I’m not sure if I want to commit my time, energy and focus on the grassroots movement ”Providers Unite”, apart from we want more funding, sounding exactly like the NHS (where more money doesn’t translate to a better service), there is not much substance to it as there’s no offer of meaningful change or improvement or innovation from the sector even if they will be allocated more money.
Let’s break it down:
I know very well how much profit it is in the sector as I been working in the private sector and NHS for the last +15 years, and instead of focusing on real change, and innovation (like creating new ways of delivering care in the community like: CareRooms a CQC registered service – where people can host patients in their own home at a fraction of the cost compared to a care home/ or day in the hospital where it’s between £351 to £901 per day according to UK Parliament website); care providers ask the government to be paid anything between £25 to £40 per hour and they will say that it’s a ”fair cost of care”.
Unfortunately I don’t agree with this statement because a care worker is paid between £11.50 to £13 per hour and doubling to £23ph should be more than enough and reflect the ”fair cost of care” for most providers including those providing complex care support for people with dementia, LD and autism.
If you don’t agree with me please send me all your clients with complex care needs and I will show you that I can provide the services for £23 per hour even with the wage increases coming next April.
If you can’t make it work with £23 per hour then your business model is not good enough and I see no reason why tax payers should be forced to pay more.
It is a free market and if your services are so fantastic then the private sector will see value in you charging £30 to £40 pounds per hour, but I do not agree that social services should pay anything like that, that’s not ”the fair cost of care”, its the price of an outdated model, where you have not innovated, invested in your staff development and probably extracted all the profits without reinvesting in the service.
My second point:
The movement doesn’t represent probably between 50% to 65% of the market, as the micro providers usually don’t get access to the tender process and as a result are blocked from accessing social care packages. The big providers dominate the market by leveraging their size, and push micro providers into the private sector.
Unfortunately I don’t have any data to back this claim, as social services and councils are very good at keeping this information private, and they don’t publish the names or the numbers of care providers on the social care tender, but I can say they like to work with a small number of established providers, that have a high turnover and high capacity.
The elephant in the room
Big providers that have borrowed money to buy and expand have a problem, because of the high interest rates and the increase in minimum wage by 20% in the last two years. Add more competition from visa sponsorship and self employed carers and introductory agencies (imagine Uber but for care services) on top of councils not increasing the funding in line with inflation and you will have the real reasons why ”big” providers want to unite.
Some solution to some of the care problems:
I will happily join the movement if some of the request will benefit the small independent providers and the real people that use the services and not just protecting the status quo.
What I will like to see in order to join the ”Social revolution” and to be ”Stronger Together”.
Access to the tender process to all care providers once registered with CQC and rated ”Good”.
A cap on the cost of care to double the minimum wage for social care services, anything more than that and the care providers should focus on the private sector and not on the social sector where you should provide a service first of all for the community and not for profit.
Better integration with NHS, like a patient records app, where care workers can provide blood pressure and blood sugar readings once trained. This type of training should be mandatory to all care workers as it will free up so much time for the nurses and doctors to focus on the medical side, and reduce the need to go and see a GP.
Making it easier for private clients that qualify for social care to employ directly care workers by providing direct payments by default.
Let’s empower the people to take control of their care and lives, and not ask for more control by demanding more money.
Our resources are limited (time, people, money) and the only way to make social care work for everyone is to change our ways of thinking.
We have a simple choice in the end, either we follow the way of the NHS (demand more money and provide a worst service) or we find a better way and we innovate social care before it’s too late.
We own that to ourself, to our parents and to our children to take a difficult decision today!