Clearing the backlog caused by the pandemic – Health and Social Care Committee Report

Article by Abigail Moir, Policy Officer at Care England

The Health and Social Care Committee published their ninth report of session 2021-22 on ‘Clearing the backlog caused by the pandemic’. While the report heavily focused on the backlog that has built up in the NHS due to the pandemic, some recommendations will help support the social care sector. Below we have highlighted where social care is mentioned in the report to see where Care England can get involved and help influence future decisions. Most notably, the report suggested that HEE must be required to publish a five, ten, and twenty-year plan for the social care workforce, an initiative that Care England has continued, and will continue, to call for.

Article by Abigail Moir, Policy Officer at Care England

The Health and Social Care Committee published their ninth report of session 2021-22 on ‘Clearing the backlog caused by the pandemic’. While the report heavily focused on the backlog that has built up in the NHS due to the pandemic, some recommendations will help support the social care sector. Below we have highlighted where social care is mentioned in the report to see where Care England can get involved and help influence future decisions. Most notably, the report suggested that HEE must be required to publish a five, ten, and twenty-year plan for the social care workforce, an initiative that Care England has continued, and will continue, to call for.

Scale and impact of the backlog

1. Our key new recommendation is that, by April 2022, the Department of Health and Social Care works with NHS England to produce a broader national health and care recovery plan that goes beyond the elective backlog to emergency care, mental health, primary care, community care and social care.

2. We, therefore, recommend that NHS England publishes, before the end of this financial year, a long covid plan covering the period until 2023. The plan must be developed in consultation with a wide range of stakeholders, including patient groups. NHS England should integrate this into its wider health and care recovery plan, as long covid is likely to have implications for demand and workforce across a range of services.

3. The national health and care recovery plan must set out a clear vision for what ‘success’ in tackling the backlog will look like and what patients can expect their care to look like in their local area in the coming years. The plan must include minimum expectations for ICBs in managing waiting lists actively, and communicating with patients awaiting planned care. The Department of Health and Social Care, NHS England and local ICBs must share responsibility for communicating the ‘offer’ to the wider public, considering the “social backlog” facing many members of the public. We request the Department of Health and Social Care to report back to us on how this will be delivered.

4. We again recommend that the Care Quality Commission includes consultation with patient groups and details of patient outcomes in its assessment of ICSs.

Funding and policies to tackle the backlog

1. We repeat our recommendation that HEE must be required (whether in its own right or as part of NHS England) to publish objective, transparent and independently-audited annual reports on workforce projections that cover the next five, ten and twenty years, including an assessment of whether sufficient numbers of staff are being trained. These projections must cover social care as well as the NHS, given the close links between the two systems. We urge NHS England to ensure that workforce planning is included in any future iterations of the elective recovery plan.

2. We recommend that the Government undertake an urgent review of short-term recruitment and retention issues within the health and care workforce, including productivity improvements, sharing of best practice through data, removal of professional demarcation, use of technology, additional training places and additional immigration measures. This should be published before the arrival of the funding due in early 2022.

3. We have heard much about how a robust social care system that can support hospital discharges and free-up capacity is essential to clearing the backlog. We welcome the inclusion of the social care workforce in the refreshed Framework 15. Social care, however, did not receive an adequate settlement in the spending review, with the £5.4 billion over three years falling well short of the £7 billion annual increase we have previously recommended. Even after the spending review period, there 38 Clearing the backlog caused by the pandemic is no guarantee of additional funding from the Health and Social Care Levy, so we remain very concerned that social care will remain the poor relation. Without the right support for social care, a recovery plan for the NHS is doomed to fail.

4. In light of the Government’s commitment to reform social care, we again recommend that it publishes a ten-year plan for social care, setting out in detail how it will tackle the structural and financial problems the sector faces in the short-term, and operationalise its longer-term ambitions. The Government must also acknowledge the needs and wellbeing of staff working in the social care sector by publishing a people plan for social care, aligned to the ambitions set out in the NHS People Plan.

5. To encourage better integration and mutual understanding across health and social care, we again recommend that a duty be placed on ICSs, so that where a decision by an ICS affects carers and the social care sector, the ICS must undertake a formal consultation with the groups and sectors affected.

6. We have previously recommended that Care Quality Commission ratings include an assessment of the progress ICBs make on the integration of information technology between primary care, secondary care, and the social care sector. We repeat this recommendation here. Although the CQC is an independent body, we believe that including the delivery of integrated care and the effective use of technology within the domains it inspects, would encourage further progress on integration.