2 2GM Thursday April 28 2022 | the times
News
Social care staff need a £1 billion pay
rise and foreign workers cannot be used
to prop up the care system for the
elderly, migration chiefs said in a report
published yesterday.
In an unusual move, the Migration
Advisory Committee concluded that a
lack of government funding is the main
cause of a workforce crisis in social care
and that immigration cannot be a
“silver bullet”.
However, it recommended that
social care workers be kept on the
priority immigration shortage list and
made permanently eligible for health
visas, adding that the Department of
Health should draw up a long-term
plan for staffing in the sector.
Care homes and agencies should no
longer have to pay “illogical” immigra-
tion skills charges of up to £1,000 for
sponsoring overseas workers to come
to Britain and care staff who work for
five years should get discounts on
applying for permanent residency, the
committee recommended. A minimum
salary of £20,480 for immigrant work-
ers should be maintained to avoid un-
dercutting British staff, it concluded.
The Migration Advisory Committee,Better pay is the answer,
say migration advisers
Chris Smyth Whitehall Editor an independent government body that
advises ministers, was asked to look at
social care last year amid fears of
worsening staff shortages after the end
of free movement from the EU.
Professor Brian Bell, the chairman of
the committee, said that a pay rise was
the only way to address workforce
problems. Average hourly pay is less
than £9.40, the report says.
Scotland has set a minimum of £10.
and the report says that England
should copy this and go “significantly
further”.
The report estimates that a shortage
of 66,000 full-time staff will more than
triple over the next decade as demand
rises from an ageing population.
Professor Bell said: “We are clear that
immigration cannot be a silver bullet to
solve the fundamental challenges the
sector faces. These challenges result
from years of underfunding.”
Vic Rayner, head of the National
Care Forum, called on ministers to
implement the recommendations “as a
matter of urgency”.
Kevin Foster, the immigration
minister, said: “The government will
consider the report and its recommen-
dations carefully before deciding what
steps to take next.”Peers back
down over
asylum plans
Matt Dathan Home Affairs EditorPlans to overhaul the British asylum
system were finally approved last night
as peers backed down at the eleventh
hour over attempts to block the govern-
ment’s Nationality and Borders bill.
The plans were opposed by many
members of the House of Lords, includ-
ing Conservative peers, over proposals
to send asylum seekers abroad for proc-
essing and to make it easier to strip
people of their British citizenship. The
bill is expected to receive royal assent
today.
Enver Solomon, chief executive of
the Refugee Council, said: “Far from
deterring people from making danger-
ous journeys, it will simply punish those
who need our help.”
The New Scientist reported yesterday
that the British Medical Association
and the British Dental Association had
opposed proposals in the bill to intro-
duce scientific methods to assess the
age of refugees.
Last year 3,762 asylum seekers
claimed that they were unaccompanied
children; 2,517 cases were disputed and
six in ten were judged to be adults.A High Court ruling that the policy of
discharging patients from hospitals to
care homes during the pandemic was
unlawful may “open the floodgates” for
legal claims against the government.
Dr Cathy Gardner and Fay Harris,
whose fathers died in care homes dur-
ing the pandemic, partially succeeded
in legal action against the health secre-
tary and Public Health England.
The High Court said yesterday that
the policy not to isolate people dis-
charged from hospitals to care homes
in the first weeks of the pandemic with-
out testing was “irrational”. The gov-
ernment’s “unlawful” policies failed to
take into account the risk to elderly and
vulnerable residents from non-symp-
tomatic transmission of the virus,
despite “growing awareness”.
Nadra Ahmed, chairwoman of the
National Care Association, said the
judgment created a “litigation night-
mare” for the government. An estimat-
ed 20,000 people died in care homes
between March and June 2020 in
England and Wales.
“This was a government policy... and
there was pressure on care homes toDischarging Covid patients
to care homes was unlawful
James Beal Social Affairs Editor accept people. If you’ve got a loved one
who was part of that chain you might be
thinking,‘I want to get my day in court’,”
Ahmed said. “This opens the floodgates
to a possible litigation nightmare for
the government. They were so defini-
tive about their ‘protective ring’ —
which was a blatant lie — and I think
they are on shaky ground.”
Lawyers said that loved ones could
pursue personal injury claims against
the government, and even care homes
may seek costs. Michelle Penn, a part-
ner at the London law firm BLM, said
the government was “staring down the
barrel of potentially very costly claims”,
adding: “[This] arguably creates a prec-
edent for other families to bring similar
claims, including claims for personal
injury, against the government.
“Should any care home operators
themselves face personal injury claims
during this period, it’s likely they will
seek contribution from the govern-
ment. They might also seek recovery
from the state for any alleged forced
closures or losses as a consequence of
the flawed and unlawful policies.”
Gardner, 60, from Sidmouth, in
Devon, and Harris, 58, from Medstead,
in Hampshire, brought legal actionagainst the Department of Health and
Social Care, Public Health England and
NHS England. They were not seeking
compensation but looking for declara-
tions that unlawful decisions were
made by the government.
