Registration charge threat is looming

The General Social Care Council, the regulatory body that comes
into effect in October, may consider introducing a registration fee
for social care staff.

Ian Johnston, director of the British Association of Social
Workers, which has a representative on the GSCC advisory panel,
said: “There has been talk of having a £20 fee that would
cover registration for three years. It would not be renewed
annually to cut down on administration.”

He added: “A varying scale could be brought in for people who
earn less than shelf-stackers.”

Johnston said he did not know how the social care sector might
react to the prospect of having to pay to be officially registered.
But he conceded: “The minute you ask people to put their hands in
their pockets, they balk.”

Meanwhile, nurses have reacted angrily to news that the UKCC,
their own profession’s governing body, is to raise its registration
fee from £36 to £60.

The fee covers registration over a three-year period but nurses
argue that it amounts to “a charge for the privilege of going to
work”.

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