A Northern Ireland healthcare trust has been accused of operating a draconian regime that makes “Victorian factories appear progressive”.

The Homecare Association said Southern Health and Social Care (HSC) Trust, which was the subject of a system inspection by the Regulation and Quality Improvement Authority’s (RQIA) this month, followed domiciliary care workers with stopwatches and invoiced them for minutes not spent in the home.

The home care body said the trust paid independent providers among the lowest rates in the UK, at just over £18 per hour, or only 62% of the actual cost of delivery.

The association said the trust delivered 42% of domiciliary care itself at a cost per hour much higher than independent providers.

Jane Townson, chief executive of the Homecare Association, said: “Imagine nurses in a hospital being paid only for minutes by a patient’s bedside. No pay when walking from one bed to another, or whilst training or being supervised. Imagine nobody asking about the outcomes for patients of their care or treatment, just counting minutes spent by the bedside. There would be an outcry.

“But this is the everyday reality for domiciliary care workers in the Southern HSC Trust area, whose poor pay and terms and conditions of employment result from this approach to commissioning and contracting.”

Townson called on the Northern Ireland government to invest adequately in home care and “put an end to the minute-by-minute monitoring and payment of domiciliary care workers, which makes Victorian factories appear progressive”.

A spokesperson for the HSC Trust said: “The domiciliary care sector across Northern Ireland continues to face significant pressure on services, as demand outstrips supply. We greatly value the contribution of and proactively work in partnership with our independent sector domiciliary care providers to prevent admission to hospital, support timely discharge and find solutions to help as many local people as possible to remain at home.”

The trust said figures published by the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency show the proportion of visits lasting 15 minutes or less in its area were among the lowest of any trust in Northern Ireland, with the proportion of visits over 30 minutes among the highest.

The spokesperson added: “Trust domiciliary care staff are paid in line with the Agenda for Change terms and conditions of service rates of pay for staff working unsocial hours including evenings, nights or weekends and is publicly available information.”