A troubling specter haunts thousands of the UK’s most vulnerable adults living in specialist residential care homes – the threat of traumatic ‘eviction’ as a deepening funding crisis pushes many facilities to the brink of financial collapse. Care providers supporting people with learning disabilities and severe autism are sounding the alarm that without an urgent injection of funds to match steep tax and wage increases, they may be forced to ‘hand back’ care contracts to local councils and close homes, uprooting residents from the stable, familiar environments they depend on.
The stark warning emerges from the annual Sector Pulse Check survey of over 200 private and charitable social care organizations, which paints a picture of a specialist care sector on a knife-edge. As costs soar but cash-strapped council funding remains frozen or cut, many providers say they can no longer afford to provide high-quality 24/7 support for people with complex needs without facing insolvency.
‘Handing Back’ Contracts in a Funding Squeeze
For care providers, ‘handing back’ contracts to local authorities is the last resort when the sums simply don’t add up anymore. This means ceasing to provide care for individuals the council has placed with them because the funding is inadequate to cover escalating costs. The consequence is that vulnerable residents who may have lived happily in a care home for years, building relationships with staff and fellow residents, face being moved out as their placement becomes unviable.
Learning disability charity Mencap, one of the UK’s biggest care providers, has warned it may be forced to close services and hand back contracts due to “crippling” hikes in costs and the National Living Wage without matched funding. This could leave local authorities struggling to find alternative placements for adults with complex support needs.
The Human Cost of ‘Evictions’
For the individuals and families affected, this amounts to a wrenching ‘eviction’ from a place they considered home, bringing huge uncertainty and disruption to lives that thrive on consistent routines and familiar faces. Many have profound intellectual disabilities or fall on the severe end of the autism spectrum, meaning even small changes to their environment or support staff can trigger extreme distress and challenging behaviors.
Families say the experience can be profoundly traumatic, setting back progress by years. One parent of an autistic adult facing transfer to an unfamiliar care home said it was “like ripping up a tree and replanting it, roots and all“. Advocates argue such upheaval breaches the rights of disabled people to choice and stability under the Care Act.
These are real people, not packages to be passed around. Forcing them out of their homes is cruel and short-sighted – the long-term costs to their wellbeing will be immense.
– Mark Vickers, learning disability advocate
Specialist Care at a Crossroads
Many in the sector argue years of central government austerity and stagnant care fees have left local council budgets overstretched, creating a dire shortfall between the true cost of quality care and the funding available. They say the funding formula fails to account for the extra expense of round-the-clock staff support, specialized therapies and autism-friendly environments that people with the most complex needs require to live safe and fulfilling lives.
With inflation now biting and the National Living Wage poised for a record 9.7% hike in April, providers warn the gap is becoming a chasm. As costs mount for everything from energy to food to insurance, there are fears of a wave of financially driven ‘evictions’ if the Treasury doesn’t provide emergency funds in the Spring budget to help councils pay a fair rate for specialist care.
Eroding Quality for Those Who Remain
Even for those not directly threatened with transfer, chronic underfunding of specialist residential care risks a steady erosion in quality of life as a financial vice tightens on providers. Two-thirds of organizations surveyed in the Sector Pulse Check said they would need to make cutbacks if funding doesn’t rise to meet soaring costs, such as trimming staffing levels, reducing community activities, or cutting back on therapies and equipment.
For people whose conditions demand intensive support and rigid routines, such pruning of provision due to penny-pinching risks aggravating challenging behaviors and damaging hard-won progress. Staff reductions are especially feared for the impact on safety and continuity of care.
Our autistic residents struggle with any change to their support team. Gaps in shifts and a churn of agency staff to plug vacancies just increases their anxiety. We need funding to recruit and retain permanent, well-trained carers.
– Alexandra Homes, care manager
A System on the Brink?
With specialist care providers edging towards a financial cliff-edge, experts warn of a looming eruption in unmet need and unmanaged crises if more facilities are forced to close or retrench services due to unviable council contracts. Local authorities will be left scrambling to find suitable alternative placements for those ‘evicted’ in a shrinking pool of supply, with the specter of people ending up in inappropriate settings ill-equipped for their needs.
There are even fears of more autistic and learning disabled adults getting stuck in secure psychiatric units, the very institutions specialist community-based care was meant to replace. This would turn back the clock on years of hard-won progress towards supporting the most vulnerable disabled people to live fulfilling lives in the heart of their communities.
The crisis in specialist care funding threatens to unravel decades of advances in disability rights and inclusion. We’re on the brink of a full-scale reversion to institutionalization by default.
– Stephen Chandler, director of adult social services
A Plea for Emergency Investment
As the Spring budget approaches, care providers, charities, and families are united in pleading for an urgent cash injection to patch the hole in local care budgets and put the sector on a more sustainable long-term footing. Without it, they say, a wave of financially-driven ‘evictions’ and care home closures is inevitable, unleashing a domino effect across the entire care system.
The Care and Support Alliance, representing over 70 disability organizations, is demanding the Chancellor pump an extra £2.5 billion into councils’ adult social care budgets for 2023-24 to help cover soaring costs, warning of a deepening “human crisis” in support for working-age disabled adults living in the community if funding remains frozen.
This is a fight for the very survival of a specialist care sector that enhances so many lives. Without an immediate funding boost and a long-term plan, we’ll see an avalanche of ‘evictions’ from homes people cherish. The human cost will be devastating.
– Jane Ashcroft, CEO of Anchor Care
With the government under intense pressure to invest in clearing NHS backlogs, there are fears social care will again lose out in the coming budget. But advocates warn this would prove a false economy, arguing that properly funding community-based specialist care is vital to reducing demand on hard-pressed hospitals and mental health services. As the squeezed sector approaches a tipping point, all eyes will be on Westminster to see if the plight of autistic and learning disabled adults facing ‘eviction’ from cherished homes finally spurs action to pull specialist care back from the brink.
