Despite the central importance of social care in many people’s lives, the past few years have shone a greater light on the essential role that social care plays across the health and care system, for people and their families. Given that the political appetite for reform seems to have stalled a little, as raised by the Care and Support Alliance recently – this report offers a timely reminder of the huge importance of the care and support sector, as well as the challenges and potential opportunities facing it, at this juncture.
In this report, we identify six key issues affecting all social care sectors – albeit to different degrees – and uncover some worrying statistics that raise concerns about the future viability of social care, unless urgent action is taken.
49%
of respondents believe a greater use of technology is a potential solution to help address cost rises for staff and providers
Workforce and funding issues in social care, alongside wider pressures across the health and care system due to the cost of living crisis and the after effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, are making it hard for people to get the right care at the right time in the right place.
Participants highlighted how the government’s focus during the pandemic was on NHS hospitals, rather than social care. Furthermore, the impact of mandatory vaccinations for care home staff caused them to leave and not return when the policy was revoked. There was a general feeling that social care is viewed by decision makers through the lens of its impact on the NHS, with 41% of our survey respondents saying their interdependence was a critical factor and 31% saying the NHS – with its greater visibility – is seen as a higher priority.
Whilst the cost of living is affecting everyone, there is very real concern about its impact on the health of vulnerable people, cited by 34.5% of the respondents to our survey as having the biggest impact on social care, rising to 43% among those working with vulnerable adults. This topic is explored in more detail in this report.
A factor running through many of these topics is the difficulty in maintaining the social care workforce. Experts highlighted a variety of reasons for the difficulty in recruiting and retaining staff, including post-Covid burn out, the lack of value assigned to the work, low wages and the perception of social care as a job rather than a career. Many believe that a solution to this problem would be to raise the profile of the social care sector.
Despite most of us assigning Covid to the past, our research shows it is still having the biggest impact on the ability to provide social care, with words such as “exhausted”, “burned out” and “lack of value” being used to describe how staff feel. None of this was helped by ever changing rules about the need for Covid testing or what type of test when people were leaving hospital to go into care homes; or the difficulty with accessing PPE.
When asked about sustainability, economic rather than environmental sustainability was the first thought on respondents’ minds. Although the cost of living crisis is now necessitating those environmental measures that can result in cost savings.
As well as looking at the problems, we asked about strategies that could help address both the short-term and long-term structural issues within the social care sector.
Insights include:
Higher pay is not the leading or the only solution to the recruitment problems facing the sector; a better benefits package would make it easier to retain staff
A nationally approved social care qualification was the more popular choice among several ideas to help improve the perception of social care
Greater use of technology was seen as a way to help address cost rises for staff and providers, with 49% selecting this as a potential solution
Technology was also thought to have a significant impact on improving communication and service provision
The main barriers to greater technology adoption are perceptions around older people’s appetite for technology use, commissioners’ expertise and the workforce’s reluctance to learn a new way of working
Investment in technology and integration with the NHS was seen as the way to financial sustainability
There are no quick fixes, but now is the time to develop a strategy to address the key issues in social care, ensure the opportunities presented by new developments in technology and integrated care systems are taken, and elevate social care in the eyes of the nation to maintain and develop a workforce to deliver increasing demands for care.
Social care needs to be future proofed to help us all navigate these turbulent times.