Rachel Cackett, CEO of the Coalition of Care and Support Providers Scotland (CCPS) writes about the need to value social care workers and the sector here in Scotland beyond its role in supporting the NHS – and calls for the government to implement its Fair Work commitment.

Today we’re launching a national campaign calling on the Scottish government to make a step change in the delivery of Fair Work*, which has long been promised to Scotland’s social care workforce.

We need your help to bring pressure on the Scottish government on this issue, share the reality of what’s happening in social care, and ensure that MSPs speak up about it.

So, why does fair work matter for people who work in the social care and support sector? And why should you care about this campaign for those who provide care?

We’re responding to the voices of CCPS members: not-for-profit providers of care and support for people of all ages in Scotland.

For months they’ve been telling us that the sector is beyond crisis.

Minimum wage workforce

With a Scottish government-funded base rate of pay of just £10.90 per hour (and that only applies for some workers) many staff are leaving the workforce for better paid jobs elsewhere. And people aren’t joining the workforce either.

Let’s remember that support staff are trained and regulated workers doing skilled and complex work being offered the minimum wage required to “get by” in life.

The result? A loss of current expertise; a loss of potential talent; and a massive undermining of key services. In the end, all of this jeopardises support for those who need it most.

And those people are not an abstract: they are your families, your friends, your neighbours and your communities.

We may not always ‘see’ it, but social care and support is a fundamental; it touches all of us at points through our lives. But it mostly happens behind closed doors and is often obscured behind the big headlines about the crisis in the NHS.

Social care needs to be championed in public for its crucial role in supporting people to realise their right to independence, their connections with the people and places that matter to them, their wellbeing, and their ability to participate in work, school and community.

The Scottish government needs to start talking about why social care matters – not just to keep the NHS on its feet, but to keep people on theirs. And it needs to articulate a plan for how it will invest in, and finally deliver, Fair Work.

Four Steps

That’s the context. Now here’s what the Scottish government needs to do, set out in four steps that are the core of our campaign:

1. Deal with pay inequality: As a first step, implement the promise of a minimum of £12 per hour for social care staff, starting from 1 April 2023. 

2. Ensure equal pay for equal work: Apply pay uplifts to staff in all services, not just those in registered adult social care. 

3. Value all staff who play their part: Deliver funding packages that value the crucial role of support staff and managers, alongside frontline workers. 

4. Give us hope of equality: Publish a timetable by this September to deliver fully on Fair Work in Social Care by 2025.  

Taking these four steps wouldn’t solve everything – of course not. But it would mean we’d be on a surer footing on the journey to Fair Work.

On that journey we could see social care and support workers begin to be properly rewarded for their public service.

We could see a leap towards rebalancing the extreme gender inequality in our sector, by reversing the scandalous low wage being paid to a workforce that is over 80% female.

We could see progress in the strengthening of services and in social care becoming a well-regarded profession that retains its staff and attracts new people.

And we could have in our sights what we really all want for our friends and family members: people thriving by getting the support they need at the right times and in the right places, with consistent relationships placed at the heart of that support.

We can get there, with your help. We hope you’ll join us on the journey and add your voice to our campaign. It’s time for the Scottish government to step up for social care and deliver on Fair Work.

*The Fair Work Convention says fair work is work that offers effective voice, opportunity, security, fulfilment and respect; that balances the rights and responsibilities of employers and workers and that can generate benefits for individuals, organisations and society.

The views of columnists and people who write other guest insights articles are their own.

Read more: Community Link Workers can't solve inequalities alone; Can Scotland make health fairer?; Social care: The cost of doing nothing;