Nicholas Soames – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nicholas Soames on 2015-09-16.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment he has made of the effect of reductions in local authority social care budgets on the prevalence of delayed discharges in the NHS; and if he will make a statement.

Alistair Burt

The Department has not formally assessed the relationship between local authority social care budgets and the prevalence of delayed discharges in the National Health Service.

Internal analysis has been unable to demonstrate a statistical relationship between local authority budgets and delayed transfer of care performance, although qualitative evidence from the sector does indicate the importance of strong and effective social care services in supporting delivery of NHS services.