A cinderella service with no prince charming

The adult social care sector employs more people than the NHS, adds over ￡55bn of value ?to the economy and can act as a powerful source to support empowerment, and “levelling up”, in challenged communities. Despite this, the Autumn Statement misses the opportunity to view the sector as an investment and unleash more of its economic potential.

The sector ?has stood on a precipice for some time, and faces profound workforce recruitment and retention crises, with care workers being asked to undertake ever more complex responsibilities that benefit millions of people and their families. It has faced chronic and socially unjust underfunding for over a decade. In recent months, leading bodies within it issued reports highlighting the urgency of the situation and offering simple short and longer term steps to give it the parity of esteem it has long deserved.”

?The Government commitment to fix social care made as part of its electoral mandate in 2019 has demonstrably failed to be delivered. The silence about social care in the King’s Speech was deafening and, unlike the NHS, the failure to have a long term workforce strategy for social care perhaps speaks to how much the Government truly value the sector.?

The absence in the Autumn Statement today of any substantive steps to address the immediate problems of the sector seems to follow this story of silence. Some have called the sector a “Cinderella service” for this reason. Unlike in fairy tales there, at present, seems to be no Prince Charming on any meaningful horizon.

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