The Government’s decision not to go ahead with a fund dedicated to training the social care workforce is “desperately shortsighted”, according to a leading health charity.
In a written statement on Tuesday, care minister Stephen Kinnock said the adult social care training and development fund, which was announced in provisional form by the previous government in April, will not be taken forward due to the need to “manage down overall fiscal pressures in 2024-25”.
However, Mr Kinnock said the Government still intends to provide funding for adult social care “learning and development, with the budget maintained at the level we spent last year”.
The Nuffield Trust criticised the decision, saying it “looks like yet another troubling decision to deprioritise social care in order to plug gaps in health funding”.
It comes a day after Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced that adult social care charging reforms will not be taken forward.
An £86,000 cap on the amount anyone in England has to spend on their personal care over their lifetime had already been delayed by the Conservative government from October 2023 to October 2025.
On Monday, the Government said the decision not to proceed with charging reforms in 2025 would save a projected £1 billion by the end of that year.
The decision to scrap the reforms “means the risk of extremely high social care costs” of potentially hundreds of thousands of pounds for people, the Institute for Fiscal Studies said, while Age UK described it as “really bad news for all those older people who were hoping against hope for some relief from their sky-high care bills”.
The County Councils Network had warned the Government earlier this month it would be “impossible” to deliver the reforms from autumn 2025 as costs had risen and said going ahead could have risked “serious consequences”, including cuts to other council services.
The previous government said the initial £50 million allocated to the workforce fund would support up to 37,000 people in direct care roles to study for a new Level 2 social care certificate qualification by March 2025.
Planned arrangements would have seen social care providers reimbursed for the costs of training.
The previous government also said it intended to make contributions to enable people to renew their registrations to work in care.
Mr Kinnock said the administration of new arrangements would be “shared in due course” and committed to developing a “care workforce pathway” and a new qualification.
He added: “We are committed in our support for the adult social care workforce.
“Our long-term plans will include a new deal for care workers through a fair pay agreement.
“We will also take steps to create a national care service underpinned by national standards, with the aim of delivering consistency of care across the country.”
Responding to the announcement, Nuffield Trust deputy director of policy Natasha Curry said: “Taking away limited funding that had been set aside for upskilling and training much-needed social care staff looks desperately shortsighted and is a significant blow for the sector.
“This, taken on top of the indefinite delay to a cap on social care costs announced by the Chancellor, looks like yet another troubling decision to deprioritise social care in order to plug gaps in health funding.
“The new government states that it is committed to the workforce and long-term plans for social care reform.
“We now need to see concrete action to reassure that these promises are not simply rhetoric.
“Sadly, so far what we have seen is consistent with social care continuing to play poor relation to the NHS.”
More than half a million extra roles in social care will be needed in the next 15 years to keep up with demand, according to a major workforce strategy for the sector published earlier this month.
The projection published earlier this month by Skills For Care, the strategic workforce development and planning body for adult social care in England, came as the latest data showed a vacancy rate in social care remains at around three times the national average of other economic sectors.
Skills For Care recently published a workforce strategy which it says is sorely-needed and should be regularly reviewed in a similar way to the NHS long term workforce plan.
It called on the Government to bring in legislation to mandate strategic workforce planning and to work on improving pay, terms and conditions for care workers.
A push to get people discharged from hospital more quickly is partly contributing to a rise in those needing more complex care in the aftermath, according to a major survey of adult social care directors.
A more-of-the-same approach will not work, the Association of Directors of Adult Social Serves said, as it warned investment must shift from a focus on freeing up hospital beds to better funding for social care.
