Councils and health boards dispute £250m care costs (Fenella Morris QC & Benjamin Tankel)

News Fenella Morris QC, Benjamin Tankel 27th April 2017

Fenella Morris QC & Benjamin Tankel, acting for Cardiff and Vale University Health Board and the six other Welsh trusts, are instructed in the £250m dispute over who pays for nurses delivering social care in residential homes in Wales, which has been heard by the Supreme Court.

The NHS pays for 24-hour healthcare, while general care needs are funded privately or by the council.

But health boards and Welsh councils cannot agree who should pay when a person needs certain healthcare – but not around the clock.

Care home companies claim the row has left them waiting to be paid.

Fenella Morris QC argued that if a nurse carried out a social care task, it did not make it an NHS obligation but work for a local authority.

“We say the NHS is entitled to decide that where a local authority is required to provide social care and a nurse is present to provide social care, it is not necessary for the NHS to pay the cost of that social care.”

To read the full article on the BBC News website, please click here.

The case is currently awaiting judgment.

Related Barristers

Fenella Morris QC

Benjamin Tankel