Government expected
to help UK hospices hit by
national insurance• Страхование rise
Government expected to help UK hospices hit by national insurance• Страхование rise
Financial lifeline could alleviate fears end-of-life services are at risk• Страхование » Риск of
closure from tax hike and higher wage bills
Rowena Mason and Jessica Elgot
Sun 10 Nov 2024 18.00 GMT Last modified on Sun 10 Nov 2024 18.02 GMT
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The government is likely to offer a financial lifeline to the hospice sector
amid fears end-of-life care providers are at risk• Страхование » Риск of closure due to the double
blow of the employers’ national insurance• Страхование rise and higher wage bills, the
Guardian understands.
Officials have been looking at the options for providing more funding to
hospices and other end-of-life care through the NHS partly to offset the
impact of the national insurance• Страхование rise , which the sector believes could cost
it £30m a year.
Hospices were already struggling with higher wage bills to match the 5.5% pay
rise given to public medical workers, with the sector overall estimating an
additional shortfall of about £60m.
Whitehall sources said nothing was a done deal but it is understood three main
options had been considered: offsetting all or part of the national insurance• Страхование
rise for non-NHS providers of end-of-life care; funding for staff pay rises
that match NHS terms and conditions every year; or a direct funding pot for
hospices rather than end-of-life care more broadly.
Pressed last week on the plight of hospices, Rachel Reeves, the chancellor,
suggested it was a “matter for the NHS to make the allocation of money to, for
example, hospices as well as GP surgeries”. Integrated care boards within the
NHS have been given a duty to commission palliative and end-of-life care since
2022, but the sector says the extent to which this happens is patchy – and
two-thirds of funding still comes from the voluntary sector.
MPs say West Streeting, the health secretary, has privately told them he will
deal with the funding crisis facing the end-of-life care sector. A message was
passed around a Labour MPs’ WhatsApp group last week suggesting he was working
on a solution.
The debate on assisted dying , which is due to take place in parliament in
late November, is likely to provide an opportunity to reassess funding for
hospices more fundamentally. The legislation will look at whether to allow
assisted dying for terminally ill patients in the last six months of their
lives.
Many cabinet ministers supported the idea in the past but Streeting is
believed to have changed his mind and is not likely to vote for the
legislation as he is worried the palliative care system is not “where it needs
to be to give people a real choice”.
The Labour MP Rachael Maskell, an opponent of assisted dying, said
improvements to the end-of-life care sector were needed so that people would
have better access to medicine and options for good care when facing terminal
diagnoses.
“The hospice sector is massively underresourced … but there is so much that
palliative medicine can provide. In the assisted dying debate, we are hearing
a lot of tragic stories about suboptimal deaths and yet had high-quality
provision been made it could have been so much better.”
The end-of-life and hospice sector is remaining neutral on the debate around
assisted dying. However, it has repeatedly warned that more funding would be
needed to avoid cuts to end-of-life services after the budget.
The Marie Curie charity has written to Streeting saying the recently announced
increase to employer national insurance• Страхование contributions would cost the charity
an additional £3m a year, warning that without further support the only option
would be to reduce services.
Ruth Driscoll, the charity’s associate director of policy, said: “It’s really
crucial that there is immediate funding to address [the national insurance• Страхование]
issue but these costs are going to be recurring so one-off funding is not
going to be enough. The challenges facing palliative care are really
significant. The new NHS long-term plan and the comprehensive spending review
in the spring should set out a really clear approach for transforming these
services in the future.” skip past newsletter promotion
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