The UK's social care sector is on thin ice.

Last year its workforce diminished for the first time on record, as staff realised that fast food chains and supermarkets are almost across the board paying better wages for less stressful, less skilled work.

Home care workers are even earning under the National Minimum Wage in many cases, as they are usually not paid for their extensive travel time.

Furthermore, the little-discussed category of personal assistants aiding vulnerable people in their own homes often work with informal agreements rather than proper contracts, forgoing annual leave, sick pay and notice periods.

Despite having a larger overall workforce than healthcare is in the UK, the care sector finds its problems ignored by the government and the media time and time again. Healthcare may be a more imminent concern for the average Brit, especially those not nearing retirement age, but home care and care homes are likely in the future for almost all of us.

To this end, Care Home Professional magazine, and sister title Home Care Insight, are making four demands of the UK Government:

1. A sector-specific minimum wage that means UK care workers are paid fairly for the skilled, emotionally taxing work they do;
2. An end to home care workers’ travel time not being included on their payslips;
3. An investigation and legislative change around the informal employment agreements of most personal assistants in care, which often flout laws pertaining to minimum wages, holiday pay and notice periods;
4. That the government finally takes seriously the problem of understaffing in care settings, which is creating issues of safety in care settings across the country.

In support of the Fair Pay for Carers campaign, Professor Martin Green, chief executive of Care England, says:

"There is no place for the minimum wage in a sector which requires high-level skills and complex decision-making, and there is no place for commissioning that only understands the time and task rather than the outcomes which our colleagues deliver to the people they support. Social care is in crisis, and now is the time for the system to be radically changed and for a new approach to pay, qualifications and careers in care.”

We hope you agree that this is an extremely pressing issue: for the 1.5 million social care workers in England alone enduring unfair pay, for the millions living with the help of either a care home or home care right now, and for all of us who will one day end up reliant on the fast-crumbling social care system.