Impact of the social care reform

Implementation of the adult social care charging reform has been delayed until October 2025. The work undertaken with providers during 2022-2023 has, however, provided a wealth of information that helps to inform the current gaps between Council average fee rates paid and the median rates calculated as part of the fair cost of care and the wider challenges that are impacting on market sustainability.

In the 2021-2022 market position statement, we said that we would:

Move towards paying a fair cost of care for services commissioned
Develop the market sustainability plan detailing how, and over what time frame, we will move to paying the fair cost of care as calculated via the review process
Secure the capacity needed to support the expected increase in assessments needed relating to the take up of section 18 (3) of the care act 2014

Visit the GOV.UK website for more information about the adult social care reform.

What we achieved

In collaboration with providers, we have:

Produced and have published the market sustainability plan for Norfolk and fair cost of care reports for older adult care homes and over 18 year olds domiciliary care services
Work has been done to understand the level of self-funders and the assessment capacity needed once the charging reform is implemented

What we have not been able to achieve

The delay in the implementation of the social care reform has resulted in resources previously earmarked to support the charging reform being allocated as part of the social care grant. This meant that as a Council, other market sector priorities needed to be considered not just those relating to older adult care home and over 18 year olds domiciliary care provision.

This means that we have not been able to move further towards the median rates calculated through the most recent national fair cost of care for 2023-2024 for older adult care homes.

Next steps

We are committed to moving towards paying the median cost of care within the Government's timescales and within the funding afforded to us for this specific purpose.