DHSC tells us it hears us but ARC England members are asking – what’s the plan?
The latest ARC England Fee Rate Maps are launched today with updated 2024-25 data showing that, in addition to year-on-year underfunding, average fee rate uplifts do not come close to covering the additional costs employers have to meet following the Chancellor’s 2023 Autumn Budget.
This brings vital services to the point of collapse, leaving people with a learning disability and autistic people without the essential support they need to live safe, dignified lives of choice and control.
The maps now contain seven years of data and are again searchable by local authority and by constituency. Average fee rates for each area and service have been added, accessible from a drop-down menu above the map:
· Fee Rate Maps 24-25 by Local Authority
· Fee Rate Maps 24-25 by Constituency
For yet another year the cumulative impact of year-upon-year of below-inflation fee rate increases is starkly visible in the uplift line graphs.
ARC England called for 12% to cover just the impact of the autumn 2023 Budget, without other inflationary costs. The average fee rate uplifts by service type fall significantly short:
- Residential: 8.67%
- Supported Living: 8.51%
- Day Services: 7.39%
- Domiciliary: 9.2%
As a result, our members are tell us they are:
· refusing to accept new packages of care they are well-placed to deliver
· handing back existing packages of care that are costing them too much to deliver
· using reserves that they have a legal duty to preserve to ensure that they can continue to support people.
Members also tell us that, where they work with more than one Local Authority, they are seeing an increase in occasions when one council is not paying fully for the services it is commissioning and is therefore being subsidised by other authorities. This is in breach of the legal duties councils need to adhere to. Public bodies must also be aware of their statutory duties contained in other legislation, such as the Human Rights Act 1998 and the Equality Act 2010, as well as the best value obligation contained in the Local Government Act 1999.
ARC England Director Clive Parry: “The state has a duty to provide the services that we have analysed and it is time for central government and councils to stop passing the buck between them and for the state to pay for the services it is required to provide and on which people with a learning disability and autistic people and their families depend.
“DHSC colleagues have told us they are hearing us. What we want to understand is: what is the plan for dealing with the crisis?”
“With the Chancellor’s Spring Statement confirming benefit/welfare cuts that will affect so many disabled people, including the people supported by our members, ARC England’s position is that making already poor people worse off will do nothing to improve their lives and prospects or the economy of the country. We understand the financial pressures facing the country and we understand the geopolitical changes that are happening, but we think there are fairer, better and more humane ways to balance the books.”
The Fee Rate Maps data, gleaned from Freedom of Information requests to all 175 local authorities in England and Wales, shows that learning disability and autism services are now firmly in crisis. With the Fair Pay Agreement on the horizon, the time is long past for the Government to recognise and accept its responsibility to ensure that the state pays for services it has a statutory duty to commission.
New for this year
Members told us more detail was needed to allow meaningful comparison of day service rates, so local authorities were asked additional questions to gather data about support ratios (1:1 vs group support), travel and food provision costs.
Where local authorities have not responded to our Freedom of Information request, this is noted and provider data is given if available.
What’s next?
We will soon be publishing the LA league tables and results of our surveys to providers and ICBs about the detail of fee rates paid to learning disability and autism support providers.