In a report by the cross party group of MPs earlier this month, members highlight fragmented services as failing older people, and say the key to securing better outcomes for service users as well as delivering savings for the NHS, is joined up commissioning of services.
The committee also urge government to:
- co-ordinate policy more effectively across Whitehall and regularly rebalance national spending across health, housing and care services
- replace the three overlapping but confusing frameworks that currently exist, with one outcomes framework for older people
- recognise the widening "funding gap" in social care services - between the number of people who need care and the amount of money currently in the system to deal with their rising needs
- accept the recommendations in the Dilnot report for a series of caps on care costs, and identify the level at which it thinks these caps should be set
- take steps to ensure GPs identify much earlier, and assess more clearly the needs of carers providing essential informal care to the old and vulnerable
- develop a new, integrated legal framework to support integration of health, social care and other services around the needs of the individual.
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