Responding to Baroness Louise Casey’s speech on social care, RCN General Secretary and Chief Executive, Professor Nicola Ranger, said:

“As Baroness Casey continues with her review of social care, she is right to point out that the system is being held together with sticking plasters, as well as highlight the need for urgent workforce reform. Successive governments have failed to give the sector the attention it deserves despite multiple reviews over the last 20 years. The actions that have been needed have been repeatedly kicked down the road, seen as too difficult or too costly. 

“This abdication of duty and the lack of action on repeated warnings has left this vital part of our health and care system unable to give people the care they deserve and added pressure to an NHS already cracking at the edges. Today our hospitals are forced to treat patients on corridors and others are stuck in hospital beds due to a lack of available social care. A fragmented system is damaging patient care.

“With an ageing society, the need for investment in a highly skilled social care nursing workforce has never been clearer. The government must be prepared to tackle the big challenges facing the sector that undermine health and care integration and have an honest conversation with the public about how these are addressed."

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