Anonymous

“I work in residential care for adults with learning difficulties and challenging behaviour.

We are on £9.61 per hour and our shifts are changed constantly at the drop of a hat and we’re pestered to pick up more and more shifts without any “overtime bonus”.

We wear far too many hats carer, friend, cleaner, cook, fire marshal, nurse, admin therapist you name it we do it.

We are woefully undervalued and underpaid.

Private-owned social care should be held to the same standards of pay as the NHS, seeing as the government also pay these companies to look after these adults etc.

I transferred from day staff to night staff due to my shifts being changed every day without warning and just being told to “check the rota every day” however it was advertised as 4-week rotas but changed daily.

Training has been poor for over 15 months with this company, and I still haven’t had my medication training on nights it’s “waking night” and no extra pay for the unsociable hours and sometimes we’re requested to do Late Nights starting at 14:30 and not finishing until 07:45. The job advertisement stated that after the probationary period had passed we would get our NVQ level 2 in social care paid for by the company however due to “funding” this has not been the practice for years.

Mental health isn’t taken seriously at least by my manager as I myself have started suffering from it due to a change in a work situation (having to work with 2 specific people” and upon requesting to change shifts I got told basically my mental health isn’t as important as one of the staff feel like they’re fitting in. Thank you Night Staff Member – Adults with learning difficulties, complex needs and challenging behaviours.”