Analysis: home care placed at the centre of England’s health strategy.

The UK Government and NHS England have published Fit for the Future: the 10-Year Health Plan for England, setting out a long-term strategy intended to reshape health and care delivery across the country between 2025 and 2035. The plan, launched on 3 July 2025, articulates the government’s ambition for a health service that is more community-based, digitally enabled and focused on prevention, with significant implications for providers operating outside traditional hospital settings.

You may be asking yourself why this actually matters to you.

If you are reading this, there is a strong chance you are exploring home care franchising and the idea of building a business that genuinely changes lives, including your own. What happens over the next ten years will sit squarely with high quality home care providers and play a large part as to the success of your business.

What is the 10-year plan?

The 10-Year Health Plan responds to what its authors describe as longstanding pressures in the English health system, including ballooning waiting lists, difficulty accessing primary care and workforce challenges. It positions the health service at a “historic crossroads” and argues that transformational change is needed to sustain universal, free-at-the-point-of-delivery care in the face of demographic change and rising demand.

At its core, the plan retains the founding principles of the National Health Service (universal access and need-based care) while reimagining how those principles are delivered through a new model of care.

Three core shifts in care delivery.

The plan is structured around three broad system-wide shifts:

1. From hospitals to communities: Care will increasingly take place outside hospital settings, bringing services closer to where people live.
2. From analogue to digital: Technology will be used to empower patients and liberate staff from administrative burdens.
3. From sickness to prevention: A stronger emphasis on preventing ill health aims to reduce demand on acute services.

Under these shifts, the NHS plans to prioritise community-based services such as general practice, mental health support, diagnostics, and care provided in people’s homes, as well as expanded use of digital tools for both patients and health professionals.

Delivering care in the community as well as home.

One of the clearest strategic ambitions of the plan is to shift the pattern of health expenditure over time so that a larger share of funding supports care delivered outside hospitals, including home-based services where clinically appropriate. Integrated neighbourhood health services are intended to combine professionals across disciplines into teams focused on local need, reducing reliance on acute settings and strengthening continuity of care.

This approach aligns with the plan’s emphasis on personalised care and choice. By 2027, the NHS aims to ensure that 95 per cent of people with complex needs have a personalised care plan, supporting care outside hospitals and enabling patients to engage with services in ways that suit their circumstances.

For providers in the home care market, this represents a policy environment that formally recognises care at home as part of mainstream health service delivery, not simply as social care adjuncts. It also paves the way for closer collaboration between NHS services and independent providers in delivering integrated care packages.

Digital transformation and workforce strategy.

The 10-Year Plan places significant emphasis on digitisation. Key proposals include the development of a single patient record, expanded NHS app functionality for remote care access, and investment in technologies that improve productivity and coordination across the system. This digital shift aims to make health interactions more efficient and patient-centred.

The plan also sets out ambitions for a future-focused workforce, with an emphasis on building capacity in general practice, community services and digital roles — recognising that transformation will require staff trained for new models of care and supported by digital systems.

The prevention imperative.

A central objective is to move more of the health system’s energy towards preventing illness rather than reacting to it. The executive summary states an overarching goal to halve the gap in healthy life expectancy between the richest and poorest regions in England, while improving life expectancy overall. This represents a broader public health ambition that extends beyond healthcare delivery to encompass social and economic determinants of health.

By prioritising preventative care, the plan positions community-based health action — including lifestyle support, early intervention and chronic disease management — as a core component of future service design.

What this means for you.

Taken together, the commitments set out in the 10-year plan point to a healthcare system that is structurally re-orienting around community-based and home-delivered care. While the plan is not a franchise document, its direction of travel is clear and has practical implications for those considering entering or expanding within the home care sector.

For prospective home care franchisees, the opportunity sits in several defined areas:

• Growing demand for care at home: As policy shifts care away from hospitals and residential settings, the volume and complexity of care delivered in people’s homes is expected to increase.
• Closer integration with healthcare systems: Home care providers are likely to play a more formal role alongside NHS services, particularly in supporting discharge, long-term conditions and preventative care.
• Rising expectations of professionalism and governance: Providers operating in this environment will need strong systems, training and leadership to align with NHS-led care pathways and digital infrastructure.
• Long-term relevance of home care businesses: The plan signals that care delivered at home is not a short-term solution to system pressure, but a core part of how health and care services will function over the next decade.

In this context, becoming a home care franchise owner is increasingly about operating within a strategic growth sector aligned with national health policy, rather than simply running a local service business. The 10-Year Health Plan reinforces that well-run home care providers will be central to how care is delivered in England for years to come.

Want to learn more?

If you'd like to learn more about CareYourWay franchising, feel free to reach out and speak to a member of our family-run team. We're eager to speak with anyone who is purpose-driven, ambitious and shares our values.