In this climate, those of us who want public services to be transformed and democratised through user and worker involvement to truly meet the complex needs of those we ‘serve’, are really up against it. It is hard to give time and develop close relationships and engage with user groups when fewer and fewer undervalued staff work with ever more vulnerable service users – whether in benefits, child protection, adult social care or housing. It may also be harder to empathise when you yourself are run ragged at work, yet have to rely on benefits and even food banks to make ends meet – as many of our members do. And managerial structures in councils and external providers rarely provide the means for our members’ knowledge and experience to inform the way services are provided – let alone the views of users!
No group of workers feels the tension between cuts and care more than home care workers. Overwhelmingly women, most have been outsourced to the private and voluntary sectors. As a result, basic pay is often at the level of the Minimum Wage while our members have to provide cars, often pay for fuel and mobile phones themselves and are frequently not paid for travel time between visits. Many are on zero hours contracts, not knowing who they will visit or when they will have work next. Training is often minimal. Talk of developing a new ‘relational’ approach to public services is very tough indeed, when time is increasingly rationed to 15-minute visits to clients with critical needs, when you are monitored through a swipe card and rarely have the chance for supervision or simple ‘download’.
The cuts since 2010 have not just resulted in over 400,000 elderly and vulnerable clients being denied publicly funded home care. They have squeezed council budgets so hard that council commissioners are demanding more and more of providers – and therefore of our members – on less and less funding. The UK Home Care Association has calculated that £14 an hour is the minimum cost of externally provided home care. We know of councils who have now pushed the price down to £10 or £11 an hour, forcing providers into law-breaking behaviour such as not paying for travel time and pushing pay below the National Minimum Wage. As for quality – shorter and shorter visits and personal care and interaction restricted to the minimum are becoming the order of the day.
I know how much our members care about the services they provide. Many home carers work unpaid and out of hours to ensure that their clients enjoy a taste of humanity amidst the rushed bath, quick breakfast and hurried dressing. They know that good care is as much about relationships as tablets and bath time. Without the unpaid goodwill of women, homecare and many other services just would not survive. That’s why we will be having a Day of Protest on 4 February. Please join us. The seventh richest country in the world can afford world class public services, time to care and a workforce not pushed into poverty.
Heather Wakefield is Head of Local Government for Unison. Follow her on Twitter here. Follow the Day of Protest on Twitter using the hashtag #LGProtest.
This piece was first published on Relational Welfare here on 02/02/14