A report by National Care Forum member Community Integrated Care has warned of a social care workers pay gap crisis.
Unfair To Care 2022, commissioned by NCF member Community Integrated Care in partnership with Korn Ferry, has found that social care workers are undervalued by more than £8,000 compared to their exact equivalents in the NHS.
According to the report, social care support workers would need a 41 per cent pay rise to have parity with Band 3 NHS Healthcare Assistants. It would take 23 years for current rates of uplift to deliver that parity. The report notes that frontline social carers require complex technical and emotional skills to effectively support people with complex medical and behavioural needs.
NCF CEO Professor Vic Rayner OBE said: “This is a really valuable report, building on the benchmarking work delivered last year by Community Integrated Care. It brings together insights from across the care and support sector which highlight, yet again, the level of skill needed to be a care and support worker and just how demanding it is to provide high quality, person centred care and support.
“Unfair To Care also offers some very powerful stories from care and support workers, highlighting how difficult it is to remain in a job they love because of the current low levels of pay and the rising cost of living. The public perception research by Ipsos shows that the public believe in the importance of our social care workforce to society and all the evidence in this report shows the urgency of investing in that workforce now, addressing the current pay disparities and longer-term planning for the future of this essential workforce.”
