Abstract
Social care policy and employment regulation are both significant in producing the conditions for individualised risk for social care workers. Solutions for decent work for care and support workers lie in the design and regulation of the care system; however, employment regulation also needs rejuvenation. The achievement of an equitable person-centred social care system cannot be left to the market. Nor will the market develop the skilled workforce in secure and fairly-remunerated jobs that is necessary for a sustainable social care system. Government is the key actor with power to make the changes required. Care and care workers must be properly valued within and beyond the care system. There must be opportunity for collective effort and responsibility in the care system. Employment regulation and arrangements must provide all workers in personal work relations with protections and rights in the labour market if we are to re-fashion care jobs as sustainable and secure work.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Andrews, K. (2014, September 12). Address to the BCCM ‘make it mutual workshop’. Parliament of Australia. http://kevinandrews.dss.gov.au/speeches/64. Accessed 25 October 2020.
Bagenstos, S. R. (2017). Disability rights and labor: Is this conflict really necessary? University of Michigan Law School Scholarship Repository, University of Michigan. https://repository.law.umich.edu/articles/1852/. Accessed 5 October 2020.
Berry, D., & Bell, M. P. (2018). Worker cooperatives: Alternative governance for caring and precarious work. Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal, 37(4), 376–391. https://doi.org/10.1108/edi-02-2017-0027.
Boris, E., & Klein, J. (2012). Caring for America. Home health workers in the shadow of the welfare state. New York: Oxford University Press.
Borkin, S. (2019). Platform co-operatives—Solving the capital conundrum. Nesta and Co-operatives UK. https://media.nesta.org.uk/documents/Nesta_Platform_Report_FINAL-WEB_b1qZGj7.pdf Accessed: 18 August 2020.
Bottery, S. (2020, February 27) Social care can’t cope alone with the cost of the living wage. The King’s Fund Newsletter. https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/blog/2020/02/social-care-cost-living-wage. Accessed 1 October 2020.
Briggs, C., & Buchanan, J. (2005). Work, commerce and the law: A new Australian model? The Australian Economic Review, 38(2), 182–191.
Brotherhood of St. Laurence. (2019). Submission to the NDIS Thin Markets project consultation, Department of Social Services. Fitzroy, Vic: Brotherhood of St Laurence. http://library.bsl.org.au/jspui/bitstream/1/11392/1/BSL_subm_DSS_NDIS_Thin_Markets_Consultation_Jul2019.pdf. Accessed 22 December 2019.
Carey, G., Weier, Malbon, E., Dickinson, H., & Duff, G. (2020). How is the disability sector faring? A report from National Disability Services’ annual market survey. Sydney: Centre for Social Impact, University of New South Wales. https://www.unsw.adfa.edu.au/public-service-research-group/reports. Accessed 13 August 2020.
Charlesworth, S., & Malone, J. (2017). Re-imagining decent work for home care workers in Australia. Labour & Industry: A Journal of the Social and Economic Relations of Work, 27(4), 284–301. https://doi.org/10.1080/10301763.2017.1400420.
Cortis, N., Macdonald, F., Davidson, B., & Bentham, E. (2017). Reasonable, necessary and val-ued: Pricing disability services for quality support and decent jobs. Sydney: Social Policy Research Centre, University of New South Wales. https://www.arts.unsw.edu.au/sites/default/files/documents/NDIS_Pricing_Report.pdf. Accessed 17 September 2020.
Countouris, N., & De Stefano, V. (2019). New trade union strategies for new forms of employment. Brussels: European Trade Union Council. Brussels. https://www.etuc.org/en/publication/trade-unions-protecting-self-employed-workers. Accessed 21 September 2020.
Cranford, C. (2020). Home care fault lines: Understanding tensions and creating alliances. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Cunningham, I., Baluch, A., James, P., Jendro, E., & Young, D. (2019). Handing back contracts: Exploring the rising trend in third sector provider withdrawal from the social care market. Glasgow: Coalition of Care and Support Providers Scotland. http://www.ccpscotland.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Handing_Back_report_CCPS.pdf. Accessed 20 November 2019.
De Stefano, V. (2015). The rise of the just-in-time workforce: On-demand work, crowdwork, and labor protection in the gig-economy. Comparative Labor Law and Policy Journal, 37(3), 471–504. https://cllpj.law.illinois.edu/archive/vol_37/.
Ewing, K. D., Hendy, J., & Jones, C. (2019). Rolling out the manifesto for labour law. Liverpool: Institute of Employment Rights. Available at: https://www.ier.org.uk/product/rolling-out-manifesto-labour-law/. Accessed 28 October 2020.
Fenwick, C., Howe, J., Marshall, S., & Lau, I. (2007). Labour and labour-related laws in micro and small enterprises: Innovative regulatory approaches SEED Working Paper No. 81. Geneva: International Labour Office.
Fredman, S., & Fudge, J. (2013). The legal construction of personal work relations and gender. Jerusalem Review of Legal Studies, 7(1), 112–122.
Freedland, M., & Kountouris, N. (2011). The legal construction of personal work relations. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Fudge, J., & Owens, R. (2006). Precarious work, women and the new economy: The challenge to legal norms. In J. Fudge & R. Owens (Eds.), Precarious work, women and the new economy (pp. 3–27). Oxford, Portland and Oregon: Hart Publishing.
Fudge, J., Tucker, E., & Vosko, L. (2002). The legal concept of employment: Marginalizing workers. Ottawa: Law Commission of Canada. http://www.justlabour.yorku.ca/volume3/pdfs/fudge.pdf. Accessed 22 September 2020.
