Skills for Care Explained: What It Does, and the Training Funding Route That Replaced the Workforce Development Fund

Skills for Care is the organisation most English adult social care providers deal with for workforce development, and most of them are working from an out-of-date picture of it. The funding stream everyone knew has closed. Training provider endorsement is being replaced. And two separate workforce reports are in circulation with different numbers in them.

This guide sets out what Skills for Care is, how training funding works now, and which figures to quote.

What Skills for Care actually is

It describes itself as the national adult social care charity — an independent charity that has worked closely with the Department of Health and Social Care for 25 years. It is not a statutory body and not a regulator. It is a delivery partner that wins government contracts competitively.

In May 2026 it was awarded two three-year DHSC contracts starting in April 2026: an integrated workforce support programme covering recruitment, retention, upskilling, the Care Workforce Pathway, qualifications and standards, digital and leadership capability, workforce planning and delegated healthcare; and continued management of the Quality Assured Care Learning Service. Contract values are not published.

The practical consequence of being a contractor rather than a regulator: Skills for Care sets no legal requirements. The Care Quality Commission does that, through the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014. Skills for Care publishes the standards, routes and data the sector works to.

The Workforce Development Fund has closed

This is the change most providers have not caught up with. The Workforce Development Fund is described on Skills for Care’s own site in the past tense: it was a funding stream from the Department of Health and Social Care, distributed by Skills for Care between 2011 and 2025. The most recent figures on that page relate to 2024-25 claims.

The replacement is the Adult Social Care Learning and Development Support Scheme — a DHSC grant, and importantly, one that is administered by the NHS Business Services Authority on behalf of DHSC rather than by Skills for Care. If you are still looking to Skills for Care to process a claim, you are looking in the wrong place.

The grant determination for 2026 to 2027 was published on 30 March 2026. Eligibility runs to adult social care employers in England, including registered charities and local authorities, that directly employ care staff and hold an up-to-date Adult Social Care Workforce Data Set account. Costs paid between 1 April 2026 and 31 March 2027 fall in the claim window.

There are caps. Most eligible courses are subject to a total reimbursement cap of £400,000 per recipient, with a separate £25,000 cap per recipient for Oliver McGowan training. Reimbursement is capped at evidenced spend, and only courses on the published GOV.UK list, from an eligible awarding organisation, are funded.

Published maximum reimbursements per learner, for training paid for in the current window, include £1,540 for the Level 2 Adult Social Care Certificate, £835 for the Level 3 Diploma in Adult Care, £1,100 for the Level 4 Diploma in Adult Care and £1,565 for the Level 5 Diploma in Leading and Managing an Adult Care Service. For Oliver McGowan training, Tier 1 is reimbursed at £12.50 in-house or £25 procured, and Tier 2 at £50 in-house or £90 procured.

Two traps worth knowing. Several previously funded qualifications closed to claims on 31 March 2026, including the Level 2 autism and learning disability certificates and the Level 4 leadership and management certificate. And the scheme does not fund the Level 3 Diploma where it forms part of an apprenticeship.

The ASC-WDS account condition is the quiet enforcement mechanism here: an up-to-date account is a stated condition of claiming, which is why the data set has the coverage it does.

Endorsement is becoming quality assurance

If you have ever specified a "Skills for Care endorsed provider" in a tender, that language is in transition. The Quality Assured Care Learning Service, launched by DHSC in autumn 2024 and run by Skills for Care under contract, reviews the quality of individual courses and qualifications delivered by training providers. Application guidance is dated April 2026. It is free to providers, funded by DHSC, with no fixed application deadline.

It works against nine quality standards covering organisational values aligned with the sector, equality and diversity policies, quality assurance processes, staff development, needs-based course design, initial learner assessment, information and guidance for learners, employer engagement, and measured learner and commissioner satisfaction. Accredited qualifications attract a tenth standard requiring external quality assurance reports. Oliver McGowan training attracts further requirements on transparent pricing, use of NHS England materials and approved trainers.

The rollout is phased, and phase three is the one to plan for: only courses and qualifications from quality-assured providers will be eligible for funding. No dates have been published for phases two or three, so this is a direction of travel rather than a deadline — but a provider buying training on a multi-year contract should be asking about it now.

Successfully assessed courses carry the Quality Assured Care Learning Mark, and the provider list is updated fortnightly.

The statutory and mandatory training list

Skills for Care does publish a training list, and it is more useful than most providers realise. Its statutory and mandatory training guide for adult social care employers distinguishes statutory training — usually required by law, or directed by a statutory body — from mandatory training, which the organisation or its commissioners consider essential. Crucially, it does not label each topic as one or the other: the provider defines its statutory and other mandatory training for each role.

