Neath Port Talbot Council in Wales is investing an additional £677,000 in care home provider payments for older people to cover inflation costs and offer the real living wage.

The funding is equivalent to an additional fee of £30 per person to providers who deliver residential and/or nursing care services on behalf of the council.

Councillor Jo Hale, Neath Port Talbot Council’s cabinet member for adult social services and health, said: “The care home market is currently facing unprecedented pressures and challenges during this period of economic uncertainty.

“Increasing the fees we pay to our providers will help to bring stability and improve the council’s ability to purchase the services it needs to help residents.

“We recognise the essential role that care home providers play in looking after older people in Neath Port Talbot, and are pleased that the increase will also enable providers to pay their staff the real living wage.”

The council currently commissions 288 placements in older people care homes to deliver both residential and nursing care. Plus, it commissions an additional 140 placements to deliver only residential care.

Professor Martin Green OBE, chief executive of Care England, told Caring Times: “The fact that Welsh councils are not only acknowledging the financial pressures on social care, but doing something tangible about it is to be commended 

“The Welsh government acknowledges the challenges of social care and has put more money into the system. We saw that when they gave extra money to care workers to recognise their contribution during the first two phases of the Covid crisis, and it is a stain on the English government that they do not acknowledge the essential role of social care or fund it properly.”