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Improving terms and conditions for the social care workforce in Wales 2024

Compiled by Dr Grace Krause, edited by Dr Kat Deerfield and Dr Rhian Reynolds

In this briefing, we’ve gathered findings from our research on terms and conditions in the social care workforce in Wales. We’ve grouped our findings into the following themes: 

  • job satisfaction
  • pay and reimbursement
  • types of contract
  • other terms and conditions.

Following a discussion of these findings, we outline what’s being done to improve working conditions for the social care workforce in Wales. 

The social care workforce in numbers

The social care sector is a significant economic force in Wales, employing an estimated 88,232 people across the country (Social Care Wales, 2025). The sector added about £2.1 billion of value to the Welsh economy in 2023 (Alma Economics, 2024). 

In 2024, we carried out our second survey of the workforce to find out how people felt about working in social care. We got responses from 3,307 care workers, 461 social care managers, 838 social workers, and 418 people in other roles. We also held two focus groups and carried out 27 interviews to find out more about the experience of social care workers. 

While some of the things we asked the workforce were the same as last year (Krause et al., 2024a, Krause et al., 2024b) there were also some significant differences. As a result, some of things we wrote about in last year’s briefing on improving terms and conditions are not included this time. 

These are some of the important things we learned from those who responded to our survey (Social Care Wales, 2024):

  • 68 per cent were very or fairly satisfied with their terms and conditions
  • most respondents agreed they could meet the needs of the people who accessed care and support (75 per cent)
  • 11 per cent were employed on a zero hours contract
  • 65 per cent of people who said they had zero hours contracts said they’d prefer to be on a fixed or regular hours contract
  • 46 per cent were dissatisfied with their pay, with 35 per cent satisfied
  • 42 per cent said they were ‘living comfortably’ or ‘doing alright’ financially, 32 per cent said they were ‘just about getting by’, and 23 per cent said they were finding it ‘quite’ or ‘very’ difficult to get by. 

The Have your Say survey looks at what it’s like to work in social care in Wales. The NHS Wales Staff Survey 2023 (NHS Wales, 2024) asks what it’s like for health workers to work for the NHS in Wales. In this briefing, we compare the data collected for questions that are the same in both surveys. This is to show how the experiences of the social care workforce and NHS workforce in Wales might be similar or different. 

Why it’s important to improve terms and conditions

Good terms and conditions are important for workers’ well-being. Poor working conditions can also have an impact on retention rates and on attraction and recruitment to the sector. This can have a knock-on effect on the delivery of care and support.

When we asked social care workers if they were happy with their terms and conditions, 68 per cent of all respondents said they were satisfied overall. There was some variation across roles. Sixty six per cent of care workers were satisfied with their terms and conditions. This rose to 72 per cent for social workers and 77 per cent for managers (Social Care Wales, 2024).

From our workforce survey, we know that 69 per cent of registered social care workers started working in the sector because they wanted a job that would make a difference to people’s lives. Forty five per cent said they felt it would be a job they’d enjoy (Social Care Wales, 2024). This data suggests that the social care workforce in Wales is highly motivated and that workers want to provide the best possible care to the people they support. However, we know from other research that working conditions in the sector can make this difficult to achieve.

The Fair Work Wales report, produced by the Fair Work Commission in 2019, recommends looking at working conditions in the social care sector. It describes the sector as a ‘core industry that contributes to individual and social well-being’. The report also notes that, despite working in a sector of great importance, the social care workforce often struggles with insecurity and poor working conditions.

A Senedd research paper, published in 2022, describes the social care workforce in Wales as ‘in crisis’ (James, 2022). Recruitment and retention issues are the main reasons for this (James, 2022). The sector is understaffed when compared to other sectors in the Welsh economy. In 2023, there were around 5,299 vacancies in social care across Wales, equivalent to six per cent of the workforce (Social Care Wales, 2025).

We've grouped our findings on terms and conditions into different themes so that we can explore the data in more detail.

