New bid to tackle social care vacancies

Caring Plymouth is a city-wide partnership looking to offer more support for those looking to go into social care

Support is being offered to people in Plymouth looking to get a job in health and social care.

There are currently more than 200 vacant roles in adult social care in the city, according to Plymouth City Council.

The local authority said the majority were in domiciliary care, providing support to adults in their own homes and enabling them to keep their independence.

The council is has set up a partnership called Caring Plymouth, which is working on behalf of the city’s health and social care employers to connect people with opportunities for skills, training, education, careers and jobs.

'Highly rewarding'

Councillor Mary Aspinall, cabinet member for Health and Adult Social Care, said there were clear challenges across the sector, with both recruitment and retention.

She said: "While this problem is not exclusive to Plymouth, we are determined to address it and we’re taking a collaborative approach.

"The initial focus of Caring Plymouth will be on adult social care as that is currently where the largest pressure is – if there aren’t enough care workers then we cannot provide care packages, and this can create a backlog in hospitals which means beds aren’t free for new patients."

Ms Aspinall said working in adult social care was "highly rewarding" and more needed to be done to celebrate those who did and to encourage people to pursue such roles as a career choice.

The council said a city-wide recruitment campaign would be launching soon to highlight the opportunities available.