A SOCIAL care leader is calling on the Welsh Government to take urgent action to quell a ‘perfect storm’ threatening care homes and domiciliary care in Gwynedd.

According to Care Forum Wales, the social care sector has been blighted by inadequate care homes and domiciliary care companies are facing a double whammy of having to pay staff a 30 per cent increase without knowing where the money is coming from.

Mario Kreft MBE, the chair of Care Forum Wales, said: “The social care sector is being caught up in a perfect storm that needs to be addressed at the highest level.

“Social care should be treated as a sector of national strategic importance.

“The problems cannot be solved by local government and health boards – we need the Welsh Government to intervene.

“The NHS is under huge pressure, care home beds are being lost across Wales because of inadequate funding, there’s a chronic shortage of nurses and vitally important domiciliary care companies are having massive recruitment problems.

“It’s creating the environment where it is highly unlikely there will be many new care homes built in the future because the figures just won’t stack up.

“On top of everything else, the issue of paying staff the living wage is looming large.

“There’s absolutely no doubt that social care workers deserve the living wage and more but nobody has answered the question how it’s going to be funded.

“Introducing the national living wage over the next four years is going to represent a 30 per cent increase for many workers.

"This will ramp up all pay rates across the sector and this will have to be paid for.

“Most industries are able to pass such increases on to the customer. However, the overwhelming majority of people in care homes in Wales are supported by local authorities, and health boards who are having their budgets cut. That means there is just no money to pay these increases. Something has got to give and I’m afraid it will plunge the social care sector into an even deeper crisis.”