Issue - meetings

To look at the Internal and External Spend analysis and the number of service users supported by Haringey Older People Service.

The total gross budget for older people’s services is £40,000,000.  This is the largest budget spend for any one service in the Adult, Culture and Community Services Directorate.

The majority of the budget is spent on assessed services which come under the Fair Access to Care Services Criteria and are at the higher level of dependency.

Drop In centres are non-assessed and are universally available to those who are over the age of 65yrs and able to get to the centres.

Approximately 5% of the budget is spent on preventative services. The service is trying to move resources to the preventative end in line with policy directions, for example Our Health, Our Care, Our Say.  This is a slow process and can only happen on a incremental basis due to the shift of resources from the acute end.

Over the past three years the service and partnership direction has been in moving from institutional care to helping older people remain in their own homes with more flexible support. There is recognition that there is still more to be done.

Placements in Care Homes as a totality have reduced by over 200. 

The future focus is on personalising services – a significant cultural change.  This ‘self-directed’ care is centred on people making their own choices on the care that they receive with budgets given to them.

The enabling of this will be a significant challenge for the directorate as a whole.

Points of discussion

Safeguards for potential risks associated with Direct Payments include close monitoring of older people in receipt of Direct Payments and investigating any cases where concern arises.

Transport is noted as an issue for older people accessing services.

Queries on the Spend Analysis.  For example the Assessment and Care Management spend looks like it has doubled from 05/06 to 06/07 when in fact this reflects the externalisation of residential homes and the subsequent way in which costs are classified. 

Spend Analysis will come back to the next Panel with further clarification.