Archbishops call for ‘radical redesign’ of England’s ‘broken’ care system

Published

1 year ago

January 24, 2023

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Archbishops have called for a “radical redesign” of England’s “broken” social care system.

A so-called National Care Covenant, setting out the rights and responsibilities of national and local government, communities, families and citizens should be established, the Archbishops’ Commission on Reimagining Care said.

Published today, it also calls on the government to “set out a long-term commitment to introduce a universal entitlement to care and support” which should be on a par with the NHS.

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The report took 18 months to compile, and it included input from people including unpaid carers, experts and care workers.

Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby said such a covenant would be a “step towards” a position where “everyone is engaged in a collaborative effort to ensure that we can all access the care and support we need”.

The report said: “This will require a means of collective funding and pooling of risk, probably with a tariff of care charges established on a national basis.”

In November, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced that social care reforms due to come into effect in October this year would be delayed by two years until 2025.

They include an £86,000 cap on personal care cost contributions, and an expanded means test that is more generous than the existing one.

In their report, the archbishops insisted “piecemeal tinkering with the existing system will not produce the desired result”.

They called for “a radical redesign of the system to make it simple, consistent and person-centred”.

They acknowledged their recommendations will come at a cost, stating that it “cannot be the work of government alone, nor will it be achieved in one parliament”.

Stating that “social care is everybody’s business”, the commission said people should be willing to contribute funding through taxes “so that everyone, regardless of income and wealth, can get care and support”.

The commission has also called for a new deal for unpaid carers, ensuring they are better valued and supported, with adequate recognition, rest and recompense, as well as more investment in communities.

Census data for England and Wales revealed that five million people currently provide unpaid care to people with long-term health conditions or problems related to age.

Katharine Macy is among the five million.

She became a carer for her mum when she was just 10 – helping to cook, clean and organise the household finances.

“It was quite natural to go to school, come home, do things at home then do things like homework – or my own ‘fun’ things,” she said.

Katherine said her role as a carer has always been “at the centre of many things” in her life, which made deciding to study a PHD full time difficult – as it would mean her 80-year-old grandmother picking up the slack.

She is glad she made the decision, and grateful for the support of her family, but said she still deals with “a lot of guilt and a lot of tears because you would do anything for the people you love”.

Mr Welby said: “This report gives me hope that we can rise to the challenge of fixing our broken social care system.”

Commission chairwoman Dr Anna Dixon said: “This is no time for tinkering around the edges of a social care system that for too long has left people who draw on care and support feeling marginalised, carers feeling exhausted and undervalued, a system which provides no clarity about what is expected of each of us.

“A National Care Covenant, with its focus on the mutual responsibilities, will help us to work together towards our common goal.”

A Department of Health and Social Care spokeswoman said: “We are committed to working with a range of stakeholders on how best to improve adult social care and we have made up to £7.5bn available over the next two years to support services – the biggest funding increase in history.”

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World

Israel-Hamas war: Hostage’s parents tell him ‘stay strong’ after video shows him alive but missing part of arm

Published

1 hour ago

April 25, 2024

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Israel-Hamas war: Hostage's parents tell him 'stay strong' after video shows him alive but missing part of arm

The parents of an Israeli hostage have told him “we love you, stay strong, survive” after he appeared with part of his arm missing in a video released by Hamas.

Hersh Goldberg-Polin was kidnapped at the Nova musical festival when Hamas attacked Israel on 7 October.

The video shows him with his lower left arm missing; witnesses said it was blown off when he helped throw grenades out of a shelter where people were hiding.

Middle East latest: Hezbollah dismisses ‘worthless’ Israeli claims on commanders killed

He reportedly used his shirt as a tourniquet to stem the bleeding, but was captured.

Clearly under duress in the undated video, the 23-year-old criticises Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government, saying they should be “ashamed” for not securing the hostages’ release.

He also claims Israeli bombings have killed “about 70 detainees like me” and that the rest are living in an “underground hell without water, food, or sun”.

Mr Goldberg-Polin, who wears a red shirt and sits against a plain white wall, finishes with an appeal to his parents, telling them “stay strong” and “I love you so much, and miss you so much”.

His parents responded to Wednesday’s video by filming their own emotional response.

Jon Polin says hearing his son for the first time in more than 200 days is “overwhelming”.

“We are relieved to see him alive but we are also concerned about his health and wellbeing as well as that of all the other hostages, and all of those suffering in this region,” he says.

Mr Polin calls for the countries involved in negotiations to “be brave, lean in, seize this moment and get a deal done to reunite all of us with our loved ones and end the suffering in this region”.

His mother, Rachel Goldberg-Polin, stares resolutely into the camera and tells him: “Hersh, if you can hear his, we heard your voice today for the first time in 201 days… I am telling you – we are telling you – we love you, stay strong, survive.”

