Unison members at Alternative Futures Group, a charity which employs 2,500 care staff, mainly in the north-west, are threatening an initial 48-hour walkout. Some local councils that commission care providers are also moving to cut their contract prices in line with lower rates. Until then, it had said that minimum pay rates should apply only when a worker was “awake for the purposes of working”. Barbara Keeley, Labour’s shadow social care minister, called on ministers to take responsibility for what she called the sleep-in pay “injustice” and to ensure that shifts were paid at full minimum wage. “This latest blow inflicted on care staff adds insult to injury and will simply drive workers away from the sector when they have never been needed more,” Keeley said.

Source: The Guardian January 16, 2019 16:30 UTC