UK Edition
Social care workers could get their own higher national minimum wage to combat chronic staff shortages and end the reliance on “cheap” foreign labour under plans being considered by ministers.
The Government’s Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) has proposed that all care workers should get a compulsory minimum salary of £10.50 an hour, at least £1 above the national living wage, as the first step to a “significant” increase in their pay.
They said this was the only way to reverse high vacancy rates, low pay and poor conditions and meet the growing demand from the surging numbers of elderly needing care workers to look after them.
They warned that it would be “highly damaging” for social care if the reliance on migrants plugging the gaps was used as an “excuse” not to address fundamental problems in the sector. One in four social care workers in London are foreign.
The MAC estimated an extra 236,000 social care workers would be needed in the next decade, a quarter of the current total of one million, where there are already 66,000 full-time vacancies.
They said workers were undervalued and exploited because they were often not paid for “work” time travelling to elderly people’s homes or sleeping overnight while caring for vulnerable people.
The MAC said they should be paid for “all” hours on the job, including travelling and sleeping, as they were effectively being “underpaid for their time spent at work”.
The Government advisers said they shared the “anger” felt by those in the sector at being viewed as low-skilled. “We categorically disagree that care work is low-skilled,” they said.
“Although some basic technical skills can be acquired through training, other skills are vital attributes in providing good-quality care, such as emotional and physical resilience, communication, planning and organisation, problem-solving skills as well as understanding individuals’ needs.”
Persistent underfunding of care sector
The MAC slammed the Government’s failure to recognise this: “We are in no doubt that the single most important factor that underlies almost all the workforce problems in social care arise as a result of the persistent underfunding of the care sector by successive governments.”
“One cannot seriously address the workforce issues in social care unless pay is improved; this is essential to boosting recruitment and improving retention. What is needed is a minimum pay rate for care workers that is fully funded by Government and is above the national living wage.”
This would cost about £1 billion. The MAC also recommended care workers were made permanently eligible for the health and care worker visas and kept on the Shortage Occupation List - designed to help migrants get work visas to fill jobs where there are shortages - until it is next reviewed.
It called for additional taxes placed on such staff to be scrapped or lowered. Firms can face costs of up to £1,000 per worker per year under immigration skills charges.
Brian Bell, MAC chairman, described it as “illogical” to tax public bodies and described this as “simply shifting funds across government”, so recommended the charge be removed for all health and care worker visas.
He also said the cost of applying for indefinite leave to remain in the UK after holding the visa for five years - at present almost £2,400 per person - should be waived or reduced to the “actual processing cost”.