Farce as care home workers are ‘made to pay £1.20’ for Matt Hancock’s new ‘badge of honour’ as website to order them CRASHES… while hard-hit sector is still crying out for PPE and testing
- Health Secretary last revealed care sector badge similar to the one for the NHS
- Came as sector complained that it has not been given the same consideration
- Letter from social care chiefs mentioned ‘paltry’ personal protective equipment
Matt Hancock’s new ‘badge of honour’ website honouring social care professionals has crashed amid claims workers are having to pay £1.20 for the pins while the hard-hit sector is still crying out for PPE and testing.
The Health Secretary last night revealed the badge, which reads CARE, after carers up and down the country cried out for personal protective equipment amid the pandemic.
He was roundly ridiculed for creating a badge for the social care sector similar to the pin that reads NHS as care chiefs complained that they weren’t being given the same consideration as the health service.
Today on LBC he was asked about reports that some care workers would have to buy the badges for £1.20, Mr Hancock said he was ‘not aware’ that was the case.
He added: ‘I’ll look into that. But the thing is that most care providers are private sector organisations whereas the NHS is in the public sector and that sometimes explains some of these apparent differences.’
Mr Hancock said the CARE badge would have ‘practical consequences as well’, including enabling care workers to attend priority shopping hours at supermarkets.
Meanwhile shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth said care workers should be given more than just a badge, and he called on the Government to provide a ‘package of substance’.
The badges have been in production since March 19 2019 and are used to raise the public profiles of caregivers in the UK. They are normally distributed for free by organisations to their staff.
Health Secretary Matt Hancock is pictured with the CARE badge which was revealed yesterday
The CARE badge is pictured in close-up as the sector cries out for personal protective equipment
This morning, the buying page at carebadge.org told visitors that they were unable to purchase the item.
A message on the website said: ‘Due to changing circumstances, the CARE badge CIC is not able to accept new orders at this time.’
Hancock this morning said the Government needs ‘to do more’ for the care sector, which is why he unveiled a new plan on Wednesday.
It comes as:
- Professor Neil Ferguson insisted schools and more shops should not be open until everyone with symptoms, and everyone they have come into contact with, can been screened
- Dominic Raab is set to confirm that lockdown will stay in place until at least mid-May after a Cobra emergency committee meeting this afternoon
- A report sent to ministers has suggested coffee shops, restaurants and estate agents should be among the first to reopen on Britain’s high streets
- In a round of broadcast interviews, Mr Hancock insisted it was ‘too early’ for an exit strategy from the lockdown
- Mr Hancock defended the government’s handling of testing, despite it already having missed a target of carrying out 25,000 tests a day by mid-April
- Health Secretary repeated his promise that the Government will be carrying out 100,000 tests a day by the end of the month
Responding to reports of elderly residents in care homes receiving letters asking them to promise they will not ask for hospital care if they are seriously ill, Mr Hancock said: ‘It has always been the case that people are asked for their wishes in the terrible instances in which they might get very ill, especially as they get towards the end of their lives.’
He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘It is a standard procedure that has happened for a long time.’
Pushed on whether it is standard procedure for all care home residents to be asked at the same time, Mr Hancock said: ‘It isn’t inappropriate so long as the decision is made on an individual basis according to the clinical needs of that person and their wishes.’
He added that it would be ‘deeply inappropriate’ if residents were pressured into signing such letters.
A leaked letter from the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (Adass) to the Department of Health and Social Care says Downing Street has caused ‘confusion and additional workload’ through mixed messages.
Adass raises concerns about testing, personal protective equipment (PPE) for workers and funding.
The letter was written on Saturday and leaked to the BBC and says early deliveries of PPE have been ‘paltry’ with more recent drops ‘haphazard’.
As care workers have repeatedly raised concerns that they are being forgotten about during the crisis, the letter has revealed that some PPE meant for care workers is being confiscated by border control then sent to the NHS.
It argues that statements from the Department of Communities and Local Government and the Department of Health on the shielding scheme for people particularly at risk from the illness have been contradictory.
Government experts found 217 of 3,700 deaths had been recorded in care homes across the two nations registered up until April 3.
The ONS statistics also showed that another 5 per cent of deaths had been recorded outside of hospitals, such as in hospices.
Separate figures showed the true number of deaths was 52 per cent higher than the count given by the Department of Health every day.
The ONS counted 5,979 deaths in England by April 3, compared to the 3,939 figure given by health chiefs on the same day – a difference of around 2,000.
The Department of Health figures are affected by a backlog in hospital recordings, meaning that hundreds of deaths are not registered to be counted.