforms, let alone leave enough for wider changes to England’s broken care system.
“Social care is still in dire straits and the impact of last year’s Budget measures, including Employer National Insurance rises, are beginning to bite. Ultimately, people who need care and support will feel the effects as cost pressures continue to increase.”
Jonathan Carr-West, Chief Executive, Local Government Information Unit (LGIU), said:
“There was little in this Budget to address the real risks facing local government: SEND, temporary accommodation, adult social care. But it did reveal something about the government’s underlying attitude toward councils.
Pots of money handed out to individual areas will, of course, be welcome — and we know that councils will use every pound to great effect. But these one-off allocations are no substitute for a fair, sustainable funding system that genuinely empowers local government.
It’s right that local areas should be able to decide whether a tourist tax is right for them. But why should this be limited to mayors? Why not trust local leaders and councils? Why not bring it nearer to communities?
Most telling of all is the introduction of an additional levy on council tax — money that won’t support cash-strapped councils but will instead go straight back to Whitehall not the town hall.
There has always been a tension between councils as sovereign, democratically elected bodies and as delivery agents for central government policy.
This Budget treats councils as tax collectors for Whitehall: taking all of the political heat but getting none of the benefit.
This government came to power promising devolution, localism and community empowerment. Based on this budget, that’s still work in progress.”
Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, said:
“NHS leaders across the UK understand the pressure on public finances and that’s why they are reforming local services to deliver higher quality and more efficient care.
“To go further, they need more capital investment to create new facilities and fix the NHS’ crumbling estate. That’s why the decision the Chancellor has made in the Budget to allow private capital to be used to build new neighbourhood health centres in the English NHS is so important. Using private capital to build new facilities not only increases overall investment in the NHS but frees up public funding to tackle the £16 billion estates maintenance backlog.
“This is a first step to bringing vital investment into an NHS that has been starved of capital funding for more than a decade. NHS leaders will hope further private capital can be leveraged to create new and upgraded facilities in hospitals and mental health services.
“Much of the UK government rhetoric today is focused on how the Budget is prioritising the NHS over other areas. NHS leaders don’t take this for granted, but the reality is that the NHS budget in England is under significant pressure from rising demand for care, ongoing strike action and the threat of higher drug prices as highlighted by the Office for Budget Responsibility. In particular, local services cannot continue to absorb the costs of ongoing strike action by the BMA without consequences to patient care.”
Hugh Alderwick, Director of Policy and Research at the Health Foundation, said:
‘Tackling NHS waiting lists was one of the Chancellor’s three priorities for the Budget, but making this happen will be tough with the resources on offer. Most of the additional day-to-day funding for the NHS already announced in the Spending Review will be eaten up by rising costs, like pay growth and meeting rising demand – as well as the costs of government’s own NHS reorganisation. Boosting productivity will be critical to avoid a large gap between the health service people expect and the resources available to deliver it.
‘The announcement of £300m investment digital infrastructure is welcome and could help the NHS improve productivity. But the NHS’s maintenance backlog – including urgent repairs to avoid injury – currently stands at £15.9bn and growth in capital spending is still constrained after years of underinvestment that put us behind health systems in comparable countries.
‘Rising costs will also eat into an already over-stretched social care budget. The decision to boost the National Living Wage is welcome and will benefit the many low paid care workers delivering vital care and support, but it will also add to their employers’ costs, with no additional government funding to cover it. We estimate that meeting demand for care, covering rising costs, improving access to services, and boosting care workers’ pay could cost an extra £8.7bn in 2028/29. Meantime, the government’s plan for delivering the national care service it promised voters is still pending. The government needs to use the Casey review as a route to delivering meaningful reform to social care in England – not delaying it.
