HCCI’s pre-Budget submission calls for €211 million to prioritise home care workers and older people

HCCI calls for a focus on tackling waiting lists, a new deal for home care workers and to urgently implement the Statutory Home Support Scheme

Home and Community Care Ireland (HCCI), the organisation that represents private home care companies, is calling on the Government to prioritise home care workers and older people through a new deal for home care workers and the implementation of the long awaited Statutory Home Support Scheme in its 2025 pre-Budget submission. HCCI says home care workers need a new deal that affords them;

• guaranteed continuity of income
• index linked living wage as a minimum 
• increased carers’ allowance working limit and amend eligibility criteria for state benefits to ensure they do not disincentivise employment

Joseph Musgrave, CEO, HCCI said, “We must prioritise our carers who play a vital role in looking after our most vulnerable. A new deal for home care workers is required to guarantee the most basic of requirements such as continuity of income for home care workers, index linking the living wage and funding mileage expenses.

“Increased funding has put the home care sector on the right pathway but there are still 5,708 people in need of care.  We must strive to have a waiting list close to, or at, zero.  Since covid-19 restrictions ended in early 2022, the waiting list has not dropped below 5,000.  Rural areas are particularly vulnerable to long waiting lists.  Together with measures to attract more care workers to the sector, we need funding and policies targeted at reducing waiting lists.

“The Statutory Scheme was intended to be a transformative social scheme but has faced major delays and we do not have a timeline for its implementation. This Government will likely leave office without having completed any significant aspect of the Statutory Scheme including regulations, a legal entitlement to care, a new funding model or a new single assessment too.  We urgently need timelines for full implementation of the Scheme. 

Musgrave continued: “Harder to measure and to reach are the people who need home care but have not applied to receive it.  We know that our population is ageing and, by the HSE’s own admission, demand for home support increases by 4% each year.  Funding must then increase by a minimum of 4% each year; anything less is a cut in real terms”.

This was a record year for Home Care, over 22.1 million hours of HSE Home Support was delivered in 2023, split between the HSE’s 8.2m hours (37%) and the independent sector’s 13.9m hours (63%).  This was a welcome 1.3m increase from 2022.  Of that increase, it was the independent sector who delivered the vast majority – 1.2m (92%).  The independent sector’s leading role in increasing capacity has become an enduring trend in home care delivery. 

For further information:

Louise Cassidy 086 383 5727 louise@ckcomms.ie 
Claire Keane 087 121 4140 claire@ckcomms.ie

Priority Actions

HCCI’s pre-Budget submission outlines priority actions that the Government and home care sector as a whole must undertake to address the challenges the sector is facing:

1. Tackle Waiting Lists and Address Unmet Needs:
   – Restore the 1.9m cut in home support hours.
   – Expand the delivery of home support by 2 million hours to tackle unmet need.
   – Explore measures to end the Eircode Lottery of waiting lists.
   
2. A New Deal for Home Care Workers
   – Guarantee continuity of income for home care workers.
   – Index link the living wage.
   – Fund mileage expenses for home care workers
   – Develop a home care workforce strategy.
   – Review the eligibility criteria for state benefits to ensure they do not disincentivise employment.
   – Increase the Carers Allowance working limit from 18.5 hours to 21.5 hours per week.
   – Develop a Working Age Payment to address the ‘days worked’ model of Jobseeker’s.
   – Develop a career structure to professionalise the role of home care worker.
   
3. Urgently implement the Statutory Home Support Scheme
   – Legislate for a statutory entitlement to home care.
   – Address the future home care funding question.
   – Roll out a single assessment tool for home care
   – Establish a Statutory Home Support Scheme Implementation Committee
   
4. End the second-tier status for Disability Home Support
   – Develop an Authorisation Scheme for disability home support
   – Regulate personal assistance services

Outlining Budget Document