Agenda item

The Better Care Fund 23-25 planning submission for Croydon to NHS England report is attached.

The Health and Wellbeing Board considered the Better Care Fund Plan 2023- 2025 Submission report, which ensured that both the national and local governance was completed correctly.

The Deputy Director for Primary and Community Care, Daniele Serdoz presented to the Board a summary of the planning of the two-year Better Care Fund (BCF) 2023-2025.

At a glance:

·       The policy framework and planning requirement included a two-year spending plan, a one-year plan for a number of metrics linked to the BCF. There was an NHS minimum of funding allocations and contribution to the BCF and the discharge fund.

·       In terms of outputs and capacity, there was an additional metric including BCF which related to emergency admissions due to falls.

·       The BCF National Conditions included two policy objectives delivery and maintaining the NHS contributions to the adult social care and out of hospital services.

·       The funding streams and allocations were currently in draft from year two onwards, and the service had maintained the minimum spend on out-of-hospital services.

·       The ethos was to build on the integration work that was implemented since 2017 through the One Croydon Alliance of health and care. Schemes had been reviewed, renamed and aligned to reflect current programmes of transformation.

The Chair welcomed the work that had gone into the report and the onerous of its monitoring particularly with the frontrunner. The Chair was looking forward to assistive technology working which innovated opportunities, additionally welcomed the falls work and the key aspects noted within the report.

In response to the question raised from the Board relating to the advantages of having a two-year plan, the Board heard that though there was a lot more work, with the One Croydon infrastructure it had enabled quicker discussions and decisions for delivery. In finalising the plans for the next year, the service would revisit the plans and review any changes which may arise.

In response to the question raised from the Board relating to the margin costs of equipment and salaries rising and how the service would cope within the next one or two years, the Board heard that the growth element within the plan, enabled every scheme to have an allocated growth of 5.66% which was the only buffer for growth and inflation.

In response to the question relating to a clarification of what was meant by common mental health illness within the report, the Board heard that this was in relation to healthcare and the term was shorthand for a range of clinical mental health conditions (such as anxiety and depression and many more). In response to the question relating to workforce, recruitment and retention for 2023/24, the Board heard that this was linked to the Adult Social Care discharge funding which was a scheme of additional support for step down beds and thus was categorised as workforce for the next year.

In response to the question relating to whether changes could be made to the plans to involve the voluntary sector, the Board heard that the plan entailed that the care plan scheme would be reviewed to reinvest with other neighbourhood services with earmarked schemes for agreement. The process had not been invested, though the idea was within the plan.

Further comments from the Board included the importance of the healthy communities together programme which highlighted real tangible results from the new way of operating within the community, though the funding was to end in 2024, and with more funding, more could be done, and thus for a sustainable model the plan needed to be reviewed.

In response to the question relating to the clarification to the metric data in Appendix 1 of the report (page 8 of 28) –in the planning template and the residential admissions for long term support for 65+ years, the Board was to receive feedback on this clarification from officers.

The Board RESOLVED to sign off the 2023-25 Better Care Fund planning submission to NHS England.