Social Care Charity Joins Roundtable At House Of Commons

One of the UK’s biggest social care charity’s, Community Integrated Care, took part in a special social care roundtable yesterday (September 14) , hosted by the Adult Social Care APPG and The Care Workers Charity, at the House of Commons.

Chaired by Labour MP, Mohammed Yasin, the session provided an opportunity for care workers and those supported by them to have their voices heard by Government representatives, ahead of Professional Care Workers week which begins on Monday 18th September.

Service Leaders from Community Integrated Care’s South-Central region, Gill Edwards and Aimee Murray, and Sushma Majithia – one of the charity’s Quality Advisors, who is supported and employed by the charity as an ‘expert by experience’ – joined the session to represent the charity and share their insights and experiences of accessing and working in social care.

The roundtable also brought together local MPs and Party Spokespeople, CEO of The Care Workers’ Charity, Karolina Gerlich, and representatives from a range of care organisations– including Affinity Trust, Learning Disability England, MHA, Anchor and Care Tech.

Highlighting some of the key challenges currently faced by the social care sector, discussions focussed on celebrating professional care workers, sharing lived experiences, and ideas on the short and long-term actions the Government need to take, to improve social care.

Gill Edwards said:
“We were really proud to represent Community Integrated Care and our social care peers at the event. The roundtable provided a real, tangible opportunity for us to raise awareness around the improvements we want to see in the sector, and rally for improved reward and recognition for our incredible people.”

“As part of our charity’s Unfair To Care research, world-leading experts in job evaluation – Korn Ferry – demonstrated that a frontline social worker is highly-skilled and equal to roles such as that of a Healthcare Assistant within the NHS, but are paid between 39% and 42% less than their equivalents. It was great to speak directly with Government representatives, alongside our peers from across the sector, to emphasise the impact of our workforce and the changes that we urgently need to see, to improve the lives of colleagues and the people we support. We’d like to say a huge thank you to the Adult Social Care APPG and The Care Workers Charity for this fantastic opportunity.”

Speaking at the event, Sushma shared her lived experience and the importance of her support team. She said, “If it wasn’t for my support team, I wouldn’t be here at this event today, sharing my experiences. It’s really important that our care workers are paid fairly and rewarded for the work they do so they can continue to support us to have the best quality of life possible.”