Britain’s population is ageing.  As a result the care that the Government provides for the elderly is going to become a more and more pressing issue as time passes. Even if it cannot be agreed on whether the Government should take on more responsibility for the provision of care, surely it should go without saying that cutting current levels of adult social care is a bad idea?

The Tories became the largest single party on the Brighton and Hove City Council in the local elections in 2007; before that the Labour Party had either been in overall control of the council or at least formed the executive. Since the Tories have been in control of the council the standard of adult social care has slipped according to several reports (see the CSCI reports from when Labour controlled the Council, compared to 2007-08).

The Council report on adult social care and health services notes that: “The outcome of these various judgements is that the Council has been judged to be 2 Star overall as against 3 Star in the previous two years”. In spite of this the Tories continue to slip the possibility of front line service cuts into reports.

Worse than the reports hinting at the Tories’ dark intentions is the most recent budget. This budget outlines cuts that have threatened 160 jobs: in all 51 jobs from the Adult Social Care and Health Department were singled out in the December Cabinet Paper leaving it the worst affected department so far (the full 160 jobs likely to be cut are identified on p.13).

When something as important as adult social care is getting worse you would not expect those in charge to make significant and damaging cuts to the Adult Social Care and Health department; yet here we have the Conservatives of Brighton and Hove City Council doing just this. Once again cuts hitting the most vulnerable in society in order to make savings that will benefit the richest most.

| Category Health, Public Services, South East