Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers has been offered an investment of £181,000, enabling it to develop its existing services by steadily increasing Carer Support hours over the next 5 years.

Futurebuilders has offered an investment to Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers, which delivers high quality services for Carers and people with care needs. The investment will enable it to develop its existing services by steadily increasing Carer Support hours over the next 5 years. This means that carers will be able to take up activities or increase working hours and have more time to themselves. It will also improve the care choices available to people with care needs. The investment will fund a new finance manager, new office costs, IT system improvements and capacity building for corporate governance and marketing. Purchasers include Liverpool City Council Social Services Department, Merseyside Strategic Health Authority and local PCTs.

Established in 1991, Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers is a specialist voluntary organisation providing support to Carers and people with care needs in their own homes. The services provide Carers with time to be themselves and supports them in their role of looking after people with care needs; helping to relieve the physical and emotional stresses and strains of the role. It currently delivers over 1,100 carer support hours per week to some 180 families.

Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers assesses individual care needs, within the context of the wider family. Staff aim to meet the needs of the carers to prevent breakdown due to the stresses and strains of caring. The organisation provides a range of specialist continuing and palliative care services to support children, young people and adults with an illness, physical or learning disabilities, people recovering from a stroke, people living with cancer, the frail and elderly and young carers.

Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers has an annual income of more than £700,000. It has 46 full time and 14 part time staff and works within the Liverpool City Council boundary.

Three out of five people will become a carer at some time and the importance of this role is well recognised. Liverpool has a higher than average proportion of carers, people with long term illness and those who are permanently sick or disabled. Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers wants to increase the delivery of carer support hours by 10% each year and to develop more specialist services, supporting more carers and people with care needs.

The proposal has developed from the restructuring of the organisation’s service delivery and management capacity. Four years ago, the organisation’s domiciliary care service was loss making. The trustees reviewed the services to ensure that the organisation became fully viable and developed new specialist services, as new funding streams developed. However, it has relied very heavily on the skills and expertise of its Trustees in matters relating to finance and contracts. With the increasing growth in the organisation, the Trustees have determined that it must provide these skills on a more immediate and accountable basis.

To increase the number of carer support hours and development of new services, Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers needs to increase the capacity of its management team through the employment of a Finance Manager, providing an independent monitoring and reporting function for all management and financial reports. This will take away the majority of financial reporting responsibilities from the Business Manager, enabling him to give more time to business development. The investment will also raise the market profile and brand image of Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers and improve the effectiveness of financial and management accounting and reporting and the efficiency of the administrative system.

The improvements the Futurebuilders investment will make possible are clear. Carers will have more time for themselves. They will be able to take up activities or increase working hours and will have improved health. Moreover, people with care needs will have improved choice in their place of care and Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers will be able to be more proactive in responding to care needs.

Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers has a good track record of service delivery and public funding is significant within its income streams. It has diverse income sources, reflecting the organisation’s proactive response to contracting / partnership opportunities. Some of these are of a short term nature as they are for respite care or short term care needs, which are contracted on a case by case basis. It delivers contracts on a full cost recovery basis on behalf of Liverpool City Council Social Services (Family Advisory, Adult Learning Difficulties and Complex Needs Services), Merseyside Regional Health Authority and local primary care trusts.

As their services expands to provide more complex carer support, Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers hopes to be awarded further contracts. It is proactive in seeking new contracts; working in partnership with Voluntary Community Sector organisations and statutory agencies. It is constantly developing new services to respond to the needs of Carers and people with care needs. Feedback about Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers delivery comments on how it trains its staff with extended skills and has staff who are willing take on duties that other care providers are not trained to perform.

A number of factors recommended Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers as a suitable Futurebuilders investment. Its proposal falls within the Futurebuilders definition of public service delivery. Its current services and future plans link in with many of the Department of Health’s priorities, the national Carers strategy and will contribute to the aims of a range of statutory duties and national service frameworks. Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers’ work meets the aims of the Liverpool Supporting Carers Strategy and a range of national strategies. It provides a great model for other organisations delivering services with the health and social care sector and is an example of an organisation that is dynamically developing its services in direct response to the needs of Carers and people with care needs.

The organisation needs assistance to expand and improve its existing services. It is a commercially minded organisation and the investment will lead to greater sustainability. Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers has realistic outcomes and can continue to meet the aims of a range of statutory duties and national service frameworks.

Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers has been offered an investment of £181,000. A loan of £116,500 will fund the salary and on costs of the new Finance Manager for 2 and a half years; new office rental costs; office refurbishment costs; and website development and hosting.

A capital grant of £33,000 and revenue grant of £17,500 will fund recruitment costs, IT and Office equipment, software development, new office removal and installation costs, marketing materials and new service development costs.

A capacity building grant of £10,000 will enable Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers to review their corporate governance following a merger with Sefton Crossroads Caring for Carers and enable the board to work effectively together, whilst a further £4,000 grant will develop a PR and Marketing strategy for the development of the Liverpool Crossroads Caring for Carers brand.