The care sector will need 540,000 additional social care posts by 2040 to cope with the aging population, the adult social care workforce body, Skills for Care, estimates.
Skills for Care’s new Workforce Strategy for adult social care in England warns that the sector still has a vacancy rate around three times higher than the wider economy.
It estimates that 540,000 new social care posts will be needed by 2040 if the workforce is to grow in line with the increase in the number people over the age of 65.
The number of people over 65 is expected to grow most sharply over the next decade, which means 430,000 extra posts will be needed by 2035, according to the strategy.
Professor Oonagh Smyth, CEO of Skills for Care and co-chair of the Workforce Strategy Steering Group, said: ‘We’re going to need hundreds of thousands more care workers, with the right skills and values, over the next 15 years – yet right now the sector still has a vacancy rate around three times higher than that of the wider economy and is struggling to compete in local job markets.’
The strategy calls on the government to improve pay and terms and conditions for care workers, invest in training, and introduce legislation to mandate strategic workforce planning and create a central body to drive delivery.
Kathryn Smith, chief executive of the Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE), commented: ‘The Workforce Strategy sets out a crucial roadmap for how to tackle both the workforce shortage and the skills shortage in social care. Better pay is only one step forward. Taken together, the strategy’s recommendations have the potential to shift the dial in how we value care work.’