We know that 69 per cent of registered social care workers started working in the sector because they wanted a job that would make a difference to people’s lives

Job satisfaction

Our 2024 workforce survey asked social care workers what they enjoyed about working in social care. They were also asked what they thought could be done to make working in the sector better. There were five main things people said they enjoyed about working in social care (Social Care Wales, 2024): 

  • the ability to make a difference to people’s lives
  • the relationships with the people they supported
  • collaboration and supportive relationships with colleagues
  • the varied nature of their work
  • feeling personal fulfilment and satisfaction.

Interviews with social care workers also highlighted what they enjoyed about their work (Social Care Wales, 2024):

“being able to support people and try and make a difference in their lives. Helping them to achieve what is important and [help them] face challenges.” (Children and families social worker)

“I love seeing the people we support leading a great life! Always lots of lovely stories to share, and gives me satisfaction. Reminds me of why I came into the work.” (Adult care home manager)

People working across the social care workforce told us that they take great satisfaction in their work. However, the survey also showed that they don’t always feel they have the capacity to do their job as well as they’d like. Most workers responding to our workforce survey (75 per cent) agreed that they could meet the needs of the people they cared for. But only around half (55 per cent) felt they had enough time to do their job well. This is similar to staff responses in the NHS Wales staff survey, where only 52 per cent said they had time to meet all of the conflicting demands of their work.

The response was different depending on the social care role. Social workers were less likely than others to agree that they could meet the needs of their clients (55 per cent), or had enough time to do their job well (40 per cent). By comparison, 78 per cent of care workers and 81 per cent of managers said they could meet the needs of the people they worked with. Sixty per cent of care workers and 47 per cent of managers said they had enough time to do their job well.

The survey also showed that social care workers don’t always feel like they get enough support for their well-being in work. When asked about stress, only 41 per cent of workers felt there was enough support in place. We’ve produced a separate briefing for this workforce insight series that discusses workforce well-being in more detail, available here.

The survey also highlighted the challenges of retaining an experienced and qualified workforce when job satisfaction is low. About 25 per cent of all registered workers said they expected to leave the social care sector. We asked this group how long they planned to stay, and the average time was 13 months (Social Care Wales, 2024). 

There were four main reasons workers gave for planning to leave: 

  • low pay
  • lack of recognition and support
  • poor working conditions
  • limited development opportunities. 

Pay and reimbursement

Pay across the social care workforce varies by type of role and by employer. We don’t have specific numbers for Wales, but we know from UK-wide data that in April 2024, the average annual full-time income of residential, day and domiciliary care managers and proprietors was £48,507, with an average hourly rate of £21.52. Social services managers and directors had an average annual full-time income of £43,575 a year, and had an average hourly wage of £22.84, while social workers averaged £42,397 per year, and earned £22.12 per hour on average. Residential, day and domiciliary care managers and proprietors worked and average of 37.7 hours a week, social services managers and directors and social workers an average of 34 hours (Office for National Statistics, 2024).

By comparison, care workers and home care workers had an average annual full-time income of £26,092 or an average hourly wage of £13.62. Senior care workers had an average annual full-time income of £27,998 and an hourly income of £13.83. Care workers worked an average of 30 hours a week and senior care workers worked and average of 36.4 hours a week (Office for National Statistics, 2024). 

These figures fall below estimates from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation showing that a single person in 2024 needed to earn £28,000 a year to afford a decent standard of living (Davies et al., 2024). A couple with two children needed to make a combined average salary of around £69,400 a year (Davies et al., 2024). 

Overall, 42 per cent of people working in social care felt they were either ‘doing alright’ financially or ‘living comfortably’. When we consider the data by workforce type, care workers stand out as being particularly affected by financial pressures. Nearly 25 per cent of care workers said they were finding it quite or very difficult to manage financially (Social Care Wales, 2024). 

