Supporting resources
What is social care?
Adult social care is the care and support commissioned by local authorities or individuals who need support to be able to live their lives. This includes older people and working aged people with learning disabilities, mental ill health, physical disabilities, drug and alcohol problems, autistic people and unpaid carers. There are many distinct roles in adult social care.
Estimated number of adult social care filled posts by individual job roles
Source: Skills for Care estimates from the State of the adult social care sector and workforce in England, 2023.
Local authorities lead the safeguarding of adults (under the Care Act), with others who share responsibility for identifying potential harm. Mental health and mental capacity laws (including the Mental Health Act) require assessments for hospital stays, community restrictions and capacity limitations.
Adult social care helps people in their homes, in care homes, through day services and with equipment and technology. It might be paid for by a local authority, by the individual or through a personal budget and direct payment (where the budget goes to the person who is drawing on social care to manage).
Over 20 years, the type of support has changed to include people choosing their own carers and the support they need (once they are assessed as eligible), and more people getting support to regain independence after illness (reablement). We are also seeing more emphasis on integrating health and social care to better meet the needs of individuals including through the development of integrated care systems (ICSs).
Supporting documents and other resources
PDF - 1.29 Mb
The Workforce Strategy for Adult Social Care in England is also available in PDF format. Follow the link above to download the Strategy.
PDF - 866 Kb
To develop a Workforce Strategy, we need to understand the current and likely future expectations of those working in adult social care. Shown here are a set of reasonable assumptions based on evidence about likely future developments.
PDF - 397 Kb
Alma Economics was commissioned by Skills for Care to provide costings for some of the proposed recommendations found in the Workforce Strategy, including workforce training, digitisation, and wellbeing.
PDF - 400Kb
This short report summarises findings of an exercise that Skills for Care commissioned from The King's Fund in 2023 on what are key stakeholders' expectations of the social care workforce by 2038. The report feeds into the Workforce Strategy.
PDF - 424 Kb
Skills for Care has acted swiftly to meet the ‘Train’ recommendation to streamline statutory and mandatory training requirements. Skills for Care are working with CQC who will signpost to and share the new guidance, meanwhile the guidance is available to access now.
This report from the Alzheimer Society makes an evidence-based case for mandatory dementia training for the adult social care workforce, demonstrating the benefits it can bring to the lives of people living with dementia and their families, care staff, care providers, and our wider health and care system.
The report supports the ‘Train’ recommendation that all workers should have dementia training aligned to the Dementia Training Standards Framework and roles within the Care Workforce Pathway.
This report from The Kings Fund looks at what social care can do to recruit and retain more younger workers, one of the ‘Attract’ recommendations in the Strategy.
Launch event