Social care: key facts

• • Around 1.5 million people are employed within the social care workforce in England.
  • Around 100,000 people are employed within the social care workforce in Scotland, 70,000 in Wales and 30,000 in Northern Ireland.
  • Every week social care workers provide vital advice and support to approximately 1.6 million people in England, including 200,000 children.
  • There are about 80,000 qualified social workers in England who work with a wide range of people. About half are involved in supporting and protecting children, young people and families. The remainder work with adults in a wide variety of roles, including working with offenders, the elderly and people with mental health problems or disabilities.
  • Social care workers are employed in many different jobs, helping people with many different needs. They might, for example, work as home and day care centre assistants with the elderly, as personal assistants with disabled people or as care workers with children in residential and foster homes. Residential care accounts for around a half of all employment and domiciliary care a quarter.
  • There are around 30,000 employers of social care workers in the public, private and voluntary sectors in England. Two thirds of the entire workforce is employed in the independent sector with the remaining one third working in local authority social services departments.

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