Not-for-profit care provider association, the National Care Forum [NCF] has called on government to address the ever-growing workforce crisis that is blighting adult social care in the wake of new reports into the issue.
Skills for Care has this week published a new report outlining the severity of the crisis, in the form of the 2022 edition of its annual ‘The state of the adult social care sector and workforce in England’. Meanwhile, the Health Foundation has released a separate analysis which has uncovered that one in every five residential care workers in the UK was living in poverty prior to the cost-of-living crisis taking hold.
In the latest Skills for Care report, the figures lay bare the scale of the workforce crisis in showing that the vacancy rate has risen to a record high of 10.7 per cent and a 50,000 decrease in the number of filled care posts in 2021/22.
The findings also uncovered that the number of vacancies across adult social care increased by 52 per cent in 2021/22 (55,000) to reach a total of 165,000 vacant posts.
The report adds that the fall in filled posts boils down to recruitment and retention issues as providers have been unable to recruit and retain sufficient staffing levels. Although the adult social care sector was shown to have contributed an estimated £51.5 billion to the UK economy in England in 2021/22, four out of five jobs in the economy pay better salaries than social care roles, the findings show.
Elsewhere, the Health Foundation’s analysis outlined that one in five residential care workers in the UK lived in poverty before the cost-of-living crisis took hold, and 20 per cent of the whole residential care workforce had to make use of Universal Credit and legacy benefits between 2017 and 2020.
Furthermore, it found that around one in every 10 residential care workers experienced food insecurity and did not have reliable access to healthy food regularly.
The NCF’s CEO, Professor Vic Rayner OBE, said that chronic underfunding on the government’s part and the lack of an adequate workforce plan was largely to blame.
Calling on ministers to take notice, Professor Rayner said: “We need the government to acknowledge the huge challenges facing the adult social care workforce. The government needs to tackle the challenges head-on and deliver a strategic workforce plan that addresses pay, terms and conditions in a meaningful way.
“We are seeing the highest vacancy rate in adult social care since records began - around one in 10 of posts are vacant. This is the result of chronic underfunding and a lack of workforce planning that has been years in the making.”
Professor Rayner also took aim at the fact that hardworking carers were left without sufficient salaries to be able to work in the sector and provide for themselves and their families.
“The Health Foundation’s findings on in-work poverty for residential staff makes for difficult reading. It cannot continue to be the case that brilliant staff, carrying out vital, life-changing work cannot afford to work in care.
“Care is the backbone of communities up and down the country and they are the lifeblood of its delivery. We welcome and echo the Health Foundation’s call for additional investment and reform for adult social care to address low pay.
“The government should now prioritise improving pay by bringing forward a fully funded, strategic workforce plan for adult social care in England. This will not only benefit the people that deliver vital care but will also improve the lives of people that draw from it.
“(Prime minister) Liz Truss and her new cabinet have the opportunity to start addressing the workforce crisis after decades of inaction. They should also see social care as key to their plan for growth. Skills for Care estimates that adult social care contributes £51.5 billion per annum to the economy in England in 2021/22 - we urge the government to help grow the economy by giving the adult social care workforce the much-needed funding and support it needs.”
Photo by Georg Arthur Pflueger on Unsplash
