The impact of the Government's budget plans on Dove House
Over the coming weeks you may see Dove House in the news discussing how the Government's recent budget will be impacting your local hospice.
Our Chief Exectutive, Chris Sadler, explains what this means for Dove House:
"There has been a significant number of hospices throughout the country reducing services at a time when the demand for hospice and palliative care continues to grow. The current system for funding hospice care is archaic, broken and not sustainable. The pressure on hospice teams to continually meet their additional costs without any realistic uplift in statutory funding is not a solution and will only exacerbate the current crisis.
In the recent budget statement from the Government, it was hoped that there would be some acknowledgement of the current financial issues facing the hospice sector and an undertaking to review the current system of statutory funding. Unfortunately, this was not the case and following changes to the Employers National Insurance and the National Minimum Wage, the dire financial outlook now appears far worse.
Dove House only receives 10% of its funds from a statutory grant allocated through the local Integrated Care Board (ICB). This is one of the lowest levels of statutory funding across the sector and is not reflective of activity or the critical services provided by Dove House. In the last financial year alone, due to external factors (Inflation, Energy Costs, Public Sector Pay, National Minimum Wage), our costs increased by £1 million. The ICB contributed just £27,000 towards these costs. The budget announcement above, which will come into effect in April 2025, will add a further £515,000 to our cost base.
This systemic underfunding of the hospice sector will only accelerate the decline in hospice care and services. Whilst Dove House will always strive to increase fundraising and levels of voluntary income, this level of cost pressure is not something Dove House can sustain without a significant uplift in our statutory grant allocation. We urge all our supporters to lobby their local MPs for a fair and equitable system of funding for hospices."