Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how much funding from the public purse has been set aside to support care providers in funding the (a) historical capital costs and (b) ongoing revenue costs of complying with the tribunal ruling on sleep-in payments and the national minimum wage.

The Government recognises the pressure that has been placed on the sleep-in sector by historic liabilities for back pay and is exploring options to minimise any impact on the social care sector.

It is crucially important that we ensure stability within the social care sector; not just for vulnerable service users, but also for the many thousands of low paid workers within the sector.

At the Spring Budget 2017 we provided an additional £2 billion to councils for social care. The ongoing pressure arising from enforcement of National Minimum Wage for sleep-in shifts was one of the costs the Government took account of in deciding to provide this sum of additional funding.