What, in your view, are the key issues the sector faces with regards to recruitment at the moment?
There aren't enough carers to deliver to the client base. The demographics illustrate that the elderly population is growing and the younger population is not growing at the same rate. So it can't be fixed in that respect. There will not be enough people to serve the elderly population as we go forward. So we're going to have to be really creative about what we do and how we do it going forwards – the lack of technology in the industry, for instance, needs to be a big area of focus.
UNISON has said that the staffing emergency "could be ended almost overnight with a simple pay rise." Is pay really the silver bullet to it?
There is no silver bullet, and I think there are several things that we need to consider.
The industry suffers an unfavourable reputation at the moment. It's always in the press as doom and gloom. In the long term, education is the solution. We need to educate the younger generations that they have responsibility to the older generation and their wider communities. They are already very ethical on things like the environment; We need to drive the good that can be achieved from considering their local communities.
The immediate crisis stems from no provision in the community. Social care providers haven’t got the staff because of Brexit, vaccinations and COVID isolation rules, and so they can't move patients out of hospital.
After writing to my MP about the importance of foreign workers in the sector, I got a letter back from the Home Office saying that Europeans were only 7 per cent of the workforce, so it's not going to be much of a challenge. We're 100,000 short already, and we've just lost another 7 per cent.
However, the instigation of flexi-working could really help build a culture of looking after your own.
With no commute, it gives people the opportunity to put their heads round the door of their neighbours. In the morning, they can stop in and check they’re ok, and in an evening, do the same and maybe bring a meal round. This is what we’re trying to do with CareMatch, appealing to communities and people’s good will. We had a million volunteers come forward during COVID; if that spirit can be captured, it would be invaluable for the sector.
Raising wages will help, but CareMatch has already given carers the ability to set their own rates, and we’re still challenged in recruiting workers.
The Government pledged £462.5 million before Christmas to help with workforce recruitment and retention over the winter period. Do you feel this figure was enough?
As a provider, I'm benefiting from some of those figures coming through. We are spending it on marketing as well as trying to capture and retain staff.
Whilst the funding will help aspects of the sector it's a very scattergun approach and there's no strategy, which is really frustrating.
We've also got the £5.4 billion that's coming into the care sector from April this year from the new levy. Of course, most of the levy is going to the NHS, so the social care industry doesn't benefit from that. Plus, by raising National Insurance by 1.5 per cent, as an employer in social care it means having to pay more to be able to pay more.
It's not been thought through. The NHS will make use of the social care sector. Improving the efficiency of the way social care is provided, combined with a drive for recruitment in the sector, will help to provide the high-quality care that people need and relieve the pressure faced by the NHS. The response is always reactive rather than proactive, and currently it's trying to just nurse or keep vulnerable adults in hospital because they can’t return home yet.
Given the Government's ambition to transition to what it calls a 'high skill' economy, does this mean the adult social care sector must consider introducing minimum qualification levels to work in care beyond simply having the care certificate?
Martin Green of Care England said we need a workforce that is skilled, valued, and that is listened to. I think those are really important.
Value-based recruitment is essential in care. Someone who has looked after their grandmother since they were 16; that sounds like the ideal person to come into care. Yes, there is risk. The care has significant responsibility when they go out into their community But, I could take an old lady shopping and I don't need a qualification to be able to do that.
The issue is about monitoring and improving delivery, not saying “you need a degree”. We could solve that with a database of carers like they have in Wales, which there seems to be no appetite to achieve in England at this moment in time.
Someone may have a GCSE in Maths or a degree; we don’t necessarily need that. We need somebody who can cook a good meal and actually have a good conversation with our clients.
I've been in the industry for 30 years, and when I started, carers didn't need any training. They had the right values and just wanted to be carers because they wanted to help people - perfect.
What can the care sector do to dispel the negative perceptions it has long had to contend with to attract more people to take up social care training?
Internally, we’ve devised a CareMatch manifesto setting out what we think is really important and looking at how we're going to attract and develop a strong care workforce. A big part of this Manifesto is about transforming the industry, bringing in new technology to change how we deliver care. But the government is also helping us as providers to raise awareness of the shortage of carers.
There are a couple of other things though, that I think the government could do if they wanted to attract carers into the market. They could make driving cheaper for carers or review electric car leases. Give them tax free fuel and free parking so they don’t get given tickets when looking after someone. This is a quick win.
Local authorities should really engage and say, "if you want to be a carer, you get free access to the local gym, your children get free swimming lessons or other solutions offered"
There's so much we can do by looking at what the challenges are for the workforce and saying, "these are the challenges, let's fix that for you."