I am pleased to publish the Social Care Workforce Delivery Plan 2024-27. This builds on the work already begun as part of A Healthier Wales: Our Workforce Strategy for Health and Social Care Workforce, which was published in 2020 and sets out our 10-year plan for the health and social care workforce in Wales.
Since this was published, we have experienced the pandemic, the cost-of-living crisis and the ongoing increased demand for care and support. Despite these, our aims remain the same – we want the health and social care workforce to be motivated, engaged and valued, with the capacity, competence, and confidence to meet the care and support needs of people throughout Wales.
Social Care Wales working with Welsh Government has developed the Social Care Workforce Delivery Plan, which outlines a number of actions to address the issues specifically facing the social care sector. It also highlights progress made to date and further development areas based on engagement with the sector. A draft Delivery Plan was published for a three-month consultation in 2023, ensuring the voice of the workforce, stakeholders and those receiving care directly shaped the content.
It is important we regularly review the policies and actions in all our workforce plans to ensure we learn from the approaches we take and build on success. We are therefore developing an oversight group to monitor delivery and implementation.
Social care continues to face serious recruitment and retention challenges. As we engaged on the plan, we heard that terms and conditions for the paid workforce need to be improved. I am therefore pleased the Social Care Workforce Partnership has now been established and met for the first time last month. This brings together government, employers, and unions to work in social partnership and consider terms and conditions across the sector. A Memorandum of Understanding is being finalised, which I look forward to sharing.
I want to thank Social Care Wales for developing this plan and all those who have taken part in consultations, surveys and general feedback. My biggest thank you goes to the social care workforce. You are valued and I am committed to driving forward the change we need to ensure we have a skilled, dedicated and compassionate workforce which can support people across Wales.