4 Steps to Fair Work Campaign
This campaign has ended; it ran from June to October 2023
Read the blog below from our CEO Rachel Cackett for reflections on the campaign and next steps
Welcome to the 4 Steps to Fair Work Campaign
Scotland’s not-for-profit social care sector is beyond crisis. Every day, our member organisations feel the impact that a Scottish Government-funded base rate of pay of just £10.90 per hour is having on staff and services.Many staff are leaving the workforce for better paid jobs elsewhere. New staff are not being recruited. The result? A loss of expertise and potential talent, and a massive undermining of key services – all of which jeopardises support for those who need it most.Our campaign aims to ensure that social care and support workers begin to be properly rewarded and recognised; and the people they support can thrive by getting the support they need at the right times and in the right places.
We’re asking everyone who wants to see Fair Work for social care staff in Scotland to share our 4 Steps to Fair Work and influence the government to step up for social care.
Join us in this journey and add your voice to our campaign.
Campaign illustrations by Ross Richardson
The 4 Steps to Fair Work
We’re asking the Scottish Government to take 4 Steps so that social care staff in Scotland can experience Fair Work. They are:
- 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.
- Ensure equal pay for equal work: Apply pay uplifts to staff in all services, not just those in registered adult social care.
- Value all staff who play their part: Deliver funding packages that value the crucial role of support staff and managers, alongside frontline workers.
- Give us hope of equality: Publish a timetable by this September to deliver fully on Fair Work in Social Care by 2025.
Campaign Introduction Video by Rachel Cackett, Chief Executive of CCPS
Ways to get involved
Media Enquiries
Through the campaign we want to engage with the media, sharing stories and evidence about how lack of Fair Work is affecting social care providers, and the people they support. We’ll work with our members to give them a voice and communicate what Scottish Government must do to change the status quo.
Please contact our comms team if you have an enquiry about the campaign or would like to request a comment.
Background Information and data on Fair Work
2022 Social Care Benchmarking Report
Social care and support providers in Scotland are struggling with a loss of staff, with an average of 52% of those moving jobs last year leaving the social care sector altogether, according to a new report.
In the study of workforce benchmarking in the sector, almost three quarters of surveyed organisations reported a significant rise in staff turnover in 2021-22.
Seventy-three per cent of organisations delivering social care said their staff turnover rate had increased since 2020-21 – a jump of 14% in a single year and an indication of year-on-year rises in social care staff moving jobs.
Responses captured in the 2022 Social Care Benchmarking Report demonstrate the scale of sector-wide recruitment, retention and staffing challenges organisations are experiencing now.
The Coalition of Care and Support Providers in Scotland (CCPS) and the HR Voluntary Sector Forum (HRVSF) commissioned the University of Strathclyde to conduct the benchmarking survey and analysis for member organisations.
The Executive Summary of the report is available to download here and a media release reflecting on the report can be viewed here.
Community Integrated Care Unfair to Care report
A 2022 report by Community Integrated Care, one of the UK’s largest social care charities and a CCPS member organisation (Scotland), examined the pay gap between social care and support workers and their NHS equivalents (Band 3 Healthcare Assistants).
Community Integrated Care published a Scottish supplement of the report in March 2023. It identified that, following the pay deal from the Scottish Government securing a 6.5% pay rise for comparable roles in the NHS, the disparity between social care and NHS equivalent roles will grow from 21% to 24% or £5,164 a year.
Pay gap between social care workers and equivalent NHS band 3 staff
In February 2023 we published a graph showing the gap between a third sector support worker salary funded by Scottish Government and their NHS equivalent:
Blogs and Resources
Blogs and Media Releases:
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Blog: “Why the Scottish Government must step up for social care” (29 June, 2023)
Introducing our campaign, CCPS’s Chief Executive Rachel Cackett writes for HealthAndCare.Scot on why the Scottish Government must take 4 Steps to Fair Work.
- Guest blog: “It’s too easy to think that social care is about someone else. It’s about all of us”
Providers must have better resourcing to reflect the societal importance of our work in communities across Scotland, says Andrew Thomson, Deputy CEO of Carr Gomm. - Media Release: Report reveals reality of staffing crisis in social care, with more than half of those moving jobs last year leaving the sector
Scale of challenges facing providers uncovered in new study of workforce benchmarking. - Guest blog: “It lacks both logic and fairness that social care staff are being paid a base rate of £10.90”
Ian Cumming, CEO of Erskine, urges you to unite and support the 4 Steps to Fair Work campaign. - Guest blog: “What is the ethical defence of unequal pay?”
Old concepts of moral principle, politics and logic help explain the absence of fair work in social care, says Ron Culley.
- Guest blog: “Which part of the elephant do we start with?”
For things to improve for supported people and carers, they first need to improve for the workforce, says Claire Cairns, Director of the Coalition of Carers in Scotland. - Guest blog: “The staff who work for my son will tell you it’s not only good fun, but they have grown so much from supporting him”
The Coalition of Carers in Scotland’s Jaynie Mitchell discusses how a new approach to recruitment could reap rewards.
- Guest blog: “In a just Scotland, everyone must have sufficient income to live a dignified, healthy and financially secure life”
Lack of fair work and low income can lead to problem debt, including for staff in social care. As part of our 4 Steps campaign series focusing on Faith Leaders, Christians Against Poverty’s Emma Jackson explains the scale of the problem – and how to fight back. - Blog: “Today, the First Minister has the chance to introduce a step change in social care. Will he take it?”
The Programme for Government could answer our campaign calls and make a real difference in people’s daily lives, writes Rachel Cackett. - Media statement: Programme for Government social care pay announcement “fails to grasp reality and begs questions over timeline”
Our CEO Rachel Cackett responds to today’s pledge from the First Minister. -
Last week the First Minister announced plans for a rise in baseline pay for social care staff to £12. Where does this leave supervisory staff – and who will recognise their skills? asks Stephen McLellan, Chief Executive of Recovery Across Mental Health.
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Immediate action and appropriate funding is needed to ensure children’s social care services can deliver for their workforce as they deliver for Scotland’s children, argues Capability Scotland’s Ben Bradbury.
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The First Minister’s pledge of £12 from next April fails to address a deepening crisis, argues Karen Sheridan, Chief Operating Officer of Community Integrated Care and CCPS Board member.
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Guest Blog: “Funding packages that value all staff will play a crucial part in developing a motivated workforce”
Alex Cumming, SAMH’s Executive Director of Operations, on why social care and support managers need our backing to ensure not just that they don’t leave the sector, but that they can thrive in it.
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We refuse to accept that our children’s services staff are any less important than their adult counterparts, writes Cosgrove Care’s Depute Chief Executive Pauline Boyce.
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Guest Blog: “Ending the difference in funding levels between services would be a step towards the fairness we need”
A hierarchy in adults and children’s services or between regulated v unregulated services simply means more inequalities, says Fiona Steel, Action for Children’s Acting National Director for Scotland. -
Our CEO Rachel Cackett reflects on the disappointments and successes of our 4 Steps to Fair Work campaign – and what our emerging movement can do next in its fight for social justice.