2025 Adult Social Care Workforce Trends: What Private Care Providers Need to Know

2025 Adult Social Care Workforce Trends: What Private Care Providers Need to Know

The latest Skills for Care report on the size and structure of the adult social care workforce in England (2025) provides a clear picture of both progress and ongoing challenges in the sector. For private care providers, understanding these trends is critical to workforce planning — particularly as recruitment rules tighten and demand continues to rise.

Key Trends from the 2025 Report

• Workforce Growth, But Vacancies Remain High
• 1.71 million total posts in adult social care in 2024/25 — a 2.2% increase.
• 1.60 million of these posts are now filled (+52,000 vs last year).
• Vacancies dropped to 111,000, but the vacancy rate (7.0%) is still three times higher than the wider economy.

International Recruitment in Decline

• Overseas recruitment fell sharply: only 50,000 international recruits in 2024/25, compared with 105,000 in the previous year.
• Just 10,000 entered via the Health & Care Worker visa.
• New immigration rules now mean:
• Only CQC-regulated employers can sponsor staff.
• Salary thresholds have risen.
• Care & senior care workers will be removed from the visa route from July 2025.
• In-country transitions (students, dependents) remain allowed until July 2028.

Shifts in Workforce Nationality

• 30,000 fewer British nationals filled posts this year.
• Non-EU nationals now represent nearly 1 in 4 care workers.
• Top source countries: India, Nigeria, Zimbabwe.

Insights for Independent Providers

• Care homes with nursing: +3.0% filled posts.
• Care homes without nursing: +3.3% filled posts.
• Domiciliary care: +5.1% filled posts.
• Agency and bank staff remain critical, covering around 118,000 shifts per day (8% of filled posts).

Long-Term Demand

• By 2040, the sector will need an additional 470,000 posts to meet demand.
• Reliance on both domestic and international recruitment strategies will remain essential.

What This Means for Private Care Providers

• Domestic recruitment will get tougher — with rising competition for British staff, providers must focus on retention, career development, and employer branding.
• International recruitment routes are narrowing — sponsorship is more restricted and overseas recruitment is falling sharply.
• In-country talent pools are now critical — students, dependents, and workers switching visa categories are becoming the key route to filling posts.

How We Can Support Your Staffing Needs

At NursingjobsUK, we understand the pressures care providers are facing. That’s why we offer tailored recruitment solutions to keep your services running smoothly:

• Agency & temporary staffing to cover short-term workforce gaps.
• Sponsorship-ready in-country HCAs for CQC-regulated providers.
• Qualified NMC-registered overseas nurses for both permanent and temporary roles.
• Strong pipeline of internationally educated nurses who have passed OSCE and obtained their NMC pin — trained through our own OSCE Training Institute.
• Support for employees of private healthcare providers to become RGN via the SIFE route, with our NHS-approved OSCE training.
• Guidance on immigration & visa changes to help you plan ahead and stay compliant.