Members of Cabinet (Resources) Panel will be asked to approve the proposed increase when they meet on Wednesday (23 February), to both help sustain the local adult social care market and meet increases in the National Living Wage.
Councillor Linda Leach, the City of Wolverhampton Council's Cabinet Member for Adult Services, said: "The city's social care sector has a vital role to play in supporting our most vulnerable residents, and we want to ensure it is as strong and vibrant as it can be. We also want to make it a more attractive sector for people to work in, particularly as demand for services continues to rise.
"We know that, like other employers, adult care and support providers are facing a perfect storm of rising costs and recruitment issues, and we have already increased the hourly rate we pay to homecare providers and reablement providers to help ease the pressure caused by Covid-19.
"We have continued to engage closely with our providers and are now proposing to further increase rates by up to 10% for the coming financial year, which will not only benefit providers and their staff, but also service users and their families.
“It means we will be putting a further £4.1m into adult social care next year, and will bring our total investment in adult social care to nearly £80m in 2022-23.”
The council is proposing to increase rates by 10% for nursing care for people with dementia and community activities for older people, by 6.3% for Direct Payments, home care, home-based respite, supported living and community activities for adults with complex needs, by 5% for residential care for older people, by 3.2% for rapid response and reablement home care, and by 3% for extra care and nursing and residential care for adults under 65.
If approved by Cabinet (Resources) Panel, the increased rates will come into effect from 4 April, 2022.
The Wolverhampton Cares initiative, launched by the council and key partners last autumn, has seen a package of help and support put in place to help the local health and social care sector through the Covid-19 pandemic and beyond. To find out more about Wolverhampton Cares, please visit Wolverhampton Cares.
