Social prescribing: the view from the VCSE sector

After many years of incubation by leading voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) sector organisations, in 2019 social prescribing services were mainstreamed into the NHS primary care offer, with funding offered to Primary Care Networks to pay link workers’ salaries.

Social prescribing services capitalise on the VCSE's capacity to address issues that go beyond the medical, by bridging between the formal health system and the support available in communities. The VCSE sector has welcomed the NHS's adoption of social prescribing and wants to see it succeed.

However rolling social prescribing out across the NHS has been challenging, most notably in relation to funding for the VCSE sector. While NHS England now funds link workers directly, it does not fund the community activities and services into which link workers make referrals. The roll out of social prescribing has therefore created additional pressure on an already-stretched VCSE system, particularly in more deprived communities.

Finding sustainable solutions for funding the whole social prescribing “ecosystem” and securing its position as a core part of the health system will require work to bring a wider group of stakeholders together behind the vision for social prescribing and to secure their commitment to contributing to the outcomes it delivers.