Third sector care providers are unable to take on new care packages amid an increasingly challenging recruitment market, a survey has found.

Nine in ten survey respondents said recruitment had become more difficult and six in ten had to reduce the amount of support they provided as a result.

The survey was carried out by the Coalition of Care & Support Providers (CCPS), which represents third sector care groups.

Chief executive Annie Gunner Logan said providers being forced to hand back care packages could be “catastrophic” for the people they support.

Recruitment challenges have been exacerbated by an increasingly competitive labour market, with claims that care staff are moving to better-paid jobs in retail and hospitality.

The Scottish government has admitted its push to recruit NHS support workers could ‘inadvertently’ worsen care staffing challenges.

A minister this week poured cold water on the idea of the government funding a one-off bonus to address recruitment and retention.

Social care minister Kevin Stewart said “golden hellos and golden handcuffs” were a “very difficult thing to do.”

“It's something we could look at but in some regards I don’t necessarily think this is a solution,” he told a Scottish parliament committee earlier this week.

CCPS represents more than 80 of the biggest third sector care and support providers, who give support to more than 200,000 people in Scotland.

Its survey, which was carried out in September and has been shared with healthandcare.scot, found half of the 30 respondents had refused care packages or would refuse new ones.

Annie Gunner Logan said: “Clearly, there are major headaches here for social care providers, with 90% saying that recruitment has become both more difficult and more costly. The existing workforce is also feeling the impact, with over 90% saying they’re working longer hours.

“But perhaps the most worrying aspect of all is that 63% of providers have had to reduce the amount of care & support they provide, and some have had to hand back contracts and care packages to councils, because they simply can’t recruit enough staff.

“For mission-driven, values-based third sector organisations this is tremendously difficult and of course for the people who rely on social care support they provide, it can be catastrophic.”

A third of providers said they were considering returning existing care packages.

Vacancy rates were found to be around twice the usual rate, with six providers facing staff turnover of 20% or higher in the last three months.

One provider said they were ‘genuinely concerned for the coming months’ and another claimed the government’s actions on pay ‘don’t match [their] rhetoric’. 

Another said: ‘I think that there is a constant message about there is a “crisis” in care. I know I would not work anywhere if I was looking for a job where there is a crisis.’  

Read more: NCS commissioning reforms ‘do not go far enough’; All but one council ‘underpaying’ for homecare; Care workers swayed by NHS recruitment campaign

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