India Knight writing in The Sunday Times raises the uncomfortable issue of care for the elderly, or rather the lack of it.
Training and development for staff in the care sector has been a priority in recent years and continual learning and professional development - whether it be through NVQs, short courses, action learning sets - has a significant role to play in driving up standards. But recruitment and retention in this sector is a problem, with many care homes reliant on agency staff. And this is not surprising, after all, care workers have a lot of responsibility, work hard and don't earn very much.
I'll always remember a fantastic group of domiciliary care managers from Devon who attended a training course I ran on supervision skills. They were interested in their own learning and totally committed to their work. We talked about motivations and I asked them why they chose to do the work they do - after all they could earn as much doing something else. A silence fell over the group whilst they considered their response. Then one of the group said "Seeing someone's face light up when you arrive and knowing you are the only person they will see all day - you know you are doing a really important job"
Of course abuse must be stamped out and "disgusting nursing homes"closed or brought immediately up to an acceptable standard, but we must learn to value highly the many excellent people working in care who are doing what we can't or won't do - caring for our elderly relatives.
A skilled workforce that is trained to a high level, valued and respected for the work they do and paid accordingly is the starting place to attaining the quality of care we want - and it will be our turn to receive it soon enough. How do you want to be cared for when the time comes?
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