Supporting Carers During the Cost of Living Crisis

That the Parliament is concerned by the escalating pressures that the cost of living crisis is putting on both the social care workforce and unpaid carers across Scotland, the majority of whom are women; recognises that poor pay and working practices in social care have been increasingly exposed during the COVID-19 pandemic and have created a recruitment crisis; notes that the rise in fuel prices is impacting on the ability of care workers to visit the people they support; calls on the Scottish Government to immediately end all non-residential care charges and implement a strategy for unpaid carers, which includes the restoration and expansion of respite services, with entitlements to short breaks and wellbeing services, and resolves that the mileage reimbursement rate for care workers is increased by five pence per mile, as agreed for NHS workers.