Social Care

Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 2:25 pm on 25 October 2022.

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Photo of Mark Drakeford Mark Drakeford Labour 2:25, 25 October 2022

Well, Llywydd, Hefin David made a series of important points there, all of which I think the Welsh Government would agree with and all of which are areas in which we continue to make our efforts. I mentioned the £43 million we're investing in securing the real living wage for our social care workforce, the additional investment that we have made—£10 million in fact, on top of the £45 million we normally provide in the annual workforce grant, to help local authorities in their efforts to recruit and then to retain social care workers, and raising the status of the profession is really important in doing that. It's why this Senedd passed legislation to require the registration of the workforce. More than 40,000 workers in social care are already registered or are about to be registered here in Wales. We began with the registration of domiciliary care workers, we moved on to the registration of adult care homes as well, and that is important because it's through registration that you open the door to career progression, training, opportunities, leadership training. The social care fair work forum, which we've established as part of the social partnership forum, has just concluded the first iteration of a model that they are going to promote for progression by workers in social care. So, if you become a social care worker, you can see how a career could lie in front of you, as you would, indeed, if you joined the NHS. I'm very happy to look to see whether a conversation between the forum and Mr Southall would be a good way of taking forward some of the points he has made, relayed by the Member for Caerphilly this afternoon.