The care sector needs to to engage the wider public if its to get more political attention and subsequent funding. What would provider marketing experts on the front line suggest?
Leaders in the care sector would be forgiven for missing the Chancellor’s Spring Statement this week. Not because it fell down the agenda due to rapidly developing international conflict news – although that’s clearly a factor – but because, once again, there was a lack of funding for, or even mention of, social care.
Care England was quick to lambast Rachel Reeves’ statement for leaving the sector out in the cold, warning that the government’s “continued absence of meaningful adult social care support risks undermining wider economic stability and NHS recovery.”
While there were glimpses of light in the form of investment in apprenticeships offering potential workforce opportunities, this will do little to ease the short‑term pain felt by care providers and staff due to poor pay. Just last week, Skills for Care revealed that over 90 per cent of care providers’ wage bills will need to rise next month when the new statutory National Living Wage comes into effect.
This means providers will once again need to do more for even less in a system that Baroness Louise Casey, chair of the Independent Commission of Adult Social Care, this week dubbed “confusing and cobbled together” and one that “relies on exploitation of its workforce.”
Care England’s chief, Professor Martin Green, said the lack of direct new funding means Ms Reeves is undermining the priorities she did highlight in her statement – namely growth in communities and reduced NHS waiting times.
However, his warning that an unstable social care sector is destabilising to the economy is likely to fall on deaf ears unless and until the sector can fix its reputation problem.
In a major analysis published this week, think tank The King’s Fund called on sector leaders to work together to improve public awareness of how care works. It highlighted that public prioritisation of “social care for the elderly” as a major national issue is at a record low of just 1–3 per cent depending on age group, compared to nearly half citing immigration (47 per cent), a third the economy (33 per cent), and almost a quarter the NHS (24 per cent).
The issue’s importance to the public has “fallen sharply” since the Covid pandemic, with people preoccupied by concerns such as the “cost of living, jobs and immigration.”
The report went on to suggest that the sector’s way out of this public wilderness – and back up the political agenda – rests partly on its ability to move beyond hand‑wringing over empty coffers and to demonstrate the real, tangible impact it has on lives, including those of staff as well as service users and residents.
Finding ways to cut through the noise and engage families and communities, despite the pressures outlined above, is already well understood – as The King’s Fund notes – by provider marketing teams up and down the country.
So, what would marketing leaders in care provision suggest first? I want to hear your views – and feature them in the pages of The Care Home Environment magazine. Because if anyone knows how to create impact – and do more with less – it’s you.
Help me show and share insights from the coalface. Email marylouiseclews@stepcomms.com or DM me on LinkedIn. I look forward to hearing from you.
