Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 18
18
Deferred
The social care workforce is in a similarly precarious position, against a wider backdrop of...
Recommendation
The social care workforce is in a similarly precarious position, against a wider backdrop of declining local authority resources.64 Despite the Department’s assurances that “the numbers are moving in the right direction”, vacancies in social care have been on an upward trend over the last ten years at a national level, rising from 4.4% in 2012–13 to 9.2% in 2020–21.65 Within ICSs, social care vacancies varied from 5% to 13% and turnover in roles range from 23% to 37% in 2020–21.66 The Department told us it is taking several steps to address this situation.67 These include recently launching a national advertising campaign to encourage people to work in social care; committing £500 million to the sector through its Adult Social Care Discharge Fund as part of the Plan For Patients; adding social care to the shortage occupation list, which it told us had resulted in between 10,000 and 15,000 new recruits from overseas; and working with the Department for Work and Pensions to better match jobseekers to social care roles.68 The Department also committed £500m for investment in the social care workforce in December 2021, as part of its white paper on adult social care reform People at the Heart of Care.69
Government Response Summary
The government agrees with the recommendation but defers implementation until April 2025, when interim findings of its formal evaluation of workforce reform initiatives will be available; an update on the breakdown of spend will be available in April 2024 and a plan for adult social care system reform will be published in Spring 2023.
Government Response
Deferred
HM Government
Deferred
3.1 The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. Target implementation date: April 2025 3.2 Whilst the government agrees with the recommendation, the proposed timescales are too premature for any impacts to be measurable. The workforce reform initiatives, which were announced as part of the government’s commitment to a 10-year vision for reforming adult social care in the People at the Heart of Care White Paper (published December 2021), will be underpinned by a robust evaluation strategy to ensure government can assess the impact of these reforms over spending review period 2021 to 2024 to inform plans for further reform and investment in the future. It is therefore recommended that the target implementation date of this recommendation is revised to April 2025 when the government should be in a position to share interim findings of its formal evaluation of the reform initiatives. The government will, however, be able to provide an update on the breakdown of spend at an earlier date of April 2024. 3.3 This government has made good progress in implementing this vision set out in the White Paper including investing in workforce capacity, supporting sector digitisation, developing its approach for improving oversight of the adult social care system, enhancing the collection and use of data, and launching a procurement to identify a partner to develop the new Care Certificate qualification specification. 3.4 In Spring 2023, the government will publish a plan for adult social care system reform; this will set out how it will build on the progress so far to implement the vision for adult social care set out in the white paper.