Rethink call on home care charges

Campaigners have staged several protests against the charging policy

A Labour councillor has written to Fife Council's leaders urging them to rethink their new care charge.

The request from Mark Hood followed the release of a briefing document by officers on the progress of home care assessments.

It revealed that 350 people had been assessed on whether they could pay.

Last month, campaigners opposed to the charge staged a protest inside the main council chamber at Fife House demanding to know what was happening.

Fife Council has insisted the process is designed to ensure only those who could afford to pay do so and said concerns raised by Cllr Hood were unsubstantiated.

Community alarms

As part of a raft of changes, a weekly charge of �1 was introduced for community alarms, which allow elderly people to call for help if they fall in the home.

Mr Hood, the Labour group's social work spokesman, said: "With only 23% of service users paying for the community alarm and only 17% of service users having been assessed at the end of June, along with the additional cost incurred in completing the assessments and chasing for payments for the community alarm, I am concerned with the budget position of the service."

Council leader Peter Grant said: "If anything is distracting staff from the important job of providing support to vulnerable people it is the fact that they are constantly having to react to inaccurate statements which if left unchallenged would cause unnecessary alarm for the very people Mr Hood claims he is trying to protect."

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