Funding for adult social care pay agreement ‘not enough’

The government has announced a £500m cash injection to improve pay, terms and conditions for adult social care workers across England – but sector leaders have warned the investment will not be enough to tackle serious workforce challenges.

Health and social care secretary Wes Streeting has today set out the steps the government will take towards achieving its long-promised ‘Fair Pay Agreement’ for adult social care workers by 2028.

While launching a public consultation to gather views on the design of the pay agreement process, the government has confirmed that £500m from its recent spending review allocation for adult social care in 2028/29 will be used to support care worker pay.

In addition, the government unveiled plans for a new body to negotiate changes to pay and conditions for the adult social care workforce.

Following the public consultation, the government said it aimed to lay secondary legislation and stand-up the new negotiating body in 2026.

The body would then be ready to conduct negotiations in 2027 ready for implementation of the Fair Pay Agreement for 2028/29.

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Speaking at the Labour Party conference in Liverpool today, the health secretary said: ‘We will no longer accept a system built on poverty pay and zero-hour insecurity.

‘We will back the first-ever Fair Pay Agreement for care workers, not just in law but in practice – starting with £500m, to deliver better pay, terms, and conditions for care workers across our country.

‘Because the people who care for our loved ones should never struggle to care for their own.’

But sector leaders have warned the investment is ‘not enough’ to address recruitment and retention issues across the adult social care sector and urged the government to ‘dig deeper’.

Chief executive of Care England Professor Martin Green said: ‘While the creation of a Fair Pay Agreement represents a long-awaited acknowledgement that care work is a skilled profession deserving of fair reward, today’s announcement does little to deliver any meaningful change for our workforce.’

He added that with funding ‘this slight, it is hard to see how providers will attract or retain the staff they desperately need, undermining the very purpose of the agreement’.

‘We recognise this is a journey and that multiple agreements will follow, but the scale of today’s commitment is simply not enough to tackle the immediate challenges to recruit and retain staff that lie in front of us,’ said Professor Green.

‘If the government truly wants to value the care workforce, it must dig deeper. This announcement may mark a step forward, but without meaningful investment in the years ahead, the sector will continue to see staff leaving at a time when they are needed most.’

Meanwhile, policy fellow at The Health Foundation Lucinda Allen also raised concerns about the level of funding and said the £500m investment ‘will not be enough to provide a meaningful boost in staff pay’.

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Analysis from The Health Foundation suggested that if shared evenly between the 1.5 million workers in the sector, the funding ‘could amount to roughly 20p extra per hour each’.

‘If wages rise without more government funding, costs will fall on councils and providers – ultimately, this risks cuts to people’s services and higher fees for those who fund their own care,’ warned Ms Allen.

‘The government must commit to sufficient and long-term funding for its flagship social care policy and work closely with those who need and provide care as they design this policy.’

Nuffield Trust deputy director of research Natasha Curry said while the government was right to highlight the need to improve pay and conditions of care workers, she was concerned about the fact that the funding announced today was not ‘new’.

‘The bear trap in today’s announcement is – as is so often the case – the money. This extra £500m, already announced at June’s Spending review, is not new, will not arrive until 2028, and will need to come from funds already needed to keep social care afloat and meet the needs of the people that rely on it,’ she said.

Ms Curry warned that existing spending pressures on the sector, including this year’s increase in employers’ National Insurance Contribution ‘more than wipes out’ the £500m announced.

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‘The agreement will also rest on extensive negotiations through the new negotiating body – which will now have to be constrained by this figure,’ she added.

‘As always, good intentions and sound motives cannot balance the books. The fair pay agreement is the right thing to be doing but it won’t work unless properly funded.’

Crossbench peer Baroness Louise Casey is currently working on an independent commission into adult social care to build cross-party consensus and deliver recommendations on the government commitment to create a National Care Service.