Tag Archives: family
Leicester City Council seeks foster carers for elderly people
A fostering scheme where families will be paid to take elderly people into their homes is to be tried in Leicester.
Carers will be paid £224 a week and Leicester City Council will pay for modifications to their homes.
Age UK warned that potentially vulnerable people could be placed in homes with strangers.
But the council said carers would be vetted before being approved, and care would be closely monitored.
In October, the council confirmed plans to close or sell off eight of its care homes.
Amid growing poverty, councils have failed to save fund for those in need
From April 2015, a £180m a year hardship fund will be abolished. Councils have simply not made a strong enough argument for it
Iain Duncan Smith‘s axe has struck again. This time its local authority welfare assistance schemes on the block. But we’re not talking reform or even cuts. The scheme had already been significantly cut last year. From April 2015 a £180m a year hardship fund will be abolished completely. That’s right. Scrapped. A vital safety net will no longer be there.
For years I’ve seen the value of crisis loans, which used to operate under the social fund until the government devolved funding last year, allowing councils to set up their own discretionary crisis funds. They’re a critical part of the welfare system to help people in desperate need.
Minister prescribes New Year’s resolution to combat loneliness
January, not Christmas, can be the loneliest time of the year, warns Norman Lamb, the care minister, as he urges people to make a New Year’s resolution to help an older person
Britons are being urged to make a special New Year’s resolution to help an elderly person as part of a Government drive to combat a national “epidemic” of loneliness.
Norman Lamb, the care minister, took the unusual step of recommending a specific resolution to the public, warning that January, rather than Ch
ristmas, is often the loneliest time of the year for many people.
It comes after Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary, spoke out about a “forgotten million” older people left without any regular social contact – something he described as Britain’s “national shame”.
The Daily Telegraph has been supporting the NHS “Winter friends” campaign, in which people sign a pledge to help isolated elderly people in practical ways.
