Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Helen Whately and Andrew Selous(1 month, 3 weeks ago)
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Helen Whately
I am grateful to international care workers who have come to the UK to look after loved ones. Their work has contributed to reducing vacancies and increasing the supply of social care, but we need to get the balance right between international recruitment and our homegrown workforce. We are carrying out ambitious reforms of our adult social care workforce, and therefore it is right, alongside that, to ensure that we have the right numbers of people coming here from overseas for social care. That is why we have worked with the Home Office on changes to visas.
Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)
The managers of the wonderful care home I visited in Dunstable on Friday were annoyed by the number of job applicants for care places who were making the interview stage and then not arriving on the day. Can the Minister have a word with ministerial colleagues at the Department for Work and Pensions to ensure that job coaches are certain that jobseekers are not wasting the time of care homes? It is not fair, and those who work in care homes are busy people with a lot to do.
Helen Whately
I work closely with colleagues in the Department for Work and Pensions on the recruitment of people looking for jobs in social care, and I will raise that point with my colleague in the Department.