Tory visa scheme will cripple social care – and the NHS will suffer knock-on harm
Charming. The Conservatives are openly announcing plans to harm services for people in need.
Tories are demanding a £30,000 salary threshold and tougher visa requirements for overseas workers once the UK has left the EU and free movement has come to an end. They also want migrants to be earning £35,800 after five years.
As care workers receive much less than £30k a year – due to Tory pay restrictions? – this means that the care sector will lose personnel.
Not only will the needs of vulnerable people go undetected, not only will people be forced to go without care, but the NHS will face knock-on effects as elderly patients are taken to A&E as a last resort, or end up stuck on wards unable to go home.
See for yourself:
Boris Johnson’s plans for fast-track “NHS visas” will do nothing to head off an impending post-Brexit staffing crisis which threatens to cripple social care in the UK, with catastrophic consequences for hospitals and other services, health chiefs have warned.
The Independent has obtained a document written by NHS Employers [that] sets out strong opposition to the Home Office’s planned points-based immigration system and new salary thresholds, pointing out many social care staff earn as little as half the proposed minimum of £30,000 per annum needed to obtain entry to the UK.
Under the scheme, the cost of a visa application for health professionals would be halved from £928 to £464 and a decision would be guaranteed within two weeks. Applicants coming to work in the NHS would receive preferential treatment with extra points under the points-based system, and no cap would be placed on numbers entering through the NHS route.
However, it makes no provision for people working in social care.
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Next they will probably say that pensioners and the unemployed should be forced to do this work!
I had no support for about a year, as nobody was applying for the job, and I had been told that direct payments and employing someone myself were the only option. During that year, I had professional visit from three professionals, including my social landlords, all of whom saw that I can’t look after myself, and contacted social services. It was only when a student social worker (herself an immigrant) saw my notes and that I had been under the wrong team (short term care for over a decade, and given wrong information) that they increased my care levels and are in the process of trying to get funding for an agency who work with autistic adults (another forgotten group). I dread to think what it will be like if we get more Tory cuts. I know a couple of people who need as much support as me (if not more) but just keep getting sectioned instead, stretching the NHS meagre budget. Care in the community only works if the care is actually available.
Well surely not everyone will be in favor of this.