Government moves quicker for football than vulnerable people

Mike Padgham, chair of the Independent Care Group (ICG), said the government moved far quicker to tackle the threat of a new football super league than it has in reforming the care of older and vulnerable people.

We wish the government could show the same intensity of action in bringing forward long-promised reform of the social care sector.

Tackling a threat to the national game happened in the blink of an eye, while reform of social care is moving at a glacial pace.

In the last week, we have seen that the government can move extremely quickly when it wants to when it comes to tackling an emergency.

While I can see that sport, and in this case football, is very important to the country it is a shame that the government cannot show even a tiny amount of the same passion in tackling the social care issue.

Some 1.4m people are living without the care they need every day and reform of social care has been promised not for days, weeks or months, but for decades, right back to when Tony Blair and Gordon Brown promised to tackle the situation after they were elected in 1997.

Care providers and those needing care have waited patiently behind other crises, most recently Covid-19 and Brexit.

But it is really galling to see that care was pushed further down the pecking order very quickly when football was in crisis.

I love football, but I just want to see a little of the same enthusiasm turned towards reforming care now that the immediate threat to its future is receding.

The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics show that 64 people died from Covid-19 in care and nursing homes in England and Wales during the week up to April 9, down from 76 the previous week.

According to these figures, some 31,693 people have died in care and nursing homes from Covid-19 between December 28 2019 and April 9.

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