We welcome the Government’s focus on moving from a model from sickness to prevention and the commitment to improving the health of the nation. Our members play a key part in supporting the improvement of community and individual health needs through prehabilitation, rehabilitation and preventative services and this is something they will be eager to build on in the coming years with local health partners.
We look forward to sharing our views on the 10-year health plan due to be published in Spring 2025 and look forward to supporting the preventative approach the Government is adopting.
Supporting those who are inactive and helping them return to work and a reform of the delivery of elective and activity patient care pathways will also be warmly welcomed by our members, who have a proven track record of success working with local partners on such programmes.
However, key pressures coming out of this budget for our sector are the combination of the increase in National Living Wage, particularly the higher rate of increase for 18-20 year olds, and the rise in National Insurance Contributions.
Our members fully support the National Living Wage, however the rate of increase over recent years – and this further increase – adds pressure to an already pressurized sector which has struggled to deal with the fallout of Covid, the Cost of Living and Energy Crisis in recent years.
As significant employers of 18-25 year olds, the additional increase for 18-20s will further increase this pressure. As one member commented, “an extra 1% increase in salaries across the workforce adds £100,000 to our costs”, which illustrates the scale of the challenge.
As a sector delivering public services, that works closely with local authority partners, we are pleased to see a a real terms increase in core local government spending power of around 3.2%, including at least £600 million of new grant funding to support social care.
However, there is no clear mention of public leisure or culture, and very limited reference to the net zero ambitions for decarbonising public buildings. We hope that further detail on this will emerge, as the infrastructure across the UK is ageing and in need of significant investment and future proofing.
There is much to be positive about the direction this budget takes to supporting healthier, happier communities but that must be balanced against rising costs for employment.”
