The new government must immediately address the problem of low
pay in adult social care by tackling illegal underpayment of
wages, and urgently consulting the sector on a separate minimum
wage and a national pay scale, two leading think tanks have said.
A new report by the Nuffield
Trust and the Health Foundation examines five national policy
options to increase wages for social care workers in England:
better minimum wage enforcement, increasing the National Living
Wage, bonuses for social care staff, a sector-specific minimum
wage, and a national pay scale similar to the NHS's Agenda for
Change. The study comes as the Labour government has pledged to
consult with the sector on introducing a fair pay agreement to
set pay, terms and conditions in social care.
The report reveals how an inadequate national policy approach to
social care pay and funding has trapped staff in a cycle of low
wages and poor career prospects. Care workers in the independent
sector earn on average £4.88 per hour less than the average UK
wage of £15.88 per hour, and 1 in 10 social care roles is
currently vacant. Care workers with significant experience are
insufficiently rewarded, being paid only 8 pence more per hour
than new starters.
Despite this, there have been no national policy attempts to
improve pay in the sector in England, beyond increases to
economy-wide minimum wages. Underfunding and problems regulating
the sector mean that around 15% of low-paid social care staff in
the UK are paid less than the national living wage.
Despite a 24% real-terms increase in the sector's total wage bill
from 2013/14 to 2022/23, driven largely by rising demand for care
and increases to the national living wage, government spending on
social care only increased by 17%. The previous government's
approach to leave wage setting to commissioners and employers in
local areas has left the sector with entrenched low pay, leading
the authors to conclude that a more comprehensive national
approach, underpinned by extra funding and stronger enforcement,
is needed.
The research draws on discussions with care workers, people
receiving care, policymakers, and providers, and examines case
studies from New Zealand, Australia, France, Scotland and
Wales.
Commenting on the report, Nina Hemmings, Researcher at
the Nuffield Trust said:
“For too long, care workers have been undervalued and underpaid.
A shockingly high number are still not even paid the legal bare
minimum to travel to and care for the hundreds of thousands of
people in need of social care. Social care is losing valuable
staff to other sectors like retail and hospitality.
“The new government is right to develop proposals to address this
and their suggested national approach is more likely to succeed
than one that pushes the problem onto employers. Other countries
have introduced bold pay reform for care workers. But the new
government will need to pay careful attention to the design and
implementation of any new policies to ensure pay reaches workers'
pockets and experienced staff are retained.”
Lucinda Allen, Senior Policy Officer at the Health
Foundation said:
“There is growing consensus that the government needs to do more
to improve wages for people working in social care. To help
address the high vacancy rates in the sector and high levels of
poverty among staff, care workers must be better rewarded for
their vital work. Pay is not a silver bullet; improvements to
wider employment conditions are also needed.
“Beyond boosting staff pay and conditions in social care, the new
government must enact wide-ranging reforms to improve access to
care, better support unpaid carers, and protect people against
care costs. Successive governments have broken promises to fix
the funding system for social care. Labour's new government has
an opportunity to finally reform social care, improve care worker
pay and leave a lasting legacy for the future.”
ENDS.
Notes to Editors
-
From ambition to
reality draws on a combination of methods:
- Discussions with 40 stakeholders from across the social
care sector, including care workers, people with lived
experience of care, policy-makers, researchers, and people
from provider organisations, trade unions, local government
and charities;
- Analysis of trends using data from Skills for Care's
Adult Social Care Workforce Data Set and Office for National
Statistics data;
- International evidence on implementing pay policies in
Australia, France, New Zealand, Northern Ireland, Scotland
and Wales.
- Skills for Care has set out cost estimates for pay policies
in the Workforce Strategy for Adult Social Care (also published
today, Thursday 18 July). According to these estimates, the
additional costs to government could be: £30 million per year to
enforce the economy-wide national living wage across the social
care workforce; £3.6 billion per year for a minimum wage for care
workers set £2 above the national living wage; and £4 billion for
aligning pay for care workers with two or more years' experience
to NHS pay band 3. The net costs of introducing these options
will vary depending on the additional on-costs, returns to the
Treasury, and potential productivity gains
