The assessment — which comes after The Sunday Times revealed that some councils have spent £200m intended for elderly care on other services — is expected to lead to an overhaul of the way funding is distributed to local authorities.
Under the current mechanism, some local authorities are operating waiting lists because they do not have enough money to pay for services for vulnerable pensioners. Others have surplus cash, which they divert to other areas.
The issue was highlighted last week by Holyrood’s health committee. MSPs were highly critical of the way the policy is implemented and called for an urgent review of the funding mechanism to ensure elderly people receive their legal entitlement to free care.
Now a ministerial working group and a separate body comprising local government finance experts and civil servants will examine ways of ensuring that the funding is distributed according to councils’ needs.
The ministerial working group will also clarify exactly what is included in the care package. At the moment, some councils charge for the preparation of food while others do not. Renfrewshire council used a debt collection agency to pursue the family of an 87-year-old dementia sufferer over a £500 bill for home food preparation.
Advertisement
“We are working together on the issue of resources and how they are distributed,” said a source on the working group. “We will absolutely be taking on board what the health committee has said. The suggestions it made were very sensible and practical.”
The health committee found that almost 5,000 pensioners are on waiting lists for free personal care across Scotland. Of these, 4,005 are waiting to be assessed by councils and 709 have been assessed but are waiting to receive free personal care.
Pensioners in some parts of Scotland have had to wait up to 10 weeks for their assessment, while in other areas they were forced to wait up to nine weeks after their assessment for the service.
The review group includes Scottish executive civil servants and representatives from the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, Age Concern and Alzheimer Scotland.
While opposition politicians welcomed the review, they said the situation could deteriorate before reforms were implemented.
Advertisement
“I welcome the review of the scheme, but my concern is that the changes will not come into effect until 2008, by which time the situation is likely to have become worse,” said Murdo Fraser, deputy leader of the Scottish Conservatives.
“My own council area, Perth and Kinross, had a £1.5m deficit this year and a projected deficit of £3.5m next year.”
Stewart Maxwell, deputy health spokesman for the Scottish National party, added: “The problem we have is here today. I’m suspicious that in the run-up to the election the executive is trying to find an easy way out of the crisis by saying this group is on top of the problem and sorting it out, while in fact 5,000 elderly people are being denied what is their legal entitlement.”
Last year local authorities were given £153m to pay for free personal care for the elderly. That figure will rise to £169m for 2007-8. The cash is intended to pay for carers to help vulnerable pensioners to wash, feed and dress themselves.