Top job in social care advertised

The recruitment process for the new board-level social care position at the Department of Health began yesterday, the government has announced.

The government has described the new director general role as the top job in social care.

The role has been created to give added prominence to social care following the joint social care and health white paper published last month.

Whoever is appointed will be responsible for providing national leadership of social care and co-ordinating social care policy across government and with reforms to the DH.

The announcement comes after Andrea Rowe, chief executive of Skills for Care, alleged that there was a lack of social care expertise in the department last August. Rowe said that the “decimation” of the DH’s social care knowledge base had left it reliant on the sector’s national bodies, such as her own, for help with policies.

The government has also launched a television campaign this week to try to attract more people to work in social care.