Report

Care to stay

This report from UK think tank Re:State calls on local authorities to implement a cross-cutting, place-based strategy for the adult social care workforce.

Re:State’s new report recommends an immediate, deliverable, and locally-led approach to addressing the adult social care workforce crisis. While the sector’s underfunding is a key driver of its chronic workforce issues, as Baroness Casey said herself, action to address the crisis cannot wait for the funding model to be overhauled or Casey’s Commission to conclude.

The diagnosis is stark. Vacancy rates stand at 6.8% and annual turnover at 23.7%. Domestic care worker recruitment is falling whilst demand is forecast to continue to soar. Without radical action, adult social care services may be at risk of collapse. ‘Care to stay’ calls on local authorities to implement a cross-cutting, place-based strategy for the adult social care workforce.

Interventions should span four categories: boosting productivity; better supporting workforce health and wellbeing, given this is the leading cause of the workforce leaving their job; promoting commissioning practices with positive market shaping outcomes; and improving public perceptions and trust. The individual interventions are no cost, low cost, or plausibly able to pay for themselves in the short term. Meanwhile, the cost of implementing the strategies should be funded by the Better Care Fund, reflecting the reduced NHS demand that is likely to result.

At national level, the report calls for DHSC to introduce a light-touch, voluntary register for frontline care workers, and a significant expansion of the Digitising Social Care Programme. Care to stay offers an immediate and deliverable plan for a sector that can no longer afford to delay.