VULNERABLE adults face care cuts of nearly 10%.
Councillors will decide next week whether to slash spending by £240,000 next year.
Calderdale Council officers have drawn up a plan to integrate care services with the NHS in an effort to cope with public spending cuts and an ageing population.
The proposal involves merging the council’s Gateway to Care, Reablement, Out of Hours Home Care and Rapid Response with Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Hospital Foundation Trust’s Community Rehabilitation and Hospital Rehabilitation programmes.
Officers believe the plan will allow the council to cut its social care budget from £2.5m this year to £2.26m in 2012/13 – a drop of 9.5%.
The Calderdale Cabinet will rule on the proposal at its meeting at Halifax Town Hall at 6pm on Tuesday.
Cabinet member for social care Clr Bob Metcalfe said: “Recently Calderdale and healthcare providers have been asking people what they think about the services provided and how they access them.
“People using the services made it clear to us that getting the care they needed was complicated and there was some duplication of services. They said the current system wasn’t a good use of resources and left patients frustrated.
“By bringing services together we will be providing a fully-integrated service that is more effective in helping people to make a faster recovery from illness, shorten the time that they have to stay in hospital and help them to lead independent lives when they return to their own homes.”
Clr Metcalfe added that Calderdale also had to cope with an ageing population requiring more social care.
The number of people aged over-75 in the district is expected to increase by 69% to 25,900 in 2029. Clr Metcalfe said: “People over-75 are the main users of health and social care in the borough, so it’s really important that we have services which are efficient and which provide the best possible help to people so that they can continue to live independently for as long as possible.
“These changes are a massive step towards Calderdale Council and NHS providers working together more closely to provide the service that people need.”
Kirklees Council drew up plans to cut its care bill earlier this year but had to drop the proposals following a legal challenge.