The levels of satisfaction with pay varied across the different parts of the workforce. Fifty per cent of care workers and 37 per cent of social workers were dissatisfied with their pay. Forty five per cent of social care managers were satisfied with their current rate of pay, with 25 per cent responding that they were dissatisfied (Social Care Wales, 2024).

Social care workers named low pay as a major reason for high staff turnover (Social Care Wales, 2024):

“Nobody wants to do the job anymore. We lost nine people in the space of two months because of the lower pay. We are on minimum wage. And it, oh, it doesn't make any sense, but we do it because we care about the people and I think they take advantage of that.” (Unknown job role)

“Supermarkets, factories, they get paid more than us. How does that make any sense? It doesn't. So does that mean we're worthless? That's how we feel. But we do it because we care about the people.” (Support worker)

When we asked open ended questions about pay and reimbursement we found that travel expenses were also a problem for respondents. In particular, people said they struggled with not getting their travel time paid (Social Care Wales, 2024):

“When I was doing the 70 hours a week, I was only actually getting paid for like 55 hours ‘cause the rest of it was travel time.” (Community support worker)

“You'll see you've got 20 people to go to [in] a day and some of them can live 10 minutes apart. You've only got five minutes to get there… you're putting your own life at risk as well by driving and rushing […] So I don't think it's fair on service users in that respect either.” (Support worker)

“Pay workers for a whole shift, not just when they clock in to a call. […] And sometimes a call would run over because the client needed much more attention, and we were happy to help them BUT WE WERE NOT PAID.. […] I still feel shocked at how exploited I felt.” (Domiciliary care worker) 

Types of contracts

Our workforce data collection shows that overall, 79 per cent of those employed in social care in Wales are employed on permanent contracts. Commissioned services have 6.3 per cent more of their workers on permanent contracts than local authorities (Social Care Wales, 2025).

Use of zero hours contracts in social care 

In the 2024 workforce survey we asked specifically about zero hours contracts. These are contracts of employment without any guaranteed hours of work (Ravalier et al., 2019). Eleven per cent of all respondents had a zero hours contract. Care workers were much more likely to have this type of contract than social workers or managers. Fourteen per cent of care workers said they had a zero hours contract, compared to six per cent of social workers and three per cent of managers. Our workforce data (Social Care Wales, 2025) shows that a total of 9.2 per cent of the social care workforce are on zero hours contracts. The care worker role has the most social care workers on zero hours contracts, with 4,147 (14.9 per cent) of the workers on zero hours contracts. Domiciliary care from commissioned services has the highest proportion of its workers on zero hours contracts (31.4 per cent). And the care workers within this service make up the highest proportion of 37.5 per cent on zero hours contracts (Social Care Wales, 2025).

Of the people who said they had a zero hours contract, only about 35 per cent said they would choose to work on this kind of contract. This suggests that most individuals don’t want this arrangement. This was particularly clear for managers (79 per cent) and social workers (71 per cent) saying they didn’t want them (Social Care Wales, 2024).

Only 35 per cent of people on a zero hours contract said they would choose this type of contract, suggesting that most individuals don’t want this arrangement

The survey also asked people an open-ended question about how zero hours contracts affected them. Some people responding to this question said that zero hours contracts were positive because they offered extra flexibility. But some also reported being unsatisfied with the inconsistency of their hours as well as their pay. One noted that zero hours contracts gave employers the ability to ‘punish’ them by reducing hours (Social Care Wales, 2024). People reported that not knowing their working hours made it hard to pay the bills and plan for the future. Others said that the lack of sick pay was a cause for concern (Social Care Wales, 2024):

“No sick pay [so] if I am ill forcing me to work. If there is no work I don’t get paid.” (Domiciliary care worker)

“[I] Don’t know how much money I’m having one month to the next, [I] worry if I’m able to pay bills. I want to buy a home for my children but can’t have a mortgage on zero hours. [It’s] Not sustainable.” (Adult care home worker)

Other terms and conditions

In the survey, people told us about several other topics related to employment terms and conditions, including employment benefits like pensions, leave and family friendly policies. They also told us about their awareness of employment rights and trade union membership.

