Profits before people

The UK home care industry

1.6 million people work in the social care sector in England, of which 82% are women and 18% men. Additionally about 15% of these workers are from the EU.

The combination of an ageing population coupled with the associated increase in the number of people with care needs means that by 2025 a further 1 million care workers will be needed.

Add to this the fact that, at 27%, staff turnover in the social care sector is more than twice the average for other professions in England, and it’s easy to see the scale of the problem care providers face.

Companies in the UK usually charge between £15 and £30 per hour with the average rate being around £18-20 per hour, however they only pay their staff around £9 per hour.

Personally I think if you pay someone in a highly skilled, high stress, high empathic job I think you should pay them a lot more than some one on a till in the supermarket.

On top of all that 49% of domiciliary care workers are on Zero hour contracts, many do not know week to week or even day to day what their schedule is, know how many hours they will have and how much money they will earn and often expected to do extra hours for free, work in multiple places at some expense to themselves (they get x pence per mile) all of this makes it very difficult to plan their lives.