Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 25 October 2016 to Question 49729, what changes there were in the level of capacity available between 2010 and 2014.
The number of care homes, care home beds and home care agencies can be calculated from publicly available Care Quality Commission (CQC) data which is available at:
http://www.cqc.org.uk/content/how-get-and-re-use-cqc-information-and-data#directory
The following table shows that whilst the number of care homes has been falling, they are increasing in average size and the total number of beds has been broadly unchanged. The number of domiciliary care agencies has grown significantly and there has been a shift from residential to nursing care home provision.
| September 2010 | December 2014 | December 2016 | Change September 2010 to December 2014 | Change September 2010 to December 2016 |
Residential care beds | 255,289 | 240,840 | 238,685 | -5.66% | -6.50% |
Nursing care beds | 205,375 | 224,727 | 220,894 | 9.42% | 7.56% |
Total care beds | 460,664 | 465,567 | 459,579 | 1.06% | -0.24% |
Residential care homes | 13,681 | 12,494 | 11,966 | -8.68% | -12.54% |
Nursing care homes | 4,387 | 4,721 | 4,515 | 7.61% | 2.92% |
Total care homes | 18,068 | 17,215 | 16,481 | -4.72% | -8.78% |
Domiciliary care agencies | 5,780 | 8,079 | 8,544 | 39.78% | 47.82% |