Gardner’s father, Michael Gibson, 88,
died of suspected Covid in April 2020 at
a care home in Oxfordshire during the
first lockdown. Harris’s father Donald,
90, a former Royal Marine, was one of
up to 24 people who died in his care
home in Hampshire during an out-
break that year.
Lord Justice Bean and Mr Justice
Garnham said: “The drafters of the
documents of March 17 and April 2 sim-
ply failed to take into account the high-
ly relevant consideration of the risk
from asymptomatic transmission.”
They said this was not addressed until a
further document in mid-April 2020.
They rejected other claims by the
women made under human rights
legislation, and against NHS England.
Matt Hancock, health secretary at
the time, said he was “deeply sorry” for
Covid deaths but blamed Public Health
England for failing to flag asymptomat-
ic transmission. Gardner called him a
“coward” for not taking responsibility.cautioned that Putin will struggle to
make any big territorial gains in the
next fortnight to meet that deadline.
Last night Truss said that modern-
day Russia was even less trustworthy
than the USSR and that Soviet leaders
could at least be relied on to behave
“with some degree of rationality”.
“They would de-escalate when they
were confronted and called out, as with
the Cuban missile crisis 60 years ago.
And they had an eye on their global
reputation. None of these factors
applies to Putin. We are dealing with a
desperate rogue operator with no inter-
est in international mores,” she said.
Truss said she believed that furtherDAB RADIO l ONLINE l SMART SPEAKER l APPTo day’s highlights
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Former England rugby player
Steve Thompson, right, on his
memoir Unforgettable: Rugby,
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THETIMES.CO.UK/SUBSCRIBESunak warns of
more rate rises
Rishi Sunak told the
cabinet that interest
rates were expected to
rise to 2.5 per cent over
the next year and
warned against
borrowing more to
fund public spending.
Mortgage payments
could rise by £1,000 a
year for lenders not on
fixed-rate deals. Page 4
Girls avoiding
hard maths
The government’s
social mobility
commissioner has
been criticised by
scientists for telling
MPs that girls do not
like studying physics.
Katharine Birbalsingh
said that girls shunned
the subject because too
much hard maths was
involved. Page 7‘Defensive’ Met
under attack
The Metropolitan
Police was criticised
for a “culture of
defensiveness” after it
was announced that
five officers would face
a disciplinary inquiry
over the arrest of the
black athlete Bianca
Williams as she
returned home from
training. Page 17Liverpool edge
towards final
Liverpool took a
significant step
towards reaching the
Champions League
final with a 2-0 victory
over Villarreal of Spain
in the first leg of the
semi-final at Anfield.
The two goals were
scored within three
minutes in the second
half. Pages 68-Japan to double
military budget
Japan is proposing to
double its defence
budget to £86 billion,
breaking restrictions
imposed after the
Second World War.
The ruling party said
the war in Ukraine was
a factor in the decision,
amid growing threats
from China and North
Korea. Page 32
Growth slows
at Facebook
Meta Platforms, owner
of Facebook and
Instagram, reported its
slowest quarterly sales
growth in a decade as
advertisers cut back
their spending plans.
However, the number
of users on the social
media group’s
platforms exceeded
forecasts. Page 35COMMENT
Post-Brexit Britain is developing a useful role
as a friend to northern and eastern Europeans
IAIN MARTIN, PAGE 29COMMENT 27
LEADING ARTICLES 31
WORLD 32BUSINESS 35
REGISTER 51
LAW 54SPORT 59
CROSSWORD 70
TV & RADIO TIMESmilitary and economic support should
be sent to countries threatened by Rus-
sian aggression, such as Georgia and
Moldova, and opened the door for their
accession to Nato.
Explosions were heard this week in
Tiraspol, the capital of Transnistria,
Moldova’s pro-Moscow breakaway
region, amid fears that Putin could try
to capture all the Russian-speaking
regions along the Black Sea.
Truss also referred to tensions in the
Balkans, where pro-Serbian separatists
in Bosnia have stepped up calls to
secede. She said that the fate of these
countries hinged on the war in Ukraine.
“We will keep going further and
faster to push Russia out of the whole of
Ukraine. This has to be a catalyst for
wider change.” she said. “We mustensure that, alongside Ukraine, the
western Balkans and countries like
Moldova and Georgia have the resil-
ience and the capabilities to maintain
their sovereignty and freedom. Nato’s
open-door policy is sacrosanct.”
Truss also demanded increases to de-
fence budgets across the western world
to address a “generation of under-
investment”. She said the Nato target to
spend 2 per cent of GDP on defence
should be a “floor, not a ceiling”.
She also questioned Britain’s trading
relationship with China and said that
economic access “has to be earned”.
War in Ukraine, pages 8-
Russia’s casual savagery is seared into
its soul, David Aaronovitch, page 27
The West must step up military aid for
Kyiv, leading article, page 31continued from page 1
Ukraine war ‘could last years’Banca do Antfer
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