NEWS RELEASE FROM THE
REGISTERED NURSING HOME ASSOCIATION
IN WALES
Issued 14th March 2005
SWANSEA NURSING HOMES WELCOME COUNCIL’S FEE INCREASE FOR CARE OF OLDER PATIENTS BUT SAY MORE CASH WILL BE NEEDED OVER THE NEXT YEAR
Representatives of Swansea’s nursing homes have welcomed an increase of five per cent in the amount paid by the City and County Council for older people who qualify for financial support from its social services department to meet their care costs.
The increase will go some way, say nursing home leaders, towards the goal of achieving financial stability for independent sector providers who care for Swansea’s most vulnerable older people, many of them with multiple nursing needs.
Director of the Registered Nursing Home Association in Wales, Emlyn Davies, said Swansea’s nursing homes were pleased that the Council had recognised the need for an above-inflation increase in its weekly contribution towards the costs of care.
Nursing homes were still struggling to cope with the consequences of last year’s eight per cent rise in the national minimum wage, he said. The increase would help to plug the shortfall.
Whilst applauding the Council’s decision, which comes into effect on 1st April 2005, Mr Davies warned that another rise in nursing home fees would be essential to help meet the cost of a further ten per cent rise in the national minimum wage over the next year that had already been announced by the government.
Said Mr Davies: “We shall have to look to the good offices of Swansea Council during the coming year to make sure that nursing home services to older people are not placed at risk by these further increases in wage costs that are now in the pipeline.”
He added: “It is very unfortunate that the five per cent rise we have just been given by Swansea Council has not been matched by the NHS, which is supposed to fund the nursing element of the care we provide. Overall, the NHS contribution towards costs is rising by only three per cent, which dilutes the benefit of the five per cent offered by the Council.”
Mr Davies said that, at a UK-level, the Registered Nursing Home Association would be pressing the Government to raise the NHS contribution to elderly care costs so that it more accurately reflected the true proportion of those costs represented by nursing care.
END
Notes to editors:
1. In October 2004, the national minimum wage rose from £4.50 an hour to £4.85 an hour, an increase of just under eight per cent.
2. In October 2005, the national minimum wage will go up again from £4.85 an hour to £5.05 an hour, and then again in 2006 to £5.35. Together, the two planned increases will lift the rate by a further ten per cent.
3. From April 2005, after increases in Swansea Council and NHS contributions to weekly elderly care costs are taken into account, the average weekly fee paid to nursing homes for looking after older patients will rise from £420 to £439, an increase of 4.5 per cent.
For further information please contact:
Emlyn Davies, Director of the Registered Nursing Home Association in Wales
(Tel: 07974 221531)
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