Social Care

Laura Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 25th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Laura Smith (Crewe and Nantwich) (Lab)]

Social care has been pushed into a state of emergency. A report by the CQC in July found that one in four social care services is now failing on safety grounds, with at least one care home closing every week. Only 2% of providers are regarded as outstanding.

In Cheshire East, almost a third of care homes have been rated inadequate or as requiring improvement. Imagine the uproar if Ofsted published such statistics for schools. The CQC’s chief inspector, Andrea Sutcliffe, admits that adult social care is still approaching a “tipping point.”

The only reason the social care service has not completely fallen to pieces is because it is being held together by an incredible and skilled workforce who are swimming tirelessly against the tide. A recent Unison survey of homecare workers found that more than three in five are given only 15 minutes, or less, to provide personal care. Three quarters end up rushing and have to compromise the dignity or wellbeing of those they look after. Nearly a third are unable to wash, bathe or shower the people for whom they care.

I am always lost for words when I speak to care workers in my constituency. It takes a certain kind of person to be a care worker, and imagine how it must feel for that type of person to be forced to leave somebody for whom they care before they have had time to wash them or to help them eat. To make matters worse, many work on poverty pay, a consequence of the chronic underfunding of this service.

The National Audit Office has stated that 220,000 care workers in England are being paid below the minimum wage—the national minimum wage, not the Government’s living wage. Care workers in my constituency have been underpaid for years by Cheshire East Council, which is breaching minimum wage regulations despite having a policy to pay all workers at least the local living wage. Those workers have yet to receive back pay for the duration that they have been underpaid, and it is unclear whether that back pay will lift them to a living wage.

Only yesterday, a care worker contacted my office because he did not know where else to turn. He described how staff morale is at rock bottom, with many care workers suffering from poor mental health, worrying about their job security and relying on food banks and payday loans. They are too scared to take time off sick and unable to afford annual leave. He described how care workers feel that they have no voice and receive no respect. Is it any wonder that more than 900 care workers are leaving their job every single day?