Agenda and minutes

Consideration was given to the minutes of the meeting of the Cabinet Member for Health and Social Care held on 9^th March 2010

Those present discussed the funding available for community services, what we provided and what shortfalls there were.  The Cabinet Member asked for a report to be presented to the next meeting giving details in relation to this.

Resolved:- (1) That the minutes of meeting held on 9^th March 2010, be approved as a correct record.

(2) That a report be presented to the next meeting in relation to funding for community services as detailed above.

Shona McFarlane, Director of Health and Wellbeing presented the submitted report concerning the roll out of the Transport Eligibility Criteria.

In April 2007 Cabinet agreed that a Transport Eligibility Criteria should be applied to all new customers and this had been consistently applied since that time.  The number of customers no requiring or accessing transport had proved to be low and would not achieve the original aims of the proposed criteria, which were to achieve savings in the provisions of transport.  These savings were achieved through other mechanisms.

The authority continued to provide transport to day services and activities for a significant number of service users to whom this criteria had not been applied, as at the time of the decision they were existing service users.

The report outlined the proposals which had been considered which included:

Option One

• Roll out the implementation of the revised transport criteria across all service user groups at the point of review
• That consultation with affected customers be carried out
• The criteria be amended, to ensure those in receipt of the higher rate DLA did not receive local authority funded transport

Option Two

• A decision be taken to stop utilising the criteria due to the small number of service users who were affected by the criteria and undertake a whole review of the transport services.

A discussion ensued and the following issues were raised:-

• Concerns relating to the level of risk to service users
• How elderly people would get to day centres without the transport provided
• Would carers who work, get 24 hour care allowance to enable them to transport service users to day centres
• What was the “real cost” of transporting service users to day care centres?
• How would this cost compared to providing 24 hour care allowance?

Resolved:- That a further report be presented at the next meeting with further details relating to the current criteria and the “real” costs of transporting service users to the day care centres.