What is adult social care? The Kings Fund (see policy think tanks below) explains that Adult Social Care covers a wide range of activities to help people who are older or living with disability or physical or mental illness live independently and stay well and safe.  It can include ‘personal care’ (such as support for washing, dressing, and getting out of bed in the morning) as well as wider support to help people stay active and engaged in their communities. Social care includes support in people’s own homes (home care or ‘domiciliary care’); support in day centres; care provided by care homes and nursing homes (residential care); reablement services to help people regain independence; providing aids and adaptations for people’s homes; providing information and advice; and providing support for family carers.  Others sum it up simply as  “Whereas the National Health Service is life-saving, social care is life-changing”.

For material by ERSCAG or more topical reports/articles check elsewhere on website (especially our monthly newsletters).  The listing below concentrates on key documents produced from other sources in past years.

Articles/Reports

• Association of Directors of Adult Social Services – regular annual reports, statistics and studies on social care – www.adass.org.uk
• British Association of Social Workers, A vision for social work – adults, (January 2021); see www.basw.co.uk
• Bunting, Madeleine: Labours of Love: the crisis of care, Granta Books, 2020.
• Cavendish Report – Social care reform: independent report by Baroness Cavendish, February 2022,  at Social care reform: an independent review by Baroness Cavendish – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
• Centre for Welfare Reform: Fully Funded Social Care, by Simon Duffy & Gordon Peters, 2019.
• Doctors in UNITE – policy statement on a National Care Service, 5 October 2020.
• Ethical Care Charter (undated) by UNISON, www.unison.org.uk
• Goodbye Cinderella: A new settlement for care services – moving forward from the pandemic (Autumn 2020), National Pensioners Convention, www.npcuk.org
• People’s Covid Inquiry – report published in December 2021 – see www.peoplescovidinquiry.com

Beyond England

• Australia:  A widescale public and grassroots consultation (involving Citizens Assemblies etc) was organised in 2019 leading to changes in social care www.everyaustraliancounts.com.au
• Foundational economy – a concept being explored across a range of European countries – see www.foundationaleconomy.com.  See, for example, in relation to Wales https://gov.wales/healthier-wales-foundation-economy-programme
• Scotland – see Independent Review of Adult Social Care (report published 3 February 2021) at  www.gov.scot/groups/independent-review-of-adult-social-care
• United Nations – www.un.org  and www.ohchr.org – see, in particular, key documents such as –
  1. UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (UNCRPD)
  2. UN Principles for Older Persons
  3. Universal Declaration of Human Rights (see especially Articles 2 and 25)

Ealing Specific (see erscag.org.uk)

• Determining Your Financial Contribution – information for all Adult Social Care customers in Ealing, April 2019 (www.ealing.gov.uk)
• Independence, Choice and Wellbeing – your guide to Direct Payments, published by the London Borough of Ealing (www.ealing.gov.uk)

Journals

• Journal of Long-Term Care (see www.ilpnetwork.org/journal): an international, multi- and inter-disciplinary, peer-reviewed, online journal established as a focus for advancing the research evidence base for all aspects of long–term care for adults.
• Which magazine (April 2018) with details of when Local Authorities pay care home fees.

Legal cases and legislation on social care

(www.gov.uk)

• Care Act 2014
• Coronavirus Act 2020
• Health and Social Care Act 2012
• Health & Care Act 2022
• SH, R (on the application of) v Norfolk County Council & Anor [2020] EHWC 3436 – a judicial review finding against Norfolk Council regarding charging for social care services.

Major (historic) Studies

• Commission on Fairer Care Funding (known as “The Dilnot report” after chair Sir Andrew Dilnot), July 2011, see also commentaries on Dilnot report 10 years on by Age UK/Nuffield Trust etc.
• Fair Society, Healthy Lives: Strategic Review of Health Inequalities in England post 2010, February 2010 (the Marmot Review) https://www.parliament.uk/globalassets/documents/fair-society-healthy-lives-full-report.pdf, and for ‘10 years on’ see www.futurecarecapital.com
• Royal Commission on Long Term Care (called “The Sutherland report”), The Stationery Office, March 1999, see www.health.org.uk which brings many of these seminal reports together.

