We respond to the Scottish Budget

Our charity has reviewed the Scottish Government’s Budget and its implications for the social care sector. With services already facing significant financial pressures and increasing demand, the proposals raise concerns about the sustainability of support for people and communities across Scotland. 

Sara Murphy, Managing Director at Community Integrated Care, commented: “Social care is under immense pressure – and as it currently stands, this Budget would make an already challenging environment even harder for providers to navigate. 

For too long, our sector hasn’t been recognised for what it is: the backbone of society and a fundamental partner to the NHS. When social care is underfunded, people lose the preventative support that keeps them well and independent, pushing pressure onto hospitals and emergency services. This is felt most sharply when people are ready to leave hospital but can’t be discharged because social care simply isn’t available. Without meaningful investment, pressures on the NHS will continue to grow, and the ‘corridor care’ crisis will only worsen. 

The recognition of workforce pay is welcome, but maintaining the Real Living Wage alone won’t address the sector’s recruitment and retention challenges – nor the rising operational costs, including National Insurance increases, that providers are absorbing. Recent funding approaches make it ever harder for organisations to sustain even the Real Living Wage, let alone invest in the wider improvements needed to stabilise and strengthen the workforce. 

We stand with our partners at @CCPS in calling for clearer prioritisation of social care, a credible plan that moves from ambition to delivery and sustained multiyear investment to stabilise services. 

Community Integrated Care remains ready to work openly and constructively with the Scottish Government, local government and Health & Social Care Partnerships. But to ensure the people who rely on our support can continue living the best lives possible, our sector needs longterm commitment – and it needs it now.”