Allocating Personal Budgets/Grants to Carers

Abstract

English policy and practice guidance recommends local authorities offer personal budgets to all adults eligible for social care support using transparent and equitable allocation systems which maximise choice and control for users. This includes family and other unpaid carers as carers in England are entitled to their own personal budget. The Care Act 2014 strengthens carers' rights and places duties on authorities to assess and meet carers eligible support needs. However, little is known about how authorities assess and allocate resources to carers. This article explores this information gap drawing on data from a survey of English local authorities in two regions completed by carers lead officers and complemented by follow-up telephone interviews with a sub-sample of these officers. Findings: Survey and interview results demonstrate wide practice variations around how social workers assess, calculate and distribute resources to carers. There is little uniformity across authorities. Carer eligibility criteria are used but thresholds vary and are often unclear. Most grants/personal budgets are allocated as single annual payments but how the level of these grant/personal budgets are calculated varies with little standardisation. Applications: The article develops the evidence base surrounding resource allocation to carers through carer grants/personal budgets. Findings are timely as the Care Act 2014 will strengthen carers' rights alongside the continuing personalisation of adult social care. Discussing local authority policy and practice around key objectives of equity, transparency and carer choice, implications for future social work practice and its development are considered in light of the Care Act 2014.

Carers, Choice and Personalisation: What Do We Know?

“…Examples of wider organisational and contextual factors specifically relevant to carer choice in personalisation include the way local authority regulations and practices shape personalisation processes with the result that carers do not always benefit from intended personalisation outcomes. This is particularly apparent in English social care when carer assessments and service user assessments are uncoordinated, with the consequence that carer information is potentially marginalised (Mitchell et al , 2014a, b, 2015; Glendinning et al , 2015). Further marginalisation can occur during carer assessments when carers’ wider personal outcomes (around leisure, employment and training) are not considered (Seddon and Robinson, 2015).…”

“…The availability of support, especially in the context of financial capping, alongside local authority regulations around the use of resources in relation to carers’ choices (for example, payments as only one-off block grants to carers) are also important as they can restrict the flexible and creative tailoring of individual support (Mitchell and Glendinning, 2015). This flexibility and creativity provides carers with options and thus, potentially, more choice.…”

Cash for care and care employment: (Missing) debates and realities

“…In 2008, “personal budgets” can be taken either as “direct payment,” managed by the care user (preferred policy option) who receives the payment on a specific bank account or used to pay a third party (informal care provider), or left to local councils whose responsibility is to commission the necessary services (Netten et al, ). The 2014 Care Act has reinforced the personalization agenda: local authorities have a legal obligation to offer personal budgets, whereas this alternative was only recommended up to that point (Mitchell & Glendinning, ).…”

“…local authorities have a legal obligation to offer personal budgets, whereas this alternative was only recommended up to that point (Mitchell & Glendinning, 2017).…”

“…First, since the 1970s, the “attendance allowance” (AA), a universal social security benefit, is paid to older people who need regular personal care. Conceived as a complement to informal care provision and, similarly to the Italian IdA, stemming from disability policies, it is commonly used to pay for domestic tasks and light support (Mitchell & Glendinning, ). Second, following a debate on the empowerment of care users, since 1997, local authorities have been able to deliver “direct payments” instead of services in kind (to disabled people first and also to elderly people since 2000).…”