CARE workers warned yesterday that the sector was doomed to repeat murky moments of its history after privateers warned that “unsustainable” government cuts would force many homes to close.

Union GMB welcomed Bupa, Four Seasons and HC-One — the biggest care home operators in the £24 billion care home industry — for confirming what the union has been saying all along.

The trio told the Financial Times that crippling funding cuts has put the system in crisis and that homes will close unless the situation improves.

Britain’s biggest care home operator Southern Cross collapsed in 2011.

GMB national officer for social care Justin Bowden said: “The repeated warnings from GMB that Southern Cross would collapse were ignored again and again by government.

“Warnings that the entire care sector is in a slow-motion collapse, albeit for different reasons to Southern Cross, are falling on the same deaf ears.

“If we are not prepared to learn the lessons of history, we are destined to repeat them.”

In addition to looking after paying residents, private care home operators provide beds which are funded by local councils for elderly people without the resources to pay themselves.

Beds are also made available to provide short-term care to give respite to relatives who look after elderly people at home.
Many care homes rely on money from local authorities to remain viable.

But government cuts have seen local authority funding for such beds withdrawn or at best frozen.