Private providers extracted over £250m from public spending on care in just three UK regions between 2021 and 2024, according to a new analysis.
The study by the Reclaiming our Regional Economies programme found that in North East England, South Yorkshire and the West Midlands, private firms siphoned off around £256m—of which £87.7m went to providers backed by private equity or based in tax havens.
The authors say this level of ‘extraction’ reveals how public money flows into profits rather than protecting the quality of adult social care, residential children’s homes and similar services.
The briefing calls for greater scrutiny of local authority care expenditure, legal limits on extraction, and procurement reform. It also calls for an increase in care worker wages and more regional cooperation between strategic authorities.
‘Instead of facilitating the care of children, older people, disabled and learning-disabled people, our care system facilitates the extraction of value and wealth from places and local public service budgets,’ write the report’s authors.
‘While executive pay booms, frontline workers receive little more than the minimum wage. While local government and central government struggle to pay the bills to meet increasing demand, private company profits continue to rise.’
Autumn Budget Insights: Time to deliver for adult social care
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