Stephen Jardine invites you to slag that SNP Government, today, with another evidence-free on-air debate on care homes closing and complaints.
First the ‘closings’:
One care home closing every week, industry warns but ‘the industry’ reps have no actual figures to offer.
The media are pretty much swallowing it whole and regurgitating it, undigested, for their anxious aging audiences. The opposition parties wait in the wings to pepper the regurgitated matter with their own spices.
Here are the most recent data for 31 March 2022, published in September 2022:
On 31 March 2022, there were 1,051 care homes for adults and 40,579 registered places – 20% and 5% fewer, respectively, compared with 31 March 2012.
On 31 March 2022, there were an estimated 33,352 residents aged 18 years and over in care homes – 11% fewer than 31 March 2012 (37,335).
The estimated percentage occupancy on 31 March 2022 was 82%, compared with 87% on 31 March 2012.https://www.publichealthscotland.scot/publications/care-home-census-for-adults-in-scotland/care-home-census-for-adults-in-scotland-statistics-for-2012-2022/
So, to be blunt, while there were quite a few less care homes, down 20% over 10 years, places had only fallen by 5%.
Although places had fallen by 5%, demand for places had fallen by more than twice as much, 11%.
Consequently, care home occupancy had fallen significantly.
Cash cows? See:
and:
Second, the complaints:
This from 2020, put this into useful context:
Private care home owner and Tory donor Robert Kilgour is getting easy media attention again to attack the Scottish Government and its health care inspectors.
Kilgour
We hear in the Herald:
A care group has questioned the fairness of a watchdog’s inspections approach during the coronavirus pandemic after it emerged local authority homes are far less likely to be inspected than private ones. Renaissance Care said analysis of a freedom of information (FOI) response it received from the Care Inspectorate found council-run homes, which account for around 15% of all care homes in Scotland, had received under 5% of visits since March 23.
Could this be the reason?
There are 291 voluntary [not for profit] sector, 232 local authority and 727 private care homes in Scotland.
Click to access 2018-09-11-CHCensus-Report.pdf
In the last year, to March 31 2020, there were 158 complaints about voluntary sector homes, 2040 about private homes and 146 about local authority homes.
https://www.careinspectorate.com/index.php/statistics-and-analysis
There are thus 2.5 times as many private as voluntary homes but the level of complaints is 13 times higher.
There are 3.1 times as many private as local authority homes but the level of complaints is 14 times higher.
So, the level of complaints to private homes, taking account of the number there are, is around 4 times higher than in voluntary sector or local authority care homes for the elderly.
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
Ah Robert Kilgour….he whose association with the Tories is never disclosed in the news where we are…or indeed elsewhere…..same for some of those other specially chosen ‘critics’ the media always seem to find who are willing to opine on their specialist subject #SNPBAD….
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It’s yet another deliberate diversion to what is unfolding in England and the public attention it’s getting, this from C4 the latest…
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https://www.channel4.com/news/we-have-had-to-sell-her-house-inside-englands-care-home-funding-crisis
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A lovely new care home opened in our town. Beautiful building. It operated for a few years then, to everyone’s surprise, it abruptly closed. It’s been sitting empty for over a couple of years now, possibly still full of all the equipment needed to run a functioning care home. This was not long after the last lockdown. I’ve never learned the reason for the closure.
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Do you have any information on the reductions in the number of homes and the number of places, by category – voluntary, local authority, private?
Private care homes tend to be larger and the Covid infection rates and fatalities were greater in larger homes than in smaller ones. The comparison between the two homes in Skye (one private, one council run) was striking.
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I don’t but I’m guessing its not the council or voluntary ones but the selfish bar steward owners like Kilgour.
I used to be a teacher so whenever any reader asks me for more, I say…Good! There’s a wee project for you. Get it in by Friday.
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Why can’t the Scottish Government copy the wonderfully successful English pioneer scheme in London which accommodates many many senior citizens , has first class amenities and never has any funding problems ?
It’s called The House of Lords !
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🤣
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I have good information on a local care home run by a church.
They had to shut when a big new , modern care home was opened by the local council, they needed 12 residents to break even.
The local council had kept up this level but with the usual discharges wouldn’t refer any new residents.
A relative was involved.
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One reason for the number of homes falling more than the number of places is that Councils have been closing smaller homes and building much larger ones. In Dumbaron three or four smaaler homes closed and the residents moved to the new bigger build. in the town. I suspect the motivation was scale and lower costs. In the event of another pandemic it could – if a virus got into one of these larger homes it – could be much worse than in three or four standalone homes. That said the new home has already been the subject of a report by the Care Inspectorate, and come out of it with an Excellent.
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Personal care means more people can stay in their own homes.
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