GREED and government underfunding had driven Britain’s social care services into crisis even before the coronavirus pandemic highlighted the problem, a TUC report published today shows.

Public spending on social care has plummeted by more than £600 million since 2010, the report says.

The damning report highlighted the 120,000 job vacancies in social care today, and that the sector’s poorly paid workers endure atrocious working conditions, insecure work and zero-hours contracts.

It concludes that the “badly damaged social-care services” can be repaired only by increased public funding and removing the profit motive from the service.

More than 400,000 elderly and vulnerable people in Britain live in residential care homes, and hundreds of thousands more live in their own homes only with the support of care workers.

Most of Britain’s 11,100 care homes are run by privateers, thanks to the Tories’ obsession with the privatisation of public services.

The coronavirus pandemic highlighted the neglected sector, with more than a third of Britain’s pandemic deaths taking place in care homes.

TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady said: “When the country needed them, social-care workers stepped up. 

“Care workers looked after older and disabled people in the midst of a pandemic, often without the right personal protection equipment and often for low wages and no sick pay.

“Now it’s time to fix the broken system. Social care is badly underfunded. Pay and conditions for care workers are dreadful, and families can’t be sure of high-quality affordable care when a family member needs it.

“Ministers can’t spend another decade hiding from the social-care crisis.”

Unison assistant general secretary Christina McAnea said: “Chronic underfunding of the care sector has been a huge problem for many years. 

“It shouldn’t have taken a devastating pandemic for politicians to realise this.”

Unite assistant general secretary Gail Cartmail said: “This crisis has been coming down the track for several decades. However, it was the pandemic that shone a very painful spotlight on the situation in care homes that politicians have ignored for too long.

“There can be no justification for continued underfunding and the rampant commercialisation of the sector. How can you factor in profit margins for someone’s health and care?”