Crisis in Care: Follow the Money
Panorama
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0012cbj
Tens of thousands of elderly people live in care homes owned by international investors. Panorama asks how much money is being taken out of the system.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-59504521
Care homes: Following the money trail
By James Melley & Alison Holt
BBC News Social Affairs Team
6 December 2021
Dale, son of Norman former care home residentImage source, Rogan Productions
The finances of some of the UK's biggest care providers should be investigated by the competition watchdog, according to the former health secretary Jeremy Hunt.
Three of the UK's biggest care home groups are owned by private equity companies and are saddled with significant amounts of debt.
BBC Panorama has been looking at what this means for people living and working in the homes run by two of those groups, and for the future of care in this country.
"It's the Wild West out there," says Mr Hunt. "We need the Competition and Market authority to make sure that market is operating in the interest of consumers, particularly the very vulnerable people who need that sector."
Short presentational grey line
In his basement home office on the outskirts of Sydney, a short walk from the beach and the South Pacific, Jason Ward spends much of his time poring over spreadsheets and going through company accounts trying to make sense of how businesses work.
When someone says "follow the money", that is probably what Jason will be doing.
He works for an organisation called CICTAR - the Centre for International Corporate Tax Accountability and Research - which is funded by trade unions and charities.
Jason has been investigating where money goes in the care industry in countries around the world - and in particular the role of private equity investment.
Typically, private equity investors are wealthy individuals or institutions who buy businesses looking for a better return on their money than from other types of investment.
They will often do this by making them more efficient, then selling it on at a profit.
In the UK, two of the biggest care groups, HC-One and Care UK, are owned in this way. And one of the other biggest groups, Four Seasons, was owned by private equity firms until recently.
Between them they have nearly 39,000 beds, and there have been concerns about the amount of debt they all carry.
Early this year, Jason Ward contacted Panorama about some research he was carrying out into the UK's biggest care home operator - HC-One.
HC-One was set up in 2011 from the ashes of care group Southern Cross - which was the UK's biggest care home company until it collapsed when it couldn't pay its rents.
Now, HC-One owns more than 320 homes and cares for more than 15,000 residents.
It earns on average £770 per bed, per week, from councils, the NHS and private funders, to look after vulnerable people.
Jason wanted to get to the bottom of where all this money was going.
