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IMMEDIATE RELEASE
The Homecare Association has today condemned the Government’s Comprehensive Spending Review and its political choices, as ministers prioritise billions on bombs and NHS expansion over the preventative care and support needed by millions of older and disabled people in our communities.
With no significant new funding to reform adult social care, no plan to address exploitative local authority commissioning, and no serious money to implement the Fair Pay Agreement, we are concerned the government is failing to recognise care as a vital part of our social infrastructure.
Dr Jane Townson OBE, Chief Executive of the Homecare Association, said:
“This Government is spending billions on bombs whilst neglecting older and disabled people in our communities. Caring for each other is a fundamental human need. Many UK citizens have a keen sense of fairness, kindness, and community. They have family and friends who need help and are struggling. Many will see this as a grotesque failure of moral and fiscal leadership.”
On the £29 billion additional investment for the NHS, Dr Jane Townson OBE said:
“We appreciate the importance of the NHS but it does not exist in isolation. If older and disabled people cannot access homecare, they end up in hospital or come to harm at home. Ambulance queues, rising A&E admissions, corridor care, long waiting lists for treatment - these are all symptoms of a government that refuses to fund our sector adequately. No amount of money directed to the NHS is going to fix this.”
On the Government’s reference to a Fair Pay Agreement without a defined funding envelope, Dr Jane Townson OBE said:
“This Government talks about ending exploitation, shifting care closer to home, and building a high-wage economy. These are laudable aims which we fully support. But announcing a Fair Pay Agreement without any serious funding plan is pure theatre. Providers cannot magic money from the ether. Without investment, these policies are hollow and unworkable.”
Last week, the Homecare Association warned:
- 27% of contracts fall below the minimum cost of employing a care worker at £12.21/hour, including travel and training.
- Six councils in England, including Labour-led authorities, offered 0% uplift in 2025–26, despite 10–12% cost pressures on providers.
- The average council fee rate is just £24.10/hour, compared to the Homecare Association’s Minimum Price of £32.14/hour.
- Only 1% of contracts meet or exceed the legal and operational threshold for sustainable, safe care.
Yet the Government has withheld the £1.6 billion urgently needed in homecare to close the funding gap and refused to invest properly in its own flagship Fair Pay Agreement for careworkers as the level required to make it deliverable.
The policy document accompanying the Spending Review 2025 says “The SR allows for an increase of over £4 billion of funding available for adult social care in 2028-29, compared to 2025-26”.
Dr Jane Townson OBE, Chief Executive of the Homecare Association, said:
“We have little confidence in the statement made in the Spending Review policy paper about increased funding for adult social care over the coming years. This likely means local authorities will be allowed to increase council tax. If the government intended to allocate funding from HM Treasury, the Chancellor would have said so. We know from the Urgent and Emergency Care Plan published last week that the increase in the adult social care slice of the Better Care Fund is 3.9%, which equates to £103m. This will not scratch the surface of what is needed.
"Providers are struggling to deliver services to people with increasing needs with fees that don’t even cover the National Living Wage now. What is the point of spending months negotiating with Unions about a fair pay agreement when the funding for it does not exist. It will be a colossal waste of time and energy.”
Dr Townson added:
“The Government cannot claim ignorance. It cannot pretend this is sustainable. Everyone in the social care sector had such high hopes for a new Labour government after years of Tory neglect. Sadly, we will remember this Government not for bold reform but for knowingly turning its back on the people who need care and support the most.”
The Homecare Association is calling for the government to:
- Invest at least £1.6 billion immediately for local authorities in England to ensure care worker wages meet legal minimums.
- Introduce a National Contract for Care that guarantees sustainable, lawful fee rates.
- Fully fund the Fair Pay Agreement and ensure it addresses existing shortfalls, not just future aspirations.
- Treat social care as an equal partner to the NHS, not a subordinate or afterthought.
END
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