The 23-year-old was born in California but moved to Jerusalem with his family when he was younger.

He was among about 250 Israelis and foreigners kidnapped in the initial Hamas attack, which also killed around 1,200 people.

Some hostages were freed in a deal last year, but more than 100 are still unaccounted for and there is huge pressure in Israel for the government to bring them home.

Israel’s aim to wipe out Hamas has so far killed more than 34,000 people in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run health authority.

Hundreds of thousands are also said to be on the brink of starvation and have been forced to flee the violence.

Fears are growing that a ground assault on the southern city of Rafah – where more than a million people are sheltering – is imminent after Mr Netanyahu said Israel was “moving ahead” with its plans.

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Israel underground bunker hospital preparing for worst-case scenarios

Published

1 hour ago

April 25, 2024

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Israel underground bunker hospital preparing for worst-case scenarios

Deep below Jerusalem, Israeli doctors are preparing for the worst.

Sky News has been given exclusive access to an underground hospital where they are expanding capacity in case the current conflict becomes much worse.

In a bunker below the Herzog Medical Centre, the number of beds has been increased to 350 – with 100 on the way.

Middle East latest: Hamas releases hostage video

“Because it’s built to withstand both biological and chemical attacks,” Dr Yehezkel Caine told Sky News as we entered the complex, “we have an airlock which is built of two separate sets of blast doors”.

Beyond they have installed a whole new level of wards below the existing underground hospital, ripping out a logistics floor and installing more beds and equipment.

The bunkers would be activated should other hospitals closer to the front need evacuating.

They are planning for worst-case scenarios here like an all-out war with Hezbollah.

“The hospitals in the north will be overwhelmed with casualties and they themselves will come under fire, in which case they would have to evacuate their patients to the centre of the country, the same as we did in the first weeks of the war in the south,” said Dr Caine.

He and his staff know the 7 October attack last year by Hamas and Iran‘s missile and drone barrage earlier this month have changed everything for the people of Israel.

“For the civilian population since the war of independence we’ve never been in a situation where the threat to the civilian population has been as great,” he said.

Above ground, the Herzog Medical Centre continues with its peacetime specialisms.

It has Israel’s largest ventilator unit, treating adults and children, but also excels in psycho-trauma treatment and geriatric rehabilitation.

Many of those suffering PTSD from the trauma in this conflict are treated here.

If Jerusalem itself is attacked, the hospital can evacuate even the most vulnerable to the bunkers below in just a few hours.

The bunkers can be entirely sealed off for 96 hours in what’s called a Noah’s Ark procedure.

The Herzog drills its staff regularly. Preparing for a reality it hopes will never come. But events on the northern border are looking ominous.

Israel has launched one of its biggest bombardments yet of Lebanon’s Hezbollah after multiple shelling of northern Israeli communities.

The lower-level war continues with the ever-present danger of escalation into something much bigger.

If it comes, doctors in Jerusalem’s biggest underground hospital say they’ll be ready.

World

Paris Olympics: 16-year-old arrested after he said he wanted to ‘die a martyr’ at Games

Published

4 hours ago

April 24, 2024

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Paris Olympics: 16-year-old arrested after he said he wanted to 'die a martyr' at Games

A 16-year-old boy has been arrested by anti-terrorism police in France after he allegedly said on social media he wanted to “die a martyr” at the Olympic Games in Paris this summer.

A spokesperson said on Wednesday the boy was arrested after he “publicly announced on social media that he planned to create an explosive belt to become a martyr”.

The teenager was arrested at his parents’ home on Tuesday after the alleged posts on Telegram the day prior, BFMTV reported.

The French outlet also reported that a search of the teenager’s home found handwritten papers in which he allegedly declared support for Islamic State.

The spokesperson said that an investigation was under way into whether he had genuine intentions to commit a terrorist act.

It comes after French President Emmanuel Macron previously admitted that the Olympics opening ceremony could be scaled down if the security threat is deemed too high.

Amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and continuing conflict in the Middle East, France previously raised its security alert to its highest level.

The government also asked 45 foreign countries to contribute several thousand extra military, police and civilian personnel to help safeguard the games, Reuters reports.

Earlier this month, Mr Macron said he was confident the opening ceremony, planned to take place on the River Seine, would go ahead but that France had “plan Bs, and even plan Cs” just in case.

This came in the face of concerns over potential security threats to the Games.

The 26 July event is set to be the first Olympic opening ceremony held outside a stadium setting and will see about 10,500 athletes parade through the heart of the French capital on some 160 boats on the Seine along a 3.7-mile route.

But if issues did arise, Mr Macron said that the ceremony could be restricted to the central Paris Trocadero square, facing the Eiffel Tower.

Another option would be to move the event indoors, to the Stade de France.