With a General Election on the horizon, Claire Lambert, Research Director at market research specialist Ipsos, explores the public’s views on the current state of the social care, and how can these be used to help the sector get the attention it needs?
The public are far from positive when asked about care and support services for adults: very few (only 6%) think the government has the right policies in place for social care. Nearly three in five (59%) think the standard of social care services has got worse over the last 12 months – on a par with public perceptions about the standards of care in the NHS. One of the key challenges facing the sector is workforce shortages, and the public realise this is an issue: three quarters (76%) recognise there are too few care workers in Britain relative to the need for social care.
These perceptions very much reflect what we hear when we engage with the social care workforce, with the issue of not having enough time to do their job well coming up frequently in discussions. This has significant implications for staff wellbeing, impacting on their ability to look after themselves while at work, on their stress levels and how much they worry about work outside their working hours.
Yet despite the public expressing concerns over social care, it is clearly not a priority for them: fewer than one in twenty consider adult social care as the most important issue facing Britain (4%). In contrast, the NHS tops the list, with a third of people (34%) considering it as the most important issue facing the country.
So although the public realises that the social care sector is in crisis, they do not share the sector’s sense of urgency that this crisis needs to be dealt with and prioritised.
This comes partly from a lack of knowledge and understanding of what social care is, and how it is delivered and funded. Ipsos’ polling for the Health Foundation demonstrates that a sizeable minority incorrectly believe that the NHS provides most social care services for older people (31%), and that these services are free at the point of use (38%). As we know from the discussions we have with the public about social care, many are surprised to hear that they are likely to have to pay for the care they may need in old age.
In addition, there are mixed views about how fair the current system is: just half of the public think that it is unfair that social care is largely means tested (51%) and a third consider this to be fair (34%). The public is equally divided about whether there should be a lifetime limit on how much people pay for social care, with some not accepting they should pay for care at all. And there is also no consensus on where any additional funding for social care should come from (as is also the case for additional funding for the NHS).
In this context, making the case for reform is politically difficult. A way around this could be to focus on measures for which there is strong public support, for example measures to address workforce shortages in social care. The public are particularly supportive of improving training and development for existing staff (85%), improving current working conditions such as paying costs of travelling between people’s homes or sick pay (84%), and a minimum pay rate for care workers set above the national living wage (81%). Additionally, tying social care to the problems faced by the NHS could help: a fifth of the public think that lack of capacity in social care contributes to NHS problems (20%).
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