Social care being ‘pushed to the brink’ following Autumn Budget

Naomi Dickson, CEO of Norwood, which supports neurodiverse people and those with neurodevelopmental disabilities in the Jewish community, called the Budget “another missed opportunity for social care”, saying: “With no plan and no funding to meet rising demand, more families will be left without the vital wraparound support Norwood provides.”

She warned that “rising costs - including the National Living Wage - are increasingly difficult to absorb in the current fundraising climate”.

And Richard Franklin, CEO of Kisharon Langdon - which helps those with learning difficulties and autism - agreed that it is “unlikely that further increases in the National Minimum Wage will be fully funded”.

Freezing income tax thresholds would force vulnerable families to pay more income tax year on year

Franklin also lamented the dearth of detail in the Budget about the social care sector, highlighting that there is “no commitment to a social care workforce strategy, despite recruitment challenges and new restrictions on migrant care workers”.

He warned that “without this investment, the system will continue to weaken”.

And investment cannot come soon enough, according to Norwood’s Dickson, who said that “without investment now, charities like ours are being pushed to the brink”.

While welcoming the increased funding for the NHS, Daniel Carmel-Brown, the CEO of Jewish Care, said a lack of investment in social welfare or mental health was a kick in the teeth for the sector, which “continues to face rising demand without the support needed to meet it”. 

"This gap has real consequences for older people, those living with dementia, individuals at end of life, and people experiencing mental health challenges,” he said.

Carmel-Brown added that the sector was still absorbing “the substantial impact” of the increase in employers’ National Insurance, introduced in the last Budget, for which Jewish Care has to find an additional £1.1 million annually.

Paperweight, which offers practical and administrative advice to those struggling within the Jewish community, helping people navigate the benefits system, commented that the latest Budget was pushing more and more people towards becoming what they termed “the New Vulnerables”.

They said that freezing income tax thresholds would force vulnerable families to pay more income tax year on year.

Equally, they feared the increase in the National Living Wage, on top of the previous Budget’s rise in employers’ National Insurance contributions, could make jobs even harder to come by.

While welcoming the lifting of the two-child benefit cap, the charity stated that they were increasingly hearing from “individuals who once felt stable, [who] are now only one pay cheque, one crisis, or one life event away from reaching a tipping point”.

Paperweight CEO Bayla Perrin said: “We used to think vulnerability belonged to a small minority. But today, it is teachers, small business owners, parents, carers and young professionals calling us for the first time. These are people who have always coped, until suddenly they can’t”.

“This Budget has made clear just how thin the line has become.”

The Chancellor said the 2025 Autumn Budget was “a Budget for fair taxes, strong public services, and a stable economy... “[in] the face of challenges on our productivity, I will grow our economy through stability, investment and reform. I’ve met my fiscal rules and built our economic resilience for the future.”