Staff Vacancies in Adult Disability Homes and Day Activity Centres
Ministry of Social and Family DevelopmentSpeakers
Summary
This question concerns staff vacancies in Adult Disability Homes (ADHs) and Day Activity Centres (DACs), raised by Mr Gerald Giam Yean Song. Minister for Social and Family Development Masagos Zulkifli B M M noted approximately 200 vacancies and highlighted funding increases of 25% for ADHs and 20% for DACs to improve care quality. To aid recruitment, the National Council of Social Services publishes salary guidelines, runs the Social Service Tribe campaign, and offers Career Conversion Programmes for mid-career professionals. These initiatives aim to address challenges regarding career prospects and working environments while expanding the pool of social workers and allied health professionals. Finally, 92.3% of caregivers gave ADHs high satisfaction ratings in FY2021, with DAC client surveys commencing in FY2022.
Transcript
16 Mr Gerald Giam Yean Song asked the Minister for Social and Family Development (a) what is the current number of staff vacancies in Adult Disability Homes (ADHs) and Day Activity Centres (DACs); (b) what are the challenges faced by social service agencies in filling these vacancies; (c) whether the manpower shortage has impacted their operations and, if so, how; and (d) what is the feedback from caregivers and clients about the service quality of ADHs and DACs.
Mr Masagos Zulkifli B M M: A March 2022 survey found that Adult Disability Homes (ADHs) and Day Activity Centres (DACs) have plans to fill some 200 vacancies. This includes additional staff supported by the increase in funding to ADHs by 25% ($6 million) per year from July 2021 and to DACs by 20% ($3 million) per year from October 2021, to enable them to hire more care staff and increase their quality of care.
The National Council of Social Services (NCSS) regularly reviews and publishes salary guidelines for the social service sector. This information helps social service agencies to set competitive salaries to attract and retain good staff. Nonetheless, there remain concerns about career prospects, salaries and working environment.
To encourage more people to join the social service sector, the Career Conversion Programmes provide funding support for mid-career professionals from other sectors to acquire relevant skills and become social workers and allied health professionals1. NCSS also launched the Social Service Tribe in 2018 to increase public awareness and career interest by communicating the values of the sector, highlighting the work carried out by sector professionals and sharing career opportunities and pathways.
In our FY2021 survey on caregiver satisfaction with ADH services, 92.3% of caregivers gave a rating of 3.5 and above out of 5. We plan to survey DAC clients from FY2022.