Report of the Executive Director Adult Social Services and the Director of Public Health

Following the Spending Review announcements and other updates the Council is forecasting an estimated shortfall of £4m in 2022/23, £64m in 2023/24 and £85m by 2024/25. This report sets out the high-level position. Officers have identified options to balance the budget in 2022/23 which are subject to approval.

The Committee considered the report of the Executive Director Adult Social Services and the Director of Public Health that described that following the Spending Review announcements and other updates the Council was forecasting an estimated shortfall of £4m in 2022/23, £64m in 2023/24 and £85m by 2024/25. The report set out the high-level position and where Officers had identified options to balance the budget in 2022/23 which were subject to approval.

Key points and themes in the report included:

Describing that the Local Government Finance Settlement would be released in December 2021;

A longer-term strategy to close the budget gap was being prepared with an estimated requirement to find budget cuts and savings in the region of £40m per annum for 2023/24 and 2024/25; and

Describing the priorities for the services within the remit of this committee, details on the initial revenue budget changes proposed by officers and the planned capital programme.

Some of the key points that arose from the Committee’s discussions were: -

Noting the significant number of Manchester residents with adult social care needs;

The need to articulate this to residents of the city, stating that despite the inadequate funding by Government, Manchester had remained committed to protecting the most vulnerable residents; and

Stating that the Government needed to recognise the important role that health workers and carers played, noting this had been demonstrated throughout the pandemic and they needed to adequately fund this service.

The Executive Member for Health and Care said that during the years of imposed austerity Manchester had witnessed a loss of £419M to the budget, making it very difficult to deliver services and support residents, however despite this Manchester had remained committed to supporting the most vulnerable residents in the city. She described that the Government had failed to recognise the demands upon the service and had failed to adequately fund Adult Social Care.

The Executive Director Adult Social Services stated that despite the financial challenges Manchester was committed to improving the health outcomes for Manchester residents and described that the Better Outcome Better Lives approach and the delivery of the Manchester Local Care Organisation, demonstrated this. She stated that Manchester would continue to work with the Government and articulate the case for appropriate funding to support this activity, in particular as Manchester was a Marmot City Region and was committed to addressing health inequalities.

The Director of Finance (MLCO) described that there was a clear stated commitment across all partners delivering Health and Adult Social Care to build upon and strengthen the partnership approach. She further made reference to the success of the improved arrangements to support patients being assessed to leave hospital (Discharge to Assess). In response to a specific question regarding the Greater Manchester Integrated Care Board (MCIB) she advised that she was confident that it would have the approved budgets by 31 March 2022, adding that this Board would assist with reducing the cost of commissioning of services due to the economy of scale this would enable.

The Deputy Director Adult Social Services stated that the report made reference for the need for Adult Social Care to intervene in the social care market to shape the market to meet health and social care needs including new build facilities, or the acquisition of existing buildings which could be tailored to care models. However, at this time there were no specific schemes in the pipeline, and these would be developed with partners and further options would be detailed in future budget reports to the Committee.

Decision

To note the report.