Care for the Care Staff !

Eastbourne has many hundreds of people working in the Social Care sector- providing vital services for our elderly and vulnerable residents.  However, conditions for many of these dedicated staff are a scandal !

Nationally, 220,000 care workers are illegally under-paid below the national minimum wage of £6.50 an hour. According to the National Audit Office 220,000 care workers are being exploited in this way.

This is in part because whilst the advertised rate may be above the minimum wage, most care workers are on zero hours or temporary agency contracts, with the employers cutting out paid time wherever they can. A full day on the job can translate into only a handful of paid hours.

In 2011 and 2013 HMRC investigated the care sector and found that only half of care providers were paying the national minimum wage. Thanks to their investigation several companies were forced to pay care workers the money that they were legally owed. 

One way employers under-pay home care workers is by only paying them for the time they spend caring for people in their own homes. This means the time they spend traveling between visits is unpaid.  Sadly many care workers are also not given enough time to care for people with dignity.

This puts care workers in an agonising position because they know they are being taken advantage of and are losing money they need for their own families, but they care deeply about the people they work with.

This sometimes puts care workers under pressure to leave their visits early to avoid having their wages pulled down.  Whereas others regularly stay longer and work for free to just make sure the person gets the care they need and deserve. 

Many good care workers get fed up with the situation and find other work, and the high turnover means a lack of continuity of care.

The Public Accounts Committee looked at the issue in the summer and said, “We are astonished that up to 220,000 care workers earn less than minimum wage and seemingly little has been done to rectify this”.
Unison has launched a petition calling on the (Lib Dem) Secretary of State for Industry to act to end this scandal.  You can sign the petition here !

Citizens UK has a major campaign calling for a charter of rights for workers in the care sector- including payment of the Living Wage.  Find out more here.