Pensions

Most people, across all groups, said they had access to a workplace or company pension scheme. Sixty three per cent of care workers, 72 per cent of social workers, and 82 per cent of social care managers said they received a contribution from their employer as part of a pension scheme (Social Care Wales, 2024).

Leave 

Almost all social care managers received 28 days’ paid holiday (94 per cent), compared with 76 per cent of care workers and 77 per cent of social workers (Social Care Wales, 2024).

Only 31 per cent of care workers received sick pay beyond statutory sick pay (Social Care Wales, 2024). Statutory sick pay is the minimum amount of sick pay that employers have to pay. It’s currently set at £116.75 a week (UK Government, 2024). Social workers and social care managers were somewhat more likely to receive sick pay, 63 per cent and 62 per cent respectively (Social Care Wales, 2024). 

Family-friendly policies 

In the survey, 53 per cent of social workers and 45 per cent of social care managers said they had access to family-friendly policies such as flexible working, carers’ leave, and enhanced parental leave. Care workers were much less likely (16 per cent) to have access to family-friendly policies (Social Care Wales, 2024).

Awareness of employment rights

We asked people to tell us about their awareness of employment rights. Around 78 per cent of care workers and social workers said they were aware, as did 94 per cent of managers. Twenty per cent of care workers and 19 per cent of social workers said they were not aware of their rights, compared to just four per cent of managers. We didn’t ask participants for more information about this, so we don’t know why so many are unaware of their rights. 

Trade union membership

Our workforce survey showed a considerable variation in trade union membership across respondents in different parts of the workforce. Overall, 35 per cent of social care workers told us they were members of a trade union. Social workers were more likely to say they belonged to a trade union (50 per cent) than other groups. Just 42 per cent of social care managers and 30 per cent of care workers said they were union members (Social Care Wales, 2024).

What’s happening and what’s planned for improving terms and conditions

Work has already begun on improving terms and conditions for the social care workforce in Wales. This includes the work of the Social Care Fair Work Forum, our workforce strategy for health and social care, and the establishment of an expert group to advise on the Labour Party and Plaid Cymru’s shared ambition for a national care and support service.

Social Care Fair Work Forum

There are signs of improvement in pay for people working in social care. The Social Care Fair Work Forum was established in 2020 to explore things like increasing pay and improving working conditions across the sector. The forum involves government, employers, and unions working in social partnership to look at how the definition of fair work should be applied to social care workers in Wales (Welsh Government, 2023b). 

In its first two years, forum members worked together to propose applying the real living wage across social care in Wales. As a result, paying social care workers the real living wage is now one of the key pledges in the Welsh Government’s Programme for Government (Welsh Government, 2022b). As part of this ongoing commitment, local authorities and health boards across Wales received £43 million to provide an uplift to the real living wage for registered workers in care homes and domiciliary care for 2022 to 2023 (Welsh Government, 2023b). This additional funding for the real living wage has now been included in the general funding of local authorities. There’s also work underway to regulate pay rates within children’s social work as part of a wider programme around children’s social workers who work for agencies (ADSS Cymru, 2024). The roll out of the real living wage is currently under evaluation to make sure that future approaches are as effective as possible.

Throughout 2024, the forum has worked on several projects. One is the establishment of the social care workforce partnership in which trade unions, social care employers and Welsh Government work together on developing best practice models for social care. The forum has also worked on pay and progression, employee rights, voice and representation within the social care sector, and international recruitment (Welsh Government, 2024a). The forum is also working towards publishing a voluntary framework for pay in direct care roles by early 2026.

