Dear Boris
We live in unprecedented times where yet again health and inequality are at the forefront of politics.
We saw a world built on the premise of a trickle down economy, leaving vast numbers globally in abject poverty, but when actually put to the test. That trickle almost immediately ran dry?
We have had the unlikely duo of @piersmorgan and @susannareid100 on @gmtv championing the cause for the vulnerable in the Care homes and some of the poorest in our community and we now all exist two metres apart.
Politicians, including yourself standing in doorways clapping. The biggest Black lives matter movement for equality seen in recent times which hopefully will bring positive change.
Those who are in the Care Sector across the UK, many of whom are BAME often live in or just above the poverty line. We don’t need badges or medals. Just quality of life and respected for the job that we do!
So I find myself writing to your yourself and your Cabinet that branded those in the Care Industry ‘Unskilled’ Many of whom are BAME
I am offering assistance and choosing to assume that you and your advisors are out of touch when it comes to these matters and perhaps have no experience, or just simply don’t know about the vast inequality, and poverty felt by the very people you have been clapping for, created by successive governments. Perhaps you just don’t know how much of a struggle life can really be?
I’m a Support Worker currently shielding as a result of the pandemic, overwhelmed by the generosity and support shown by your government and other local organisations who are trying to keep me safe for which I will forever be grateful for!
I am also a former unpaid carer who in response of the growing care crisis, has spent the last four years petitioning for unpaid carers to be paid.
Not because I am paid to do so but because it will work!
Reducing pressure on our incredible NHS and other emergency services and making it affordable for family and friends to look after loved one’s.
This sir could truly be the future of Social Care?
There’s 7.6 million Carers in the Uk
They are all leading daily lives that would honestly leave you in aw and bewilderment of how they manage to get through a day?
These unsung heroes largely left isolated by the Pandemic , never stop, never quit! Usually putting their own health and wellbeing second to deliver the best possible Care to the individuals that they are Caring for.
Often having a skill set that spans multiple professional fields whilst being held just as accountable
Put into positions that have been brought by illness, accident or vulnerability of a loved one and by the relentless cut’s by the government.
Especially now in this ‘new normal’ you have been asking for new innovative solutions to reshape the Country and drive the economy forward. Well sir this is it.
#payunpaidcarers https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/300032
Yes this will cost. But you might just start seeing results and serious savings elsewhere?
What is the cost of the current failing system and how much is that truly costing other services? How much is it costing the economy when police, paramedics and the NHS when the most vulnerable in our Society are overlooked and neglected and often have to attend A&E for often unavoidable accident’s.
How much is it costing if someone has a simple fall and goes unnoticed?
Or someone through isolation and loneliness repeatedly calls the Paramedics to respond, just so they can share a cup of tea and have a conversation?
How much is it costing with the bed blocking and home closures with the most vulnerable having no place to go?
More importantly this could be a measure that keeps the most vulnerable in our society safe from Covid19 itself?
Person centred Care is the best type of Care possible and what could be more person centred than being cared for by family members like our new national hero!
Sir Captain Tom whose incredible efforts for the NHS may not have been possible had he been placed in a nursing home if it hadn’t been for the love and devotion of his daughter? but as it stands being an unpaid carer comes with a serious financial consequence.
Just passing the debt and poverty down a generation , sometimes two? Maybe even denying the nation of the sharpest mind’s of tomorrow?
Paying unpaid carers would provide peace of mind and could also be a meaningful measure to kick start the economy. Changing lives and boosting the high street in a Domino affect.
The crisis has been in the news repeatedly through the last few years.
With documentaries being filmed by the talented @rosskemp
Unpaid carers hold the key to Pandora’s box with first hand knowledge of what support might just work for them and their loved ones.
. If you assembled a team to meet with these incredible people.
Armed with a recording device and a laptop, just asking the right questions?
With the right support and measures put in the right place on an individual basis, we could see an end to the national disgrace that is the care crisis.
The side affects of paying them and meeting their needs could possibly save the NHS serious money and boost the high street and the economy.
This is also the greener solution to the Care crisis. Cutting down on the carbon footprint of Care. A move that will benefit future generations!
So much weight is given to the qualifications of professional care but the truth of the matter is.
We are not born Carer’s
It is a skill developed overtime by doing.
Some may be born more caring than others, but we are certainly not born with the skills that some Caring situations may require. Caring for a person’s needs, just like politics is always evolving and that cannot be learnt with an app or on a computer.
As for professional carers, on behalf of all my colleagues I personally would have to work 78 hours a week , every week to earn less than half of what a member of Parliament earns.
With no scheduled breaks.
No overtime rate and no Sick Pay
Is this fair?
The vast majority of my colleagues are BAME. Possibly because they are more caring or possibly because the wages are so low that British people find it more distasteful or unsustainable to work in the Industry for any length of time?
With people marching in the streets and clapping on their doorsteps. I believe raising the pay to that of a ‘skilled worker’ Set by your own government, would be supported widely and would go a long way to ease some of the inequality felt by so many.
More importantly this would provide more longevity in the industry and continuity in Care saving money on training and ultimately benefitting the amazing vulnerable people that we Care for.
As unprofessional as we may be considered? We train, learn,adapt, administer medication, take those we Care for out in the community. Building Life skills and sometimes achieve astonishing results.
We provide daily health and incident reports, we can be and are attacked and assaulted without fighting back and in return for all this we have been branded unskilled. Live in poverty and often find ourselves either having to work a 78 hour week or stand in line at one of those ‘uplifting food bank’s’
We are paid less than someone reading a script over the phone for an insurance company? Is this fair?
We are ultimately responsible for the welfare of those we look after and can find ourselves in court or in prison should serious harm or death occurs as a result of our actions, or inactions.
We are not knighted for it.
With the nation looking at you Sir to deliver a meaningful change that will kick start the economy, finally protect and ring fence the vulnerable and perhaps go some way towards reducing inequality and showing those that carers and the vulnerable truly do matter.
Pay us Carer’s, support workers and other keyworkers £25,000 a year for a 39 hour week. Reinstate overtime and Sick Pay
As I have stated before I am counted as vulnerable and am shielding due to underlying health conditions but I will no doubt return. So my ticket Sir might already be stamped?
And although I am truly grateful that should I contact Covid19 at work? In the event of my death it is comforting to know that the love of my life and her two amazing kid’s will receive £60,000 to possibly transform their lives or perhaps put the kids through college?
But why is it that because I work in the Care industry I cannot provide for them whilst I am alive?
Millions if not billions have been wasted to vilify the poor and the vulnerable in recent years but just looking at it another way you will see the amount of employment and revenue created because of these individuals including the Pharmaceutical industry and it’s billionaires that wouldn’t exist without.
Be the best Prime Minister there ever was!
Show the unpaid carers, Carers, Support Workers and other key workers and the BAME community how grateful you truly are and how you are addressing inequality in our once great society
You have pegged yourself as a Man of the people. You have found 50 billion for Hs2
Sir I implore you. Reward those people you have been clapping for with financial security and peace of mind with a long overdue pay increase.
Please act now!
If the efforts of my colleagues in the Care industry and the care you received meant anything to you?
Pay us all what we truly deserve, show that you too believe Black Lives Matter and kick start the economy at the very same time
