NEWS RELEASE FROM THE
REGISTERED NURSING HOME ASSOCIATION
4th May 2005
BLAIR TO FACE £4 BILLION INVOICE
FOR ‘SHORT-CHANGING’ BRITAIN’S SENIOR CITIZENS
If Tony Blair is returned to Downing Street on Thursday, the Registered Nursing Home Association (RNHA) says he ought to be sent an invoice for £4 billion to cover the shortfall in funding of nursing home care for older people during the eight years he has been in office.
This, claims the RNHA, is the whopping sum which the Labour Government owes to the older people who have needed 24-hour nursing home care since 1997, qualify for State funding but, according to independent experts, have found themselves short-changed to the tune of about £80 per person per week.
With around 100,000 people entitled to financial help from public bodies each year to meet their nursing home costs, the under-funding adds up to around half a billion pounds for each of the eight years Labour has been in power.
Should any of the other political parties be in a position to form a Government next Friday, they should be given a year in which to get the funding of nursing home care in order, says the RNHA. But if they fail to deliver the goods, the new occupants of numbers ten and eleven Downing Street will also deserve to receive a back-dated invoice.
Commented RNHA chief executive officer, Frank Ursell: “Older people tend generally to be less demanding and less assertive than younger people. Sadly, it means they are often overlooked by the public services they rely on. Whatever the political complexion of the new Government, we need to put greater pressure on it than ever before to come up with a better deal for our most vulnerable citizens.”
END
Notes to editors:
1. Independent analysts Laing & Buisson have calculated that, during 2004/05, the average gap between the actual cost of providing nursing home care to older people and the amount which eligible patients received from the NHS and social services
towards the cost of their care was £86 per person per week.
2. Two thirds of nursing home patients (around 100,000 people at any one time) qualify for social services financial support to meet their nursing home costs - in addition to the NHS funding which all patients receive towards the element of their care delivered by registered nurses.
3. To calculate the cumulative under-funding of nursing home care since 1994, the RNHA has worked on the basis of £80 per patient per week x 100,000 people x eight years.
For further information and comment please contact:
Frank Ursell, Chief Executive Officer, RNHA
Tel: 0121-454 2511 or mobile 07785 227000
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