I'm sorry not to be able to be with you
in person I am very pleased to be able
to contribute to this video to open your
spring conference. I welcome the theme
of the conference focusing on new
approaches to the work force and to delivery
in order to support the core work of
social care whilst developing innovative
new approaches to care. It's very much
aligned to our shared agenda for social
care transformation I'd like to talk to
you about what we as Welsh government are
doing in collaboration with the Care
Council for Wales who I know are also
represented here today to support that
agenda successfully supporting social
workers as they grow and develop their
skills is a core component of any
successful social care system you'll
know that here in Wales we have already made
substantial progress on this agenda the
Care Council has developed a four stage
career pathway from newly qualified to
consultant social workers and this is
supported by a comprehensive package of
continuing education and learning to enable
social workers to progress through their careers
this package has now been fully
implemented I'm delighted that
evaluation so far has indicated it's having a
positive impact on social workers this
can only support the successful delivery
of our agenda clearly the successful
implementation of the new approach to
social care doesn't just rest on the
shoulders of our social workers the role of
care workers those who provide care to
over ninety thousand of our fellow
citizens every day is equally important
for this reason the Care Council for
Wales has an important role in promoting
and maintaining high standards in the
training of this group, reflected in the
development and quality assurance of
training and qualifications for them
it's now collaborating closely with
Qualification Wales and other
stakeholders in taking forward the
development of a suite of new
qualifications for all workers in Health
and Social Care for implementation in
2019. having talked about work which is
ongoing now I want to turn to the
immediate future. From next month Social
Care Wales will come into being
and it will begin operating using a
powerful combination of functions to
strengthen services and the workforce
that provides them. One of its third
tasks will be to prepare the extension
of workforce registration to domiciliary
care workers in 2020 this will involve
supporting the workforce to achieve the
relevant qualification level. To do this
it will use a substantial workforce
development grant funding made available
by the Welsh Government to the sector I
know that you'll all want to be a part of
this process. Presently the Welsh
government provides eight million pounds
annual grant funding to the social care sector
to support training and development this
grant is made available in response to
regional training and development plans
formulated by regional Workforce
Partnerships. I want to acknowledge here
the crucial role played by them in
making sure our key people get the right
learning and development in the right
place at the right time the regional
partnerships provide a vital
collaborative approach to workforce
development across local authorities and
the independent sector. Now our challenge
is to harness that invaluable regional
activity to the improvement purposes of
social care Wales for this reason the
delivery of this grant will be
transferring to Social Care Wales to
support its workforce development
function. We recognize that training and
development are only one part of the
picture we know the employment terms and
conditions vary and in some cases are not
what they ought to be this is not good
for the workers and we believe not in
the best interest of those they care for
and support and on that note I'm pleased
that Trevor Palmer a citizen member of
our National Social Care Partnership
board will be talking to you more about what
citizens expect from services later today
in the light of these concerns about the
domiciliary care workforce we
commissioned research from Manchester
Metropolitan University in September
2015 this research examined the
relationship between the terms and
conditions of domiciliary care
workers and the quality of care
delivered
following this research we as the Welsh
government undertook our own
consultation on a range of proposals to
address these matters the consultation
lasted 12 weeks and looked at issues
around zero hour contracts the impact of
paying the national minimum wage and
travel time. Calls of less than 30 minutes
call clipping, training development and
progression. Raising the professional
status of domiciliary care workers and
improving safety of domiciliary care
workers. We published our analysis of this
consultation in November 2016 and it was
accompanied by a written statement
from me, outlining how we intend to
support the provision of good quality
care through improved recruitment and
retention in the workforce this included
proposals relating to zero hour contracts
compliance with the national minimum wage
training and development and raising the
professional status of domiciliary
care workers the key message we hear
from you through this consultation is
that multiple actions are needed to
improve recruitment and retention. These
include reinforcing compliance with
existing requirements such as a
national minimum wage there's also
a case for increasing the transparency
of processes for example through
differentiating clearly between travel
time and call time finally we'll be
continuing to pursue opportunities to
establish domiciliary care as an
attractive well supported and rewarding
long-term career we are now taking
policy and legislative action to
implement recommendations from the
consultation in tandem with this, the care
council for Wales has developed a five-year
strategy launched earlier this week to
strengthen the home care sector they
will do this through comprehensive range
of actions including improving training
and development, commissioning practices
and promulgating best practice the
qualifications development work and
extension of registrations to
domiciliary care workers i've just
described, are all embedded in this five-year
strategy I talked earlier about Social Care
Wales in relation to its
workforce role I also want to say a few
words about the new service improvement
role this is an exciting new area of
responsibility for Social Care Wales and
one that will see it lead and drive strategic
improvements across the sector. A great
deal of work has taken place over the
past couple of years with the sector to
develop social care Wales it has been a
truly collaborative effort which is
resulted in us having every confidence
that Social Care Wales will start on a firm footing for example consideration
has been given to the early strategic
improvement priorities and to its role
of the body that will share and showcase
best practice. It will also have a key role in
influencing and determining social care
research priorities including working
with a sector to build up research
capacity. Following a ministerial public
appointment exercise I've recently
recruited and announced the new board
for Social Care Wales the board will be
led by Arwel Ellis Owen as its chair
and I was really impressed by the
quality and diversity of applications
and have every confidence that new board
members have the knowledge and
experience to help shape our social
services and social care in the future.
As the Welsh Government we also
recognize that we have a role to play in
working with all of our partners to
secure the stability of the sector there
are both challenges and opportunities
and social care sector at the moment the
national living wage is an example of this
improving the pay in the sector has the
potential to be really good news in
terms of helping our wider agenda of
making the sector a more attractive place to
make a career however it also presents
undeniable affordability pressures. I was
therefore delighted to be able to
announce in January this year that will
provide an additional 10 million pounds
of recurrent funding help manage the
impact of a national living wage even
more importantly this investment will be
part of a tripartite understanding
between the Welsh government local
government and employers to make
progress on this issue
this resource must be used by local
authorities to support the cost
associated with national living wage
and other workforce pressures it will
complement additional funding available
to local authorities in charge income as
a result of the planned increases in the
maximum charge for non residential care
commencing from this April the increase
to 70 pounds per week from April will
raise over 4 million pounds for
authorities to add to the 10 million pounds
being made available as part of our
understanding employers will also need
to contribute towards meeting these
cost pressures this is an investment to
deliver a more stable workforce. I hope
this is giving you a flavour of the work
which the Welsh Government has in hand
with its partners in order to support
new approaches to the workforce and
delivery across the social care sector I
wish you well for what I'm sure will be
an informative and stimulating conference