Oversight bodies issuing reports/commentaries on social care

• Care Quality Commission (www.cqc.org.uk) oversees care provision and produces annual assessments on the “State of Care” in England.
• Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman investigates complaints about registered adult social care providers www.lgo.org.uk

Parliamentary sources

• Audit Office: for example – “The adult social care market in England”, report by Comptroller and Auditor General, Session 2019-2021, 25 March 2021, HC 1244, www.nao.org.uk
• Economic Affairs Committee, Lords Select Committee: “Social Care Funding – time to end a national scandal”, HL 392, published 4 July 2019.
• Health & Social Care Committee report “Social care: funding and workforce” (October 2020) – and government response January 2021 (CP 360). For other inquiries, especially those currently underway, see Health and Social Care Committee – Summary – Committees – UK Parliament
• Joint Parliamentary Inquiry (by Health and Social Care Committee and the Science and Technology Committee) into Coronavirus: lessons learnt (including “its impact on the social care sector and the impact on BAME communities”), established October 2020.
• Parliamentary Briefing papers – e.g. nb.8000, 23 October 2017, Social Care: Government Reviews and policy proposals for paying for care since 1997, and nb 8001, 8 July 2020; Adult social care funding reform: developments since July 2019 www.parliament.uk/commons-library
• Westminster Hall debate on Social Care Reform and the Social Care Workforce, Hansard,  18 March 2022 https://www.parliamentlive.tv/Event/Index/15ba1f80-ba6e-49c7-9977-b71152db410d
• White Papers: Government regularly publishes official policy/consultation documents best accessed via (www.gov.uk).  For example, “Build Back Better: our plan for health and social care” (September 2021); and a ‘ten year vision’ for social care was issued (December 2021)  entitled “People at the heart of care: adult social care reform”.  See also responses, such as in the latter case, “The Future of Adult Social Care” by local government www.local.gov.uk
• Women and Equalities Committee: various coronavirus related inquiries in 2020 “Unequal impact” on grounds of disability, gender and race. Women and Equalities Committee – Summary – Committees – UK Parliament
• An Inquiry into Long-term Funding of Adult Social Care was initiated (March 2021) by the Parliamentary Select Committee on Housing, Communities and Local Government, now being pursued by its successor Select Committee on Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee.  See website for final report (expected in 2022).

Policy and academic think tanks

• Health Foundation report- www.healthorg.uk – various reports including “Social care funding options: how much and where from” (May 2018) and another (with the Kings Fund and Nuffield Trust) “The value of investing in social care”, briefing October 2021.
• Independent Living Strategy Group – Charging for Social Care: a tax on the need for support?, c.2018, available from www.in-control.org.uk and/or www.disabilityrightsuk.org
• Institute of Public Policy Research – various studies and reports, including “Who cares: financialisation in social care” September 2019 (www.ippr.org)
• Kings Fund, various expert research reports and regular statistics entitled “Key facts and figures about social care”, www.kingsfund.org.uk
• Nuffield Trust –  www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk – including “Social Care, the action we need” – report published November 2019; ISBN: 978-1-910953-72-3.
• Policy Exchange –“21^st century social care: what’s wrong with social care and how we can fix it”, ISBN 978-1-910812-21-6, June 2019.
• PSSRU (Personal Social Services Research Unit) based at Kent University maintains extensive resources of information on social care – www.pssru.ac.uk
• Resolution Foundation – www.resolutionfoundation.org “A budget for inter-generational fairness” (November 2017) looks amongst other things at funding of social care; as also their “A caring tax rise?”, July 2021, etc.
• Skills for Care – www.skillsforcare.org.uk produces annual national and regional reports on the “Size and Structure of Adult Social Care and State of the Workforce”.
• Women’s Budget Group – see www.wbg.org.uk for numerous gender focused reports including “Investing in the Care Economy” (2017); “Social Care: A system in crisis” (2017); “A Care-Led Recovery” (March 2021); and (with New Economics Foundation) “Universal Quality Social Care: Transforming Adult Social Care in England” (January 2022).