'We don't have weeks' - PM urged to 'get some skates on' to protect care homes from second wave of coronavirus

Stepping in for Sir Keir Starmer as Prime Minister’s Questions today, Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner - a former care worker herself - asked the PM whether he knew the average wage of care staff in the UK.

Pointing to the fact that Sir Keir had been self-isolating after one of his children displayed coronavirus symptoms, Ms Rayner said: “Keir was able to do the right thing and self-isolate and work from home, but other people aren’t in this position – many of them are the very people getting us through this crisis.”

The Prime Minister said he understood a negative test had been returned for Sir Keir’s child, adding: “I don’t know why he is not here.”

He defended the speed of testing but did not offer an answer on the average hourly rate, to which Ms Rayner said: “The whole country would have seen that the Prime Minister doesn’t know how much a care worker earns because that was my question – the shameful fact is the average wage in social care is barely more than £8 an hour.”

Mr Johnson revealed the Government would be unveiling a “winter care home action plan tomorrow”, as he said: “We are concerned about the rates of infection in care homes, clearly they’ve come down massively since we instituted the £600m care home action plan.”

And he added this would include a “toughening up of the rules governing the movement of workers from one care home to another”. He said: “We want to make sure we protect care homes from further infections.”

But Ms Rayner pushed the PM and said: “I must say to the Prime Minister get some skates on it. Those care workers are still not getting the PPE they need, they’re still not getting the testing they need.

“So I urge the Prime Minister to get on top of this problem now before the winter crisis hits.

“The Prime Minister has put his faith in Operation Moonshot, but meanwhile on planet Earth there are no NHS tests available for several high-infection areas.”

She asked: “Can the Prime Minister confirm yes or no, do all care homes in this country have weekly tests?”

Boris Johnson replied: “Yes, to the best of my knowledge care homes in this country… should get weekly tests for all staff members and tests every 28 days for those who are in the care homes, the residents in the care homes.”

However the chief executive of Care England, Professor Martin Green, had said this was not the case.

Ms Rayner said: “Time and time again [Mr Johnson] makes promises then breaks those promises. In June he told this House ‘I can undertake now to get all tests turned in 24 hours by the end of June’.

“They’ve had six months to get this right and yet the Prime Minister still can’t deliver on his promises.

“The Health Secretary said yesterday it would take weeks to sort this situation out.

“We don’t have weeks.”