Community Integrated Care will pay 5,000 of its frontline support workers £10.92 per hour in England and £11.40 per hour in Scotland from next month, it has announced.
The uplift will see the social care charity pay the real living wage recommended by the Living Wage Foundation.
There will be equivalent uplifts for the charity’s advanced support worker roles and nurses, the charity said.
This £4m investment in increasing staff pay follows a previous £8m investment made by the organisation, announced in November 2021.
‘The sector faces a constant battle to pay its workforce’
Jim Kane, chief executive of Community Integrated Care, said the investment “represents a really bold and ambitious” move for charity.
“However, this investment is certainly a leap of faith for our charity, at a time when we have few alternative options, and we understand why for many other social care providers, it is an impossibility,” he added.
“Ultimately, until central government take action and provide better financial support to Local Authorities, the sector faces a constant battle to pay its workforce what they deserve.
“As a charity, we will continue to lobby decision-makers until our messages are heard loud and clear and sector-wide changes are made to ensure a sustainable and robust social care system for all.”
The charity hopes the investment will improve the livelihood of its teams, and also bolster its efforts in recruitment and retention.
‘People working in the care sector should be paid better’
Teresa Exelby, chief people officer at the charity, added: “The challenges our sector faces are ongoing - from colleagues and the people we support grappling with rising costs of living, to facing a recruitment and retention crisis that continues to grip the social care sector as a whole.
“In our second instalment of Unfair to Care, published late last year, we presented evidence that people working in the care sector should be paid better for the work that they do. And whilst we continue campaigning to policymakers for the wide-scale investment that we so urgently need to achieve this, we know that in the meantime we must do everything we can to support our people.”
Community Integrated Care also previously introduced a four-day week for head office and support function staff, as part of offering workers more flexibility.
At the time, the charity said the next step would be to expand the offer to its frontline care workers.
The Living Wage Foundation announced in late 2022 that the rate, which aims to reflect the true cost-of-living, had increased by 10.1% (£1) for workers across the UK to £10.90 an hour.
Data for the financial year ending 31 March 2022 puts the charity’s total income at more than £143m.
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