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Digital

National Statistics
Publication, Part of

Personal Social Services: Expenditure and Unit Costs, England - 2014-15, Provisional release

National statistics, Official statistics, Accredited official statistics
Publication Date:
Geographic Coverage:
England
Geographical Granularity:
Country, Regions, Councils with Adult Social Services Responsibilities (CASSRs), Ambulance Trusts
Date Range:
01 Apr 2014 to 31 Mar 2015

Summary

This summary provides information about the money spent on adult social care by the social services departments of Councils with Adult Social Services Responsibilities (CASSRs) in England.

This report combines provisional data from 152 CASSRs and relates to the period 1 April 2014 to 31 March 2015. Final data for 2014-15 are due to be published in November 2015; after submitting the provisional data underlying this report CASSRs have an opportunity to update their data in response to validation queries from the Health and Social Care Information Centre which assess the integrity of the data.

The data for this adult social care expenditure report has been sourced from a new collection; the Adult Social Care Finance Return (ASC-FR) has replaced the previous finance (PSS-EX1) and reflects important aspects of the principles underpinning the transformation of social care.

This is one of several collections which have changed as a result of proposals from the Zero Based Review (ZBR) and which draws on the new Equalities and Classifications Framework (EQ-CL).

This is the first year of the new ASC-FR collection and all 152 councils made a submission; although the impact of the change in data source and the introduction of the new Equalities and Classification framework has meant some councils have experienced difficulties in completing their return for the initial pre validation deadline. As a result, some of these data presented are not representative of all 152 councils, details regarding this can be found in both the main text of this report and in the footnotes.

The HSCIC works with councils in order to attain complete data submissions from all 152 councils for the final publication, however in this provisional publication caution should be exercised when evaluating the findings from these first cut data. In the first year of the return we expect to see greater changes between these provisional data and the final data. In addition, it should be noted that we have not provided any estimates for the provisional data and therefore, when discussing figures for 2014-15 and the 152 councils, figures may be understated and lower to the previous year which did include estimates. For further information on the data quality of these provisional data please see Appendix B.

Gross current expenditure has been quoted within this summary unless otherwise stated. National level information is provided by primary support reason and service area in this summary.

Primary support reason: Physical Support, Sensory Support, Support with Memory and cognition, Learning Disability Support and Mental Health Support.

A five-year and ten-year comparison is made in relation to gross current expenditure. However, changes in the financial reporting framework mean it is not be possible to make direct comparisons between 2014-15 and previous years for the primary support reasons and service provision, with the exception of those items included in the bridging year. Further information is provided in the introduction of this report. Please note: on 08 October 2015, the csv file 'pss-exp-eng-14-15-prov-coun-lev-act-data' was updated with the following changes: the data within rows 52 to 85 for short term and additional activity have been corrected to align with the councils detailed in row 1. Users are advised to download these revised files to ensure they have the correct data. The HSCIC would like to apologise for any inconvenience caused.

 

Highlights

National expenditure

These figures are based on provisional data from the new ASC-FR data return, the data shows that Gross current expenditure by CASSRs on adult social care in England in 2014-15 was £17.1 billion. This represents a reduction one per cent in cash terms from £17.2 billion in 2013-14, which is the equivalent of a three per cent decrease in real terms.

Over the five year period from 2009-10, when the figure was £16.8 billion, expenditure has increased by one and a half per cent in cash terms; a decrease of eight per cent in real terms. Over the ten year period from 2004-05, when the figure was £13.5 billion, expenditure increased least 26 per cent in cash terms and half of one per cent in real terms.

The new return in 2014-15 shows that £13.6 billion of gross current expenditure was spent on long and short term support combined; of which 53 per cent (£7.2 billion) was spent on people aged 65 and over, compared to 47 per cent (£6.4 billion) on people aged 18 to 64.

Expenditure on long term support

The new return in 2014-15 shows that 37 per cent (£6.2 billion) of gross current expenditure was spent on long term support for people aged 18 to 64; of which £4.4 billion was spent on learning disability support, £1.2 billion on physical support, £600 million on mental health support, with the remaining £100 million split between sensory support and support with memory and cognition.

Of the £6.2 billion spent on long term support for adults 18 to 64 year olds, expenditure on residential care amounted to £2.2 billion, whilst expenditure for direct payments and supported living amounted to £1 billion each.

For people aged 65 and over, expenditure on long term support accounted for 40 per cent (£6.8 billion) of gross current expenditure; of which £4.4 billion was spent on physical support, £1.2 billion on support with memory and cognition,£540 million on learning disability support, £480 million on mental health support and £130 million on sensory support.

Of the £6.8 billion spent on long term support for adults aged 65 and over, expenditure on residential care amounted to £3.0 billion, whilst expenditure on nursing care amounted to £1.3 billion and home care amounted to £1.4 billion.

Expenditure on short term support

In the new return for 2014-15, for the 145 councils who submitted this data, the proportion of expenditure on short term support for people aged 18 to 64 was one per cent (£150 million) of gross current expenditure; of which £70 million was spent on learning disability support and £50 million on physical support.

For the 147 councils who submitted data for people aged 65 and over, expenditure on short term support accounted for two per cent (£430 million) of gross current expenditure; of which £350 million was spent on physical support.

Other Social Services Expenditure

In the new return for 2014-15, for the 151 councils who submitted these data, nine per cent (£1.6 billion) of gross current expenditure was spent on social care activities and a further six per cent (£1.1 billion) was spent on commissioning and service delivery.

Bridging Year data

In order to allow for some time series comparisons this year's ASC-FR return contained a bridging year sheet. The items listed below are comparable to some of those items collected in the old PSS-EX1 return and councils were asked to report for age groups 18-64 and 65+ but no other breakdowns are included:

1. Total gross and net expenditure on assessment and care management

2. Total gross and net expenditure on residential and nursing care

3. Total gross and net expenditure on home care services

4. Total gross and net expenditure on community-based services excluding home care

 5. Total fairer charging income in relation to community care services

 6. Total gross and net expenditure on Direct Payments

 7. Other gross and net expenditure

8. Grand total of gross and net expenditure.

All of the bridging year data discussed below are based on the submissions from144 councils and the year comparisons made are against those same 144 councils in 2013-14. It shows that in 2014-15 £4.9 billion of total expenditure of those councils was spent on residential and nursing care for adults aged 65 and over, this represents a decrease of one per cent in cash terms (two per cent in real terms), when compared to 2013-14. For adults aged 18 to 64 the figure in 2014-15 was £2.8 billion a decrease of five per cent in cash terms (six per cent in real terms), compared to £3.0 billion the previous year. Direct payments in 2014-15 for adults aged 65 and over increased by 13 per cent in cash terms (11 per cent in real terms), to £470 million from £420 million of total expenditure in 2013-14. For adults aged 18 to 64 expenditure increased by four per cent cash terms (three per cent real terms) to £1.0 billion in 2014-15 from £980 million.

Unit costs

In 2014-15 the average cost per adult aged 18 and over, supported in long term residential care and nursing care was £668 per week. For adults aged 18 to 64 with a primary support reason of physical support the average cost for long term residential care and nursing care was £887 per week, compared to £535 per week for adults aged 65 and over. For adults aged 18 to 64 with a primary support reason of learning disability the average cost for long term residential care and nursing care was £1343 per week, compared to £906 per week for adults aged 65 and over. For home care, the average standard hourly rate was £29 for services provided in-house, compared to £14 for provision by external providers.

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Last edited: 2 November 2018 2:23 pm