National Insurance increases will see a Gwynedd care company face a massive £500,000 bill as result of the “ruinous Budget”, bosses have revealed.

And wage rises imposed by the Chancellor will simply end up being a “stealth tax on the council tax”, according to the Meddyg Care Group which has three nursing homes in Porthmadog and Cricieth as well as a domiciliary care  service, Help At Home.

Social Care Champions Care Forum Wales are so worried about the impact they have launched a new campaign, called Save Social Care, Save the NHS.

CFW is calling for social care to receive an NHS-style exemption from the National Insurance increases or emergency financial support to stop care homes and domiciliary care companies going bust.

Between its three homes Meddyg Care Group has 112 beds in total, employs over 200 staff  and provides around 4,000 hours a month of domiciliary care.

The company’s Managing Director Kevin Edwards said: “We’ve had a look at the National Insurance numbers, and the increased cost is going to be in the region of £200,000 to the business.

“And that figure is just the National Insurance, not the wage increase, that will be another cost.

“A lot of our staff are not paid the National Minimum Wage, they are on the Real Living Wage, so the cost is  higher.

“With the minimum wage rate  increase and the National Insurance hike thev cost to the business is  around £2,500 per person per annum, but all of our staff are paid in excess of that figure.

“So we are  looking at in the region of a 10 per cent rise in wage costs.

“A lot of our services are quite specialist,  we provide essential services, so we have no option other than to pass the costs on to the Local Authorities and Health Boards who place individuals in our care”.

“What people don’t realise is that this is a stealth tax on the council tax, because the local authority will pay our rates, they simply don’t have a choice.

“The fundamental problem is they want gold standard care, and they want us to maintain a high standard as part of the pre-placement agreement, but you can’t do it on peanuts.”

Mr Edwards said it was essential local authorities paid the necessary fees to ensure care homes ran effectively and safely.

He said: “If we don’t get this level of support and funding, we don’t have the right staffing levels, we don’t have the right specialist environment, and subsequently if we get poor ratings from the inspectorate, the banks won’t support the business – it’s a very vicious circle.”

With a 1.2 per cent rise in Employer National Insurance contributions and a cut to the Secondary Threshold to £5,000 alongside the five per cent increase in the Real Living Wage to £12.60, Care Forum Wales has calculated the sector in Wales faces a £150 million funding hole to plug.

According to CFW chair Mario Kreft MBE, the only way to avert the funding crisis was for the social care sector to be granted an NHS-style exemption from the increases in employers’ National Insurance contributions as well as support to meet the other additional costs.

He said: “It represents a 37% increase in employer NIC for a member of staff earning £25,000 a year which equates to the Real Living wage

“If social care can’t be exempted, then the huge extra financial costs imposed as a result of the Budget must be paid for one way or another because this is a tax on publicly funded care, a tax on working people that’s going to hit families.”

CFW has warned the “catastrophic unintended consequences” of the Budget will be a disaster for hospitals in Wales.

The group said the Budget measures have put some care homes at risk of closure.

The inevitable result of that would be vulnerable people left high and dry, piling even more pressure on beleaguered hospitals already struggling to cope and create even longer waiting lists.

Mr Kreft has outlined the organisation’s stark warning in a letter to Welsh MPs, Senedd members along with First Minister Eluned Morgan and Health Minister Jeremy Miles.

A similar letter has gone to Prime Minister Kier Starmer and Chancellor Rachel Reeves.

The campaign is being supported by the Five Nations Group which represents care organisations from across the UK and Eire.

They all agree that third sector providers, including charities and hospices, will also be put at risk by the “ruinous measures” contained in the Budget.

Mr Edwards added his support to the new campaign from Care Forum Wales and said: “I would absolutely back that, social care needs that exemption.

“Our local councils don’t need the extra pressure on them. They are already at breaking point and council tax rises are going through the roof.

“Specialist care, dementia in some cases, is just becoming more unaffordable, putting more pressure on families, because it is becoming too expensive.

He said the additional £22 billion funding for the NHS announced in the Government’s Budget did not take into account that the social care sector played a key part in the health service.

He said: “It typifies their misunderstanding of how the system works. It is also a lack of appreciation about running a business, being an employer of a lot of people.

“If there’s already so many care homes shutting down over the last couple of years, why put them under increased scrutiny?

“I don’t understand the logic.”

Nicola Rutherford, Co-Director at Meddyg Care Group, said the measures included in the Budget might discourage staff from working so many hours in care homes.

She said: “I think the mistake the Government is making is they are putting good money after bad at the NHS without clear direction.

“It gets swallowed up in layers of bureaucracy.

“They should be looking to keep people in their homes for longer or in a safe setting care home and keeping them out of the hospitals, and keeping the hospitals free so those in need of appropriate treatment receive it, which was what the NHS was created for in the first place.

“You can’t fix the NHS until you fix the social care sector, we all see the bed-blocking, we see the issues which are so inter-connected.

“We are all part of the same machine supporting the health of the nation. You have got to treat us all fairly and allow us to do the job that we are there to do. It is scary times for the care sector.”