Published on 07/01/2011 

Meeting the Challenge

We asked Councillor Antonia Noble, Gloucestershire County Council Cabinet Member for Caring and Community, to give Caring Matters a brief progress report on Meeting the Challenge...

"Over 5,000 people, including the October meeting of the Carers Forum, had their say on council spending through the Meeting the Challenge programme in which we asked them which services they would protect, reduce or stop altogether.

People told us that they wanted to protect services for older and vulnerable people and their carers and we have listened to what they said. (to see the results summary, go to www.gloucestershire.gov.uk/index.cfm?articleid=101454)

. As the population of older and vulnerable people in Gloucestershire continues to increase, the way we provide services has to change. The focus will be on early intervention - six weeks of free high quality support when people leave hospital to get them back to independent life, delaying or preventing people from needing longer term, more expensive support.

Personal budgets will give people more choice and control over the way they buy in their care and other services. We can help them decide how to use their budget or just provide initial information and let them manage it from there.  

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all those people who took part in the discussions at the Carers Forum. Your input was very important to us and helped us shape our proposals.

Consultations will continue until the end of January and will help shape the county council budget for 2011/12".

Read Responses:

Carers Gloucestershire Response  ¦¦ National Perspective  ¦¦ Carers Perspective