Government cuts £115m from adult social care staff training funding

The government has cut £115m from planned funding for adult social care training and development this year.

As a result, funding will be cut for social work apprenticeships, far fewer care staff will be able to gain baseline qualifications and there will be no additional resourcing of continuing professional development (CPD) for regulated professionals, such as nurses.

Scale of funding cut revealed

The scale of the funding cut has been shared with providers on the Department of Health and Social Care’s workforce advisory group, who were told that the DHSC would be spending about £24m on social care workforce development in 2024-25.

The news follows care minister Stephen Kinnock’s announcement in late July that the government would be scrapping its Conservative predecessor’s adult social care training and development fund, instead maintaining workforce development funding for the sector at 2023-24 levels.

The decision was among a number taken by ministers to address a £22bn hole in the public finances for 2024-25 they said they had inherited from the Conservatives, £9.4bn of which relates to Labour’s decision to meet the recommendations of independent public sector pay review bodies.

New baseline qualification for social care

The training and development fund, announced by the Conservative government in April, would have provided £53.9m to put up to 37,000 care staff – roughly 3% of the workforce – through the new level 2 care certificate, from June 2024 to March 2025.

The certificate, launched in June, is designed to provide staff with baseline skills and knowledge and address the fact that  just 54% of care workers had a relevant social care qualification as of March 2023 (source: Skills for Care).

The fund would have also reimbursed providers for putting care staff through a range of other specified courses or qualifications and resourced CPD for regulated practitioners. The Conservatives did not confirm a total value for the fund before it left office in early July.

How training offer has been scaled back

Last week, the DHSC announced its replacement, the adult social care learning and development support scheme (LDSS).

Like the planned training and development fund, this will enable providers to reimburse the costs of staff training for specified courses, including the care certificate.

However, it differs in several key respects:

• Overall funding for the LDSS in 2024-25 is £12m, less than a quarter of what the Tories allocated to resourcing care certificate training alone under the training and development fund.
• Unlike the training and development fund, there is no dedicated funding for the care certificate under the LDSS and no target for the number of staff obtaining it.
• The cap on what each employer can claim is £400,000 under the LDSS, compared with £4.5m for the training and development fund.
• There is no funding available for CPD for regulated professionals under the LDSS.

The DHSC has also scrapped the second round of its fund dedicated to supporting councils recruit social work apprentices in adults’ services. 

Other DHSC-funded training for social care staff

Alongside the LDSS, employers can also claim payments from the longstanding workforce development fund (WDF), for eligible courses that started before 31 March 2024 and that will conclude by 31 March 2025. The WDF, which is DHSC funded and delivered by Skills for Care, is being wound up this year.

The DHSC is also providing funding for regulated social care providers to meet their legal requirement to ensure staff receive learning disability and autism training appropriate to their role, through the delivery of Oliver McGowan Mandatory Training.

The DHSC will provide further details on this later this year.

In his statement in July, Kinnock also pledged to continue the development of the care workforce pathway, a new career structure for social care initiated by the Conservatives.

Funding cut ‘another setback for the sector’

Homecare Association chief executive Jane Townson described the £115m funding cut as “another setback for the sector”, and said the allocated £24m “[fell] far short of addressing the sector’s critical needs”.

“We appreciate the clarity provided on some continuing programmes, such as the care workforce pathway and the newly launched adult social care level 2 care certificate,” Townson added.

“However, significant uncertainties remain, particularly regarding the implementation of Oliver McGowan Mandatory Training.”

Enhancing social care staff skills ‘of critical importance’

A DHSC spokesperson said: “This government is being honest about the appalling economic circumstances we inherited, but we are determined to grip the crisis in social care and implement the longer-term reforms needed to create a sustainable national care service.”

Creating a national care service is Labour’s long-term aim for the sector, but it is yet to flesh out what this means in practice beyond establishing national standards to ensure consistency of care across the country.

The spokesperson added: “Enhancing skills for staff working in social care is of critical importance to this, and we want that care to be of outstanding quality – fair, personalised and accessible.”