AN army of EU-born elderly care workers could quit their jobs in Scotland over uncertainty caused by Brexit, according to experts, who fear a staffing exodus could leave holes in vital provision.

It comes amid an increasing trend for private care providers to recruit from overseas, amid concerns many British workers are put off by low pay levels and status in the industry.

Scottish Care, which represents care home providers, says 35 per cent of private care organisations have recruited staff from the EU in the last year, compared with 14 per cent last year.

READ MORE: Beyond Brexit: Hospitals risk losing EU staff lifeline after Brexit

Donald MacAskill, the organisation’s chief executive, said: “More nurses are being recruited from the EU by service providers. Brexit is likely to have significant implications and present even more difficulties in filling nursing posts in the future.”

Problems are already evident, Dr MacAskill said, with some larger companies planning to close recruitment offices they had previously set up in major European cities. Take-up has already dropped due to Britain’s vote to leave the EU putting applicants off, he claimed.

“There are fewer recruits now to justify keeping an office like that open,” he said. “For a number of people in Europe, nurses and others, Britain has already decided.”

He said it was unclear how Brexit would affect the status of workers from the EU or industries most reliant on them, and added that so far care home staff seem to have been calmed by Scottish Government reassurances that they remain welcome. 

“We aren’t seeing signs yet that people are deliberately leaving the country, but Brexit isn’t likely to help recruitment,” Dr MacAskill added.

Health Secretary Shona Robison has ordered the Scottish Social Services Council to look at providing figures about the number of social care workers who hail from European nations.

She recently told Holyrood’s Health and Sport Committee: “I am extremely concerned about the potential loss of workers from other parts of Europe who support our care services, particularly in the care home sector. We should all be extremely concerned.

“The loss of that cohort of staff, who do a hugely important job here, would be a blow to the sector that we would want to avoid.”

The Government’s chief social work adviser, Alan Baird, said: “We do not know the number of people in the workforce who come from the EU and beyond, but I think that is something that we will increasingly need to understand in order to look at the potential gap in social care.”

READ MORE: Beyond Brexit: Hospitals risk losing EU staff lifeline after Brexit

Ms Robison has asked the SSSC whether it can include a question in its annual workforce survey to identify the origin of workers.

A spokesman for the Scottish Government said: “Estimates from the Annual Population Survey show that in 2015 EU nationals made up 3.5 per cent of the social services sector in Scotland.

“We are currently working with the Scottish Social Services Council and the Care Inspectorate, as the collectors and providers of workforce data for the social services sector, and with employer representative bodies, to identify possible approaches to improving our understanding of the numbers and contribution of EU citizens to social services in Scotland.”

“We want to assure EU citizens who work here that we want them here, we value their contribution, and will be doing everything we can to make sure they can continue to work with us without detriment.”

In 2009, the Migration Observatory based at Oxford University found that foreign-born workers comprised just under 10 per cent of the care home labour force in Scotland.

It said research had found 76 per cent of foreign-born care workers were women, compared to 87 percent of those born in the UK.

Poland was named as one of the main providers of employees from abroad from the industry. However, data on the nationality and length of stay of migrant care workers provided a more detailed picture of the “migrant” social care workforce in their report.

Official labour market force figures found that at the end of the last decade, 28 per cent of foreign-born care workers were UK citizens and 20 per cent were nationals of other EU countries, according to the Migration Observatory’s report in 2009.

It also suggested there was evidence that some migrant workers were being employed in social care occupations that did not reflect their level of qualifications and experience. It cited as an example those with nursing backgrounds working as care assistants, providing a source of skilled labour at much lower levels of pay.

Migration Observatory’s report pointed out these may have been partly associated with the restricted rights of non-EU workers.

It found that migrant workers who do not have family members with them in the UK may have been more “willing” to work longer hours and to work all shifts

Last week two surveys carried out by Scottish Care found nurses are choosing not to work in care homes because they can get better pay and conditions in the NHS, or as an agency nurse, and because they feel undervalued compared with “real” nurses.

The reports suggest a looming crisis, with nurse vacancy levels up to 28 per cent, from 18 per cent in 2015. This year 98 per cent of care organisations said they struggled to recruit nurses.

The survey covered 269 care services and 2,500 nurses – around 50 per cent of all those working in private care provision.

Operators increasingly have to rely on agency nurses to fill their rotas, but 74 per cent of organisations saying they have lost staff to the NHS over the last year.

READ MORE: Beyond Brexit: Hospitals risk losing EU staff lifeline after Brexit

Dr MacAskill told a conference in Glasgow last week care services are considering ceasing to operate homes with nursing provision.
 Some are considering closing services altogether as agency nursing costs make them unsustainable.