I would also add that he was kicked out of a cubicle for another patient! How many A&E departments have been closed or downgraded over the past 9 years?
It could be argued that the problem with the NHS isn't the funding that the NHS is getting but rather the funding which social care isn't getting.
There's a fair chance that there's beds being blocked by people that is there was a National Social Care Service could have moved out of hospital and into a less costly "bed".
By freeing up those beds it then frees up space for people who are in acute wards and A&E to move into them.
Now while it may not have changed the outcome in this exact case it would have likely reduced the number of similar cases.
It would also have an impact on local government, as an example Hampshire County Council have been undertaking a consultation on more cuts. The main reason for this is the ongoing and significant increases in funding requirements of the adult social care budget.
The problem that they have is that they are limited to increasing Council Tax to 2%, with the Conservatives confirming that this will continue to be the case, anyone who knows about trains knows that inflation is running higher than this (as it train tickets are going up by just over 2.5% in January). This means that Councils are getting less money each and every year where inflation is higher than 2%.
Add to this that there's also a squeeze on other government resources which Councils could draw upon (in the car off Hampshire they've had their central government grant cut by £19 million from ~£92 million to ~£73 million this year and as recently as 2016/17 this grant was £147 million) and it's not a good position to be in, even before you consider the impact of social care. Even if Hampshire were to increase council taxes by 10% it wouldn't recover the losses from the central government grant which they've seen in the last few years.
As such if national Government were to say to Councils that they were going to loose 110% of what they currently spend on social care but also loose the liability for providing it they could well jump at the chance.
There have been a group who are fighting school bus cuts, who's last MP was Gavin Williamson (the current education secretary) who has given them a meeting and who confirmed that is a choice between funding their children's school bus and providing care for the elderly. It's the same elsewhere where, in the car if Hampshire they are looking to cut school buses where they are looking to have as the dedicated walking route for over 400 children going through isolated woodland with no natural surveillance, here's a clip of what that would look like in the winter from the local campaign groups walk to school to highlight the issues they face:
Since then Hampshire have committed to funding buses for the morning walk to school during December and January when it would be dark. However even then there's a road which is just a little bit busy which the children would have to cross:
This road is so busy that under the current Design Manual for Roads and Bridges (The publication which provides the rules and regulations as to what is considered safe to be built) it says should have traffic lights to cross or a bridge, Hampshire are proposing to provide some tactile paving and some other minor changes to the existing crossing.
The actual figures are of the road has more than 8,000 cars a day on it (where the speed limit is over 40mph) then the crossing should be signals or a bridge, under 30 and there's a higher threshold over which it rules out the use of uncontrolled crossings. The road in question has 16,000 vehicles a day using it (although possibly more as the last DfT survey was undertaken whilst there was a road closure within 5 miles which stopped traffic getting through to a major town, which will have had an impact of traffic flows).
Hampshire would then like to offer the students a £600 a year bus pass, now many people are likely to look at that and say, you know what I'll drive my children to school thank you. This then will result in more traffic through a Motorway junction which when a local development was being proposed was acknowledged to be over capacity. In fact many cars would pass through that junction twice (one in each direction) in the morning peak, significantly impacting on congestion.
As you can see councils are going to some significant lengths to make, for the size of their total spending (£1,200 million), what is a fairly small saving (£300 thousand, or 0.025% of their budget).
However that's just one part of one set of cuts being pushed through by councils.
These cuts are likely to have to continue, and they are really going to start to hit home soon if something isn't done. I wouldn't be surprised if more Councils end up "going bust" like Northamptonshire did.
Social Care is one of these areas where people often have to sell their homes to fund it, yet the Tories would rather that you did that than they have to increase taxes to find the system. It comes down to, would you rather pay a few hundred pounds a year now in taxes or easily £1,000 per week for nursing home costs? Now not everyone requires nursing home care, however there's a significant number of people who do need support in their own homes or moving somewhere where there's a member of staff on site who can call for assistance of its needed, the costs of which are significant. Even having someone for an hour a day and you can easily rack up a bill of £300 per month, which few who are on pension are likely to be able to pay out of their own pocket.
Even the moving costs of going somewhere else can be significant, as well as the service charges (which pays for staff to be nearby, even if no care is being provided, 24/7).
It's because that these bills can be so significant that it's something which many suggest that it should be something which is dealt with by the national government, very much in the same way which the health system is dealt with. There are stories of people who almost wish that they become ill later in life so the NHS deals with them rather than only needing social care and therefore the costs which they have to fund (which does often lead to houses being sold). This is fine if you're a single person, but if you're the partner of another person the roof over their heads could be at risk.
It would then mean that the funding for the NHS would be able to be better spent on dealing with health issues. Likewise our Council Tax would be able to provide things like Libraries and improvements to the way we get around (which is likely to cut congestion and emissions).
