The government has unveiled a £600 million package to help with recruitment and retention in social care.

The fund will support the social care workforce and boost capacity in social care, supporting the NHS ahead of winter and through into next year.

The £600 million funding for adult social care includes a £570 million workforce fund over two years, distributed to local authorities, and £30 million funding for local authorities in the most challenged health systems. This funding aims to improve recruitment and retention, boost workforce capacity and ensure a sustainable social care workforce fit for the future.

The £570 million workforce fund will be given to local authorities as ‘flexible’ funding to allow them to tailor it to benefit local needs. This could be by increasing the fees given to care providers, which will enable better pay for care workers.

Minister for Care, Helen Whately, said: “Hundreds of thousands of older people, disabled people and their carers depend day in, day out on our social care  workforce. Care workers deserve a brighter spotlight to recognise and support what they do. That’s why we’re reforming social care careers and backing our brilliant care workforce with millions in extra funding.”

She added: “Our workforce reforms will help more people pursue rewarding careers in social care with nationally recognised qualifications. Our investment in social care means more funding to go to the front line. This matters, because support for our care workforce is the key to more care and better care.”

The investment aims to build on workforce reforms set out in the Next Steps to Put People at the Heart of Care plan, which will enable better recognition of social care as a profession. This includes ultimately working towards flexible, integrated career pathways between health and social care, in-line with the NHS Long Term Workforce Plan.

Melanie Weatherley, chair of Care Association Alliance, said: “It is particularly pleasing that this support covers two years, enabling the sector to develop effective longer-term initiatives.”

Oonagh Smyth, chief executive of Skills for Care, said: “Support for local authorities to improve capacity in social care will help ensure that we can attract and keep more of the right people with the right skills. This is vitally important because our latest figures show that there were around 152,000 vacancies on any given day in 2022-23.”

Helen Wildbore, director of Care Rights UK, said: “It is welcome to see this promised money now materialising. We need to see it quickly trickle down and make a difference for people needing care. Every day we hear from people struggling to get the basics, with their dignity and safety at risk. We fear this pot will quickly run down and where is the longer-term plan for tackling this crisis and the badly needed reform of the sector?”

The Department for Health and Social Care has issued letters to local adult social care systems and providers to share the government’s priorities for adult social care this winter, and to highlight the key actions local systems and care providers should take to protect individuals, their carers and the sector as a whole.