Hardaker, D. (2020). Revealed: The liberal, murdoch networks making millions delivering ‘Uber for aged care’. Crikey.Com. Retrieved from https://www.crikey.com.au/2020/09/21/aged-care-mable-liberal-news-corp-connection/. Accessed 22 September 2020.
Hayes, L. J. B. (2017). Eight good reasons why adult social care needs sectoral collective bargaining. Liverpool: Institute of Employment Rights. https://www.ier.org.uk/product/8-good-reasons-why-adult-social-care-needs-sectoral-collective-bargaining/. Accessed 22 June 2020.
Industrial Relations Victoria. (2016). Victorian inquiry into the labour hire industry and insecure work, final report. Melbourne: Industrial Relations Victoria. https://engage.vic.gov.au/inquiry-labour-hire-industry-and-insecure-work. Accessed 12 November 2020.
Macdonald, F., Bentham, E., & Malone, J. (2018). Wage theft, underpayment and unpaid work in marketised social care. The Economic and Labour Relations Review, 29(1), 80–96. https://doi.org/10.1177/1035304618758252.
Malbon, E., Carey, G., & Meltzer, A. (2019). Personalisation schemes in social care: Are they growing social and health inequalities? BMC Public Health, 19(1), 805. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-019-7168-4.
Matthew, L. (2017). Providing care through cooperatives 2: Literature review and case studies. Geneva: International Labour Office.
McCrystal, S. (2006). Regulating collective rights in bargaining: Employees, self-employed persons and small businesses. In C. Arup, P. Gahan, J. Howe, R. Johnstone, R. Mitchell, & A. O’Donnell (Eds.), Labour law and labour market regulation (pp. 597–616). Sydney: The Federation Press.
McFee, G. A. (2018). A cooperative-led NDIS? The potential of member-run organisations. Power to Persuade Blog. http://www.powertopersuade.org.au/blog. Accessed 16 June 2019.
National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA). (2020). Partners in the community. NDIA. https://www.ndis.gov.au/understanding/what-ndis/whos-rolling-out-ndis/lac-partners-community. Accessed 21 September 2020.
National Disability Services (NDS). (2018). Innovative workforce fund. NDS. https://workforce.nds.org.au/. Accessed 22 July 2020.
Needham, C. (2011). Personalising public services: Understanding the personalisation narrative. Bristol: Bristol University Press.
New Economics Foundation. (2020). Achieving a shorter working week across Europe. Newsletter of the European network for the fair sharing of work. May, Issue 5. https://neweconomics.org/uploads/files/workingtime-newsletter5.pdf. Accessed 1 November 2020.
Productivity Commission. (2011). Disability care and support. Productivity Commission report no. 54. Canberra: Productivity Commission.
Ryan, R., & Stanford, J. (2018). A portable training entitlement system for the disability support services sector. Canberra: Centre for Future Work. https://www.tai.org.au/sites/default/files/ASU_Training_Report_Formatted.pdf. Accessed 2 February 2021.
Scholz, T. (2016). Platform cooperativism: Challenging the corporate sharing economy. New York: Rosa Luxemburg Foundation. http://www.rosalux-nyc.org/platform-cooperativism-2/. Accessed 14 July 2020.
Stewart, A., Forsyth, A., Irving, M., Johnstone, M., & McCrystal, S. (Eds.). (2016). Creighton and Stewart’s labour law. Sydney: Federation Press.
Stewart, A., & Stanford, J. (2017). Regulating work in the gig economy: What are the options? The Economic and Labour Relations Review, 28(3), 420–437. https://doi.org/10.1177/1035304617722461.
Supiot, A. (2001). Beyond employment: Changes in work and the future of labour law in Europe. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press.
The Caring Fairly Coalition. (2018). The caring fairly coalition. http://www.caringfairly.org.au/caring-fairly-coalition. Accessed 2 February 2021.
Topping, M., Douglas, J., & Winkler, D. (2019). Understanding the factors that influence the quality of paid disability support for adults with acquired neurological disability and complex needs: A scoping review protocol. British Medical Journal Open, 9(12), https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2019-034654.
Trojansky, A. (2020). Towards the ‘Uberisation’ of care? Platform work in the sector of long-term home care and its implications for workers’ rights. Brussels: European Economic and Social Committee. https://www.eesc.europa.eu/en/our-work/publications-other-work/publications/towards-uber-isation-care#downloads. Accessed 10 October 2020.
Visontay, E. (2020, 24 August 2020). Newmarch house: Confusion over who was in charge during Covid-19 outbreak worsened outcome. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/aug/24/newmarch-house-confusion-over-who-was-in-charge-during-covid-19-outbreak-worsened-outcome.
Warr, D., Dickinson, H., Olney, S., Arstein-Kerslake, A., Wilson, E., Hargrave, J., et al. (2017). Choice, control and the NDIS: Service users’ perspectives on having choice and control in the new National Disability Insurance Scheme. Melbourne: University of Melbourne. https://socialequity.unimelb.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0010/2364499/Choice-Control-and-the-NDIS-Report-Melbourne-Social-Equity-Institute.pdf. Accessed 13 October 2020.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2021 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Macdonald, F. (2021). Changing Course Towards Decent Work. In: Individualising Risk. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-33-6366-3_9
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-33-6366-3_9
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore
Print ISBN: 978-981-33-6365-6
Online ISBN: 978-981-33-6366-3
eBook Packages: Economics and FinanceEconomics and Finance (R0)