Providers Unite is a grassroots coalition of care providers in the UK advocating for urgent reforms in the social care sector.

The demonstration includes a rally at the Houses of Parliament to lobby MPs on the implications for the sector of the increases in employer national insurance contributions and the national living wage (NLW), which are due to come into force in April.

Providers are calling on government to improve support for social care organisations and front line social care workers.

In the Autumn Budget it was announced:

• A 6.7% rise in the NLW, from £11.44 to £12.21 an hour, benefiting hundreds of thousands of care workers.
• A rise, from 13.8% and 15%, in the contribution rate for employers’ national insurance.
• A reduction in the wage threshold at which employers start paying national insurance, from £9,100 to £5,000 a year.

Nuffield Health this will cost independent social care providers an extra 2.8 bn, with 2bn of this needing to be found by local authorities whom are funding 70% of care.

Providers especially those in the more deprived areas question how local authorities can manage with such an increase in financial spend without adequate support from the government.

Paul Growney CEO of Caring Connections ‘We have campaigning for years that social care needs more recognition and support; however this latest budget feels like a kick in the teeth. We work with some fantastic local authorities who are already stretched to the limit with finances, why is the government not supporting them more and ensuring they have the money to properly pay for care. To ensure we have an effective NHS we need to have an effective social care system, to do this it needs to be recognised and valued for the contribution it provides. These NI increases look to cost us close to 200k extra per year. We are here at the demonstration to ask if the government would look to assess the budget implications on an already very vulnerable sector that supports the most vulnerable across our communities’