Social Care News

CFW chair speaks out over NHS 'gridlock'

Mario Kreft MBE, chair of Care Forum Wales, is calling for the authorities to put "prejudice" about the private sector to one side to solve the crisis facing the NHS this winter.

Mr Kreft stressed the need for everybody to work in partnership following the publication of a report by the Welsh Assembly Health, Social Care and Sport Committee into 'winter preparedness'. According to Mr Kreft, the key findings chimed with what Care Forum Wales had been saying for many years.

The report's first recommendation was that there needed to be more integration between the health and social care sectors and that, crucially, the independent sector needed to be part of the solution. The report also highlighted concerns about the financial viability of the sector in the light of care home closures, the problem of domiciliary care contracts being handed back to local authorities and the need for improved training.

Mr Kreft said: "Our hospitals are staffed by wonderful, dedicated people. The unprecedented levels of need and overwhelming pressures are not their fault. It's the system that's dysfunctional.

"A study by the respected Joseph Rowntree Trust in England has shown that 30 per cent of the people in hospital shouldn't be there at all. That means there are also many people in hospital in Wales who would be better off somewhere else receiving more appropriate care, more suited to their needs.

"One thing is certain, if the independent sector is not treated as a full and proper partner, the situation will get even worse and catastrophe could be just around the corner."

Read more on this story on the Daily Post website. Download the report here in English and here in Welsh.