Adult social care services to benefit from additional £40m Welsh Government funding

An additional £40m of Welsh Government funding will help meet the increased costs being incurred by adult social services during the coronavirus pandemic.

The funding will help meet the increased costs of basic PPE, food, staffing costs and ICT.

It comes from the £1.1bn fighting fund created by the Welsh Government to support public services to respond to the coronavirus pandemic.

Minister for Health and Social Services, Vaughan Gething said:

“Social care plays a vital role in supporting some of the most vulnerable people in Wales and the health service. This work is more important than ever. This additional funding will support the extra costs adult social care services are now facing.

The Welsh Government has been working with local authorities and other partners to identify the additional resources needed to meet the extra demands on adult social care services. We will review this allocation and potentially make further money available if needed in the future.

The social care workforce is on the front line of this huge effort to respond to the coronavirus pandemic and we are committed to supporting every single person do their job.

“Every one of us in Wales owes them a debt of gratitude. I want to personally thank our social care workforce for their fantastic efforts in protecting the public.”

The £40m will be allocated to local government through the new Covid-19 local government ‘hardship fund’.

Local authorities will work with adult social care providers to draw down the extra funding based on the new costs that are identified.

The UK Government says it committing a further £350m to support the Welsh Government tackle coronavirus.

The addtional funds takes the total given by the Treasury to support the effort in Wales to £600m.

Secretary of State for Wales Simon Hart said:

“We are supporting the devolved administration in Wales to meet the exceptional challenges it currently faces, now providing £600 million from this fund to help tackle coronavirus.

This is on top of funding to help support individuals and businesses and will provide our incredible front-line staff with the resources they need to save lives.

This means that Wales will receive a total cash boost of almost £2 billion from the UK Government to help tackle Coronavirus in Wales.”