Westmorland and Furness Council

Adult social care contact details, funding information, and care home listings for Westmorland & Furness.

Arranging care with Westmorland and Furness Council

Westmorland and Furness Council is a unitary authority in the North West, covering a large and varied patch that stretches from Barrow-in-Furness and Ulverston on the Furness peninsula up through Kendal, Windermere and Ambleside in the Lake District, and across to Penrith in the Eden valley. Whether your relative lives in a coastal town, a market town or one of the more remote rural villages, adult social care for the whole area is coordinated by this single council.

How adult social care works locally

Because Westmorland and Furness is a unitary authority, one team handles everything from first enquiry through to arranging support. Families usually start by contacting the council's adult social care service to request a needs assessment. This assessment is free, regardless of income or savings, and looks at what the person can manage day to day and where they need help. If eligible needs are identified, a financial assessment follows to work out how much, if anything, the person contributes towards their care.

The local care market

There are 103 CQC registered care homes across Westmorland and Furness, giving families a reasonable choice of settings, from smaller family run homes in the Lakes to larger providers in Barrow, Kendal and Penrith. Alongside these residential care homes and nursing homes, there is a network of home care agencies supporting people who wish to stay in their own homes for longer.

Paying for care

Funding usually comes from a mix of council support (subject to the financial assessment and national capital thresholds), NHS Continuing Healthcare where clinical needs are high, Attendance Allowance, and self funding. As a rough guide for the North West, home care typically runs around £20 to £25 per hour, residential care homes tend to sit around £900 to £1,100 per week, and nursing homes are usually £1,100 to £1,400 per week depending on need. Westmorland and Furness Council can talk you through options, and a benefits check is always worth doing before committing.