Tens of thousands of care home workers face being sacked as they are not fully vaccinated

This Thursday is the deadline for care home workers in England to have both vaccines unless they are medically exempt.

A care home manