Still working for love? Recognising skills and responsibilities of home-based care workers

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to focus on care workers employed in clients’ own homes recognising the skills and responsibilities of home-based care workers. Design/methodology/approach – Interviews and focus groups with domiciliary care workers in New Zealand centred on what these employees actually do during their working day. Findings – Home-based care workers require the same skills as residential care workers, but they also have greater responsibilities and receive less supervision and support, as they work largely in isolation. In addition, they must spend a large part of their working day travelling between clients: this time is unpaid, and brings their average hourly pay below the minimum wage. Practical implications – Although the home-based care workers who took part in this project love and are committed to making a positive difference to their clients, they also want the government, employers and the public to recognise their skills, efforts and their challenging working conditions. Originality/value – In earlier days of deinstitutionalisation, Graham described caring work as a “labour of love”. More than three decades years later, a New Zealand government minister described paid care workers as working partly “for love”. Care work is also currently perceived as unskilled. Both these perceptions depress the pay and working conditions of care staff, and in future may undermine the quality of care delivered to vulnerable clients.