Real Living Wage

Blackpool Council have recently  committed an additional £2 million  to support the adult social care sector in Blackpool to provide the ‘real Living Wage’ to social care staff.

The current National Living Wage (people aged 23 and over) is £9.50 per hour.

For several years now Blackpool Council has been reflecting a higher than National Living Wage rate in their costing models to support social care providers with the challenges of recruitment and retention.

Providers

In 2022 for the first time, the proposals include the ‘real Living Wage’*, which takes hourly pay up from £9.50 per hour to £9.90.

We have been working closely with providers on this proposal and a total of 73 adult social care providers have signed up to pay the real Living wage to their staff.

The council continue to work with  providers who are not able to commit to the real Living Wage just yet to understand the issues and try to address the barriers.

Care workers have had an incredibly difficult time during the pandemic. They have delivered services to the most vulnerable in our community and have been instrumental in the fight with their selflessness and care.

Understandably, social care staff sometimes feel undervalued when compared to staff working in retail on higher rates of pay.

Whilst pay can’t always be matched to other sectors, this is one of the reasons why the council has taken the decision to model its fee rates based on the real Living Wage calculations.

In return, providers have committed to use the increase in the fee rate to pay their staff a higher basic hourly pay rate.

Fee rate proposal 2022/20223 

Contact

For more information on the real Living Wage for the adult care sector in Blackpool contact our contracts team.

Email: contracts.team@blackpool.gov.uk