The topics it lists as required of all workers, role-dependent, with published refresher intervals, are health and safety awareness, fire safety, moving and handling objects, infection prevention and control, adult safeguarding, basic life support and first aid, assisting and moving people, child safeguarding, learning disability and autism awareness, food hygiene where food is handled, and medication administration where applicable.

Most carry a minimum three-year refresher, triggered earlier by new risk or activity. Two differ: basic life support is at least annual, and fire drills should be held at least yearly. Medication competency should be reviewed annually where no further training is given.

That list sits alongside the Care Certificate standards, which were updated in March 2025 to sixteen standards with the addition of awareness of learning disability and autism. Our guide to the Care Certificate and its 16 standards covers those in detail, and the broader picture is in our guide to mandatory training for healthcare workers.

One precision point on the Care Certificate worth repeating, because it is widely misstated: the assessor and employer guide does not call it mandatory. It says the standards can help meet the legal requirement to ensure staff are supervised, suitably competent and trained, and that they must be completed and assessed before new support workers can practise without direct supervision. There is no fixed timescale — it is determined by the employer.

Leadership: what Skills for Care recognises

The Manager Induction Standards set out eleven standards for aspiring, new and existing managers: leading and managing in adult social care; supporting and developing teams; regulation and governance; effective communication; working with partners; leading a person-centred service; safeguarding and mental capacity; making decisions; managing resources; learning and innovating; and personal development and wellbeing.

Alongside those sit named programmes including Moving Up, the DM10 programme, the RM12 programme for registered managers over twelve months, and licensed programmes that training providers buy an annual licence to deliver — Lead to Succeed, Well-led, and Leading Change Improving Care among them.

The workforce numbers, and which report to quote

Two reports are in circulation and quoting the wrong one is an easy way to look out of date.

The size and structure of the adult social care sector and workforce in England, 2026, covering 2025/26 and announced on 24 June 2026, gives: filled posts 1.59 million, up 1.4 per cent or 22,000 — the slowest growth in four years; total posts 1.69 million; vacant posts 96,000, down 10.5 per cent; a vacancy rate of 6.2 per cent, the lowest since 2015/16; and independent sector turnover of 23.6 per cent, down from 24.7 per cent.

The state of the adult social care sector and workforce in England, 2025, covering 2024/25, is the fuller report and carries the figures most often cited elsewhere: a 7.0 per cent vacancy rate, 111,000 vacant posts, turnover of 23.1 per cent and around 335,000 leavers, approximately 19,000 organisations across 42,000 establishments of which 30,000 are CQC-regulated, and sickness absence of 4.5 days per employee amounting to around 6.6 million days lost.

The registered manager figures in that report are the ones to put in front of a board: approximately 26,400 registered managers in post, with a vacancy rate of 11.4 per cent, equivalent to an average of 3,400 vacant posts.

The Adult Social Care Workforce Data Set itself is described as the leading source of workforce information for the sector. Note that its landing page and the 2026 report give different counts — the landing page cites over 20,000 care providing locations and 650,000 workers, while the report cites around 21,100 organisations and data on over 760,000 staff as at May 2026. Cite the report and its date.

Frequently asked questions

Is Skills for Care a regulator?

No. It is an independent charity and a DHSC delivery partner. Regulation is the CQC’s, under the 2014 Regulated Activities Regulations.

Can we still claim from the Workforce Development Fund?

No. It ran between 2011 and 2025. The current route is the Adult Social Care Learning and Development Support Scheme, administered by the NHS Business Services Authority.

What do we need in place to claim?

You must be an adult social care employer in England directly employing care staff, hold an up-to-date ASC-WDS account, and use a course on the published eligible list from an eligible awarding organisation.

Is the Care Certificate mandatory?

Skills for Care’s own guide does not say so. It says the standards must be completed and assessed before new support workers practise without direct supervision, and that they help meet the legal requirement on competence and training.

Does "Skills for Care endorsed" still mean anything?

It is a legacy term in transition to the Quality Assured Care Learning Service. Ask providers whether their courses carry the Quality Assured Care Learning Mark.

Which vacancy rate should we quote?

6.2 per cent, from the 2026 size and structure report covering 2025/26. The 7.0 per cent figure is from the previous year.

Getting the training evidence right

Funding and quality assurance are both moving toward the same place: evidenced, quality-assured training with records a provider can produce on demand. Learnsignal builds compliance and CPD training for care providers with completion reporting designed for inspection rather than reconstruction — covering the statutory and mandatory topics above, including infection prevention and control and learning disability and autism awareness. If an inspection is coming, our mock CQC inspection guide is a useful starting point. To see the catalogue, explore our CPD courses or see pricing for teams.