Social care workforce delivery plan 2024 to 2027

A Healthier Wales: our workforce strategy for health and social care was launched in 2020 and sets out our aims for the workforce over 10 years. The 2024 to 2027 workforce delivery plan builds on the progress made so far and includes actions based on the feedback we heard during our engagement work, consultation and the workforce survey. The plan sets out actions against the seven original themes of the workforce strategy to create an engaged, motivated and healthy workforce. It also puts in measures to support attraction, recruitment, seamless working models, digital literacy, education, leadership and planning for future social care needs. Seamless working here means that different parts of the social care and health workforce work together closely to support person centred care. It also has three cross cutting themes related to all actions, which are Welsh Language, inclusion and well-being.

A national care and support service

The Welsh Government is exploring the potential of a national care and support service for children, families and adults, that would be free at the point of need. An expert group has been formed to produce practical recommendations on how this can be achieved (Welsh Government, 2022a). 

The group has made suggestions around how to meet the values, principles, and vision set out in the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014. This includes supporting and valuing the workforce by agreeing national standards for appropriate terms and conditions and pay for all social care workers in Wales.

The national care and support service will offer central resources for the social care sector in Wales. This includes creating a sustainable learning and support environment, supporting the implementation of national standards, and collecting data and using it to create positive change. This service will also support the Chief Social Care Officer to provide leadership and to develop and implement good practice and strategy within the sector. This includes championing inclusive practices such as the Welsh Government workforce equality, diversity and inclusion strategy: 2021 to 2026, the Anti-racist Wales action plan: 2022 and the LGBTQ+ action plan for Wales (Welsh Government, 2024b).

Ymlaen

In Ymlaen, our research, innovation and improvement strategy for social care 2024 to 2029, we commit to gathering and making sense of good quality data and research. This will help us improve conditions for people working in social care and improve outcomes for people accessing care and support. 

This means we’ll continue to: 

  • use research and data to identify future opportunities and challenges and explore possible solutions
  • highlight the difficult issues that affect people working in and accessing social care
  • build the strong and compelling reasons to convince others of the need for change
  • connect people to evidence and research happening in Wales, about Wales, and relevant to Wales
  • present and promote the evidence needed to do things differently. 

Carrying out our own research and data collection, and producing briefings like this helps us to meet these commitments.

Workforce-related research used in this series

The workforce insight series reflects on recent workforce-related research that Social Care Wales has carried out and commissioned. This briefing on improving terms and conditions brings together information from recent projects and reports, including: 

  • Workforce data collection report, 2023. This reports on data collected from providers about their workforce. It includes data on about 53,000 people working in social care. In the text, this study is referenced as (Social Care Wales, 2025).
  • Social Care Wales: Have your say – 2024 report findings. This reports on the results of a survey open to everyone working in social care in Wales. It includes data on 5,024 workers. It also includes interviews and focus groups. In the text, this study is referenced as (Social Care Wales, 2024).
References - click to expand

ADSS Cymru (2024) New All-Wales Pledge Comes into Effect, available at https://www.adss.cymru/en/blog/post/all-wales-pledge-version-2 (accessed: 12 June 2024).

Alma Economics (2024) Economic and social value of the UK adult social care sector: Wales, available at https://insightcollective.socialcare.wales/assets/documents/Economic-and-social-value-of-the-UK-adult-social-care-sector_Wales.pdf (accessed: 13 February 2025).

Davies, A., Blackwell, C., Ellies, W., Padley, M., Stone and J., Balchin, E. (2024) A Minimum Income Standard for the United Kingdom in 2024, Joseph Rowntree Foundation, available at https://www.jrf.org.uk/a-minimum-income-standard-for-the-united-kingdom-in-2024 (accessed: 2 December 2024).

Fair Work Commission (2019) Fair work Wales - Report of the Fair Work Commission, available at https://www.gov.wales/sites/default/files/publications/2019-05/fair-work-wales.pdf (accessed: 6 February 2024).

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Krause, G., Johnson, E.K. and Reynolds, R. (2024b) Workforce insight series: valuing social care work 2023, the Insight Collective, Social Care Wales, available at https://insightcollective.socialcare.wales/workforce-insight-series/valuing-social-care-work-in-wales (accessed: 24 January 2025).

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