There are several care agencies that provide care hour packages. Including several short breaks clubs and activities providers that are able to provide packages.
Market Context
Section 25 of the Children and Young Persons Act requires local authorities to provide a range of short breaks for families with disabled children.
Home based care is part of a wider suite of Short Break provision. This is offered when a requirement for domiciliary and personal care is identified in a social care assessment.
Currently, when a need is identified, the provision is spot funded from agencies. The hourly cost can vary depending on the children and young people needs and location. This can vary on the agencies’ ability to recruit to meet demand.
Current Market Status
Relationships need developing with care agencies to shape and improve the home-based care offer.
Previous market engagement has show that care agencies have a preference for spot funding. This is due to being wary of pricing caps, and facing difficulties in recruiting and retaining staff.
There are opportunities through standardising operational procedures, which both placements' teams and providers face challenges with. Previous market engagement has also led to potential improvements identified. Through improved use of communication strategies as part of recruitment efforts.
Market Rating
Across Essex there are a good number of providers, but there are several challenges impacting capacity to meet demand. There is a need to develop a purchasing mechanism for sourcing care hours. Currently packages are spot-funded which presents several risks.
| Market Quality | Market Supply | Market Demand |
|---|---|---|
| Low/Moderate | Good | High |
 |
 |
 |
| Market Workface | Market Ambition | Market Maturity |
| Very Low/Low | Increase Supply | Evolving |
 |
 |
 |
|
Total Number of Providers: |
25-30 |
|
Total Number of children and young people accessing homebased care: |
168 |
|
Total Market Spend per year: |
2,163,000 |
|
Provider Quality – Good or Outstanding: |
Not known, requires review. CQC not required for all providers unless providing personal care. |
|
Average Accommodation Placement Size: |
N/A |
|
Framework/spot Placement Ratio: |
0%/100% |
|
Number of Placements per year: |
168 |
|
Number of Emergency Packages: |
Not recorded |
|
Number of Planned Placements: |
Data analysis required |
|
Average Length of Stay: |
TBA |
|
Average Pack Cost per week: |
TBA |
|
Expected future Capacity Required: |
+10% per annum (based on previous year increase) New Direct Payment Support Service may impact shift from Council sourced packages to Direct Payments. |
Work is required to increase access to capacity in this sector and ensure transparent sourcing of provision. The Council want to shape the future offer, improving relationships with providers to improve the number of suitable care hour packages.
The market indicates differences between providers, so it is unclear how sustainable this market and workforce is. Including the quality of the service received by the CWD.
There are risks relating to location, with many agencies struggling to recruit care workers willing or able to travel to rural areas. Also higher wages available going into London mean some areas have lower recruitment and retainment success.
- Agencies competing to recruit in the same pools of people leads to ‘job-hopping’ as care workers seek increased pay
- Wages in the sector are like retail, but perceived to be more challenging and risky. Particularly when providing personal care to CWD.
- Increased pressure to front line residential workers and providers retaining their workforce.
- Looking to develop market data and insight
- Investigate options to commissioning provision
- Investigating options to evolve the voluntary sector
- To continue to reduce the number of placements for CWD outside of Essex.