Health organisations call for minimum wage in social care to prevent staffing crisis in England
A specific minimum wage for social care is needed if Britain is to avoid a staffing crisis, according to leading think tanks.
The Nuffield Trust and the Health Foundation have also called for the introduction of a national pay scale system to tackle persistent low pay in adult care and encourage key workers to stay in the sector.
In a joint reportThe organisations are calling on Labour to take immediate action against illegal underpayments of wages and to urgently consult on the introduction of a separate, higher minimum wage for social care and a national pay scale.
Wales and Scotland have minimum wages for social care, while New Zealand, Australia and France have national pay scales for social care.
Thea Stein, chief executive of the Nuffield Trust, said: “Low pay in social care is a huge problem and it is vital that the government finds ways to increase pay and get more people into this vital sector.
“Tackling illegal underpayment of wages is an important first step, but on its own it is not enough to prevent people from leaving for better-paid and less demanding jobs elsewhere.
“Measures such as a sector-specific minimum wage and, in the longer term, a pay scale comparable to that in the NHS, are likely to be needed, both to increase the basic wage of care workers and to develop and retain experienced staff.
“This will cost the public purse, but it would be an essential investment and the alternative is a continued exodus of domestically trained health personnel.”
Ruth Thorlby, assistant director of policy at the Health Foundation, said: “The government must do more to improve the pay of people working in social care, given the high vacancy rate in the sector and around one in five care workers living in poverty.
“Care workers must be rewarded for their essential work. Improved pay will not solve all the challenges facing social care, but it is essential to ensure the sustainability of the care workforce.“
The report follows the Labour government’s pledge in Wednesday’s Speech from the Throne to deliver a deal on fair pay in social care.
It concludes that inadequate approaches to the payment and funding of social care by ministers “have trapped staff in a cycle of low pay and poor career prospects”.
According to Skills for Care, England will need an additional 540,000 social care jobs by 2040 if the workforce is to grow in line with the increase in the number of people over 65. human resources strategy.
But low wages make the sector dependent on foreign workers, so it’s no wonder that the vacancy rate is 8% and the staff turnover is almost twice as high as the average in other sectors, experts say.
Research published in June found that almost half of healthcare workers in England earned less than a living wage.
According to the latest data from Skills for Care, employees with at least five years of experience only receive a salary of 8p more per hour than new starters.
Polling by Ipsos for the Nuffield Trust and the Health Foundation shows broad support for a social care minimum wage and national pay scales. A survey of 2,000 people in England found that 85% supported the introduction of a pay scale and 77% supported a sector-specific minimum wage.
Implementing these proposals would be expensive. According to Skills for Care, it would cost the state a lot of money £4 billion to align pay for healthcare workers with two or more years’ experience with NHS salaries.
Paying care workers £1-£2 an hour above the “national living wage” would cost £2bn-3.6bn a year. This would be offset by an average annual saving of £1m from lower recruitment costs and fewer hospital admissions.
Responding to the findings, Simon Bottery, senior fellow in social care at the King’s Fund think tank, said: “If there are other jobs in the economy, Britons will choose those jobs rather than opt for a job in adult care.
“If we don’t do something fundamental about this, we will continue to have this chronic problem, which primarily affects people who rely on services, because there are simply not enough people to do the work that people need from them.”
A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “We are determined to tackle head-on the significant challenges facing social care.
“Social care workers make a huge contribution to society, which is why we have committed to creating a fair remuneration scheme to ensure their hard work is rewarded properly and attract more people to the sector.
“We will implement a far-reaching reform programme to create a national health service that provides everyone with the care they deserve.”