Older NI People's Care In Election Focus

Election candidates are to be lobbied over the care provided in residential and nursing homes.

Providing care for vulnerable people and the elderly will be the greatest logistical and financial challenge for the next Assembly, according to a group of independent health and care providers.

Independent Health and Care Providers (IHCP) is a non-profit making organisation representing private, voluntary, charitable and church affiliated providers of health and social care.

Its members provide nursing and residential homes, housing with care schemes and domiciliary care.

It has now said that £50m per year could be saved through more care being provided by the independent sector as it wants up to 75% of residential care provision by the independent sector.

Already, IHCP members provide care for some 11,000 people in residential and nursing homes and thousands of others who either lives in housing with care schemes or in their own homes.

Chief Executive, Hugh Mills has said a review is needed of how care is provided: "Put simply, there isn't the money to go around anymore, and we need to find new ways of providing services for the care of older and vulnerable people whilst retaining and augmenting the quality of service provided," he said.

He noted that IHCP is the recognised member organisation for those providing services for vulnerable adults and older people in NI.

Diversity

Meanwhile, Robin Newton East Belfast DUP MLA and an outgoing DUP Stormont Junior Minister, said that DUP MLAs have long recognised that older people represent an increasingly important and growing section of our society.

He said they are a diverse group of people but they are also a group of people with distinct interests that must be recognised, protected and represented

(BMcC/GK)