Home Help Service (Hansard, 7 May 1976)

§ Dr. Owen

The home help service is largely a part-time service, but the provisional estimate of staff employed in England at 30th September 1975 expressed in whole-time equivalents was 1,700 organisers and 42,500 home helps, an increase of 4.2 per cent. over the 1974 figure.

During the year ended 31st March 1975, the latest date for which figures are available, 615,000 households in England received home help service, an increase of 9 per cent. over the 1974 figure. Over 86 per cent. of recipients were aged 65 and over and by far the largest part of the service goes to the elderly. There has been an increase in the number of chronically sick and physically handicapped people under 65 receiving the service, but there has been a decrease in service to maternity cases.

I consider that the home help service is an essential part of domiciliary provision and has an important part to play 486W to enable people to remain in their homes for as long as possible, rather than to go into residential accommodation. This is particularly important in these days of limited resources. The consultative document "Priorities for Health and Personal Social Services in England", which the Department published in March, made it clear that even with present constraints on the health and personal social services there must be growth of services for the elderly in order to keep up with their increasing number and to develop the emphasis on community care.