NHS workforce plan - MHA response
The Government recently published its plan for the NHS workforce. While this is a good move for the thousands of people who work for the National Health Service, there is one glaring omission - the social care workforce.
There are currently around 165,000 care worker vacancies according to Skills for Care, and yet there is no word from the Government on how it values this key group of individuals.
Adding fuel to the crisis are the ideas coming out of the ‘New Conservatives’ political group this week. The group has announced its plan for reducing inward migration – a policy that includes reducing the number of visas offered to people taking up positions in social care.
This isn’t just short-sighted, it’s dangerous. Not being able to recruit carers from overseas would pile pressure on the sector’s already significant recruitment challenges. More positions will remain unfilled, meaning quality of care could suffer and more care homes may have to shut their doors to new residents.
Cutting off a key supply of care workers at a time when 500,000 people nationwide are waiting for care is not the answer. But, sadly, none of this is surprising. Over recent decades, governments of all political persuasions have failed to recognise the invaluable work carried out by care workers, both in residential settings and in people’s own homes.
The failure to produce a workforce plan for social care, as they have for the NHS, is just the latest example of politicians failing to fix adult social care or properly invest in the sector.
Celebrating the social care workforce
A workforce strategy developed specifically for the care sector would go some way towards recognising carers as skilled workers.
To fix recruitment and retention issues we need social care to be seen as an aspirational career choice. This also means funding decent pay for care workers and ensuring that people are properly rewarded for the roles they do.
People who work in social care complete a wide range of training to care for and keep older people safe. They carry out health checks, know how to prevent and monitor pressure sores, use equipment such as hoists, are skilled in end-of-life care, can communicate with people living with conditions such as dementia and much more. They provide essential person-centred care that older people need and deserve.
Leaders in Wales published a ten year strategy for the health and social care workforce last year and further work is taking place to hone the actions that develop the social care workforce.
We want this kind of action for our social care colleagues in England. The government needs to look at the training that care workers receive, including how this can become more standardised across providers and more easily transferable between jobs. It also needs to examine how we can keep an engaged, motivated and healthy workforce that meets the needs of an ageing population now and in the future (working seamlessly across health and care rather than in competition). This includes making sure staff are digitally ready for the tech developments coming down the line.
This, in turn, would raise the quality of care and improve the outcomes for all.
Social care helps the NHS by ensuring people are discharged from hospital safely. It can also prevent hospital admissions. Why then wouldn’t we prioritise the social care workforce that enables this to happen?
Comments on cutting immigration by reducing social care workers entering the UK are frankly an unhelpful distraction from the bigger issue. The Government needs to fix the sector’s problems at its core – by recognising the part the social care workforce plays and demonstrating that it is valued in the same way as those working in the NHS.
