Fair pay agreement process in adult social care
One of the Labour Government's main manifesto commitments was to establish a Fair Pay Agreement for Adult Social Care.
The Government included primary legislation to underpin a Negotiating Body for a Fair Pay Agreement in England in the Employment Rights Bill,. The Bill is now in its final stages in parliament. In order to establish the Negotiating Body they will need to add more legal detail via secondary legislation that looks at details of who will negotiate an agreement and what the agreement will cover. To help to inform this, the Department of Health and Social Care have launched a consultation
The consultation covers:
- the Adult Social Care Negotiating Body
- the negotiating process
- coverage and remit
- dispute resolution
- implementation
- compliance and enforcement
The consultation is available here. The Homecare Association will be responding, but we encourage members to respond on their own behalf also. If you would like to cc us into your response or raise something for us to include, please email [email protected]
The consultation will close on 16 January 2026.
Once the consultation is complete, the Government will lay further secondary legislation with an aim to establish the body in 2026/27; negotiate an agreement in 2027/28 and implement a Fair Pay Agreement in 2028/29. They have allocated £500m funding to support this. (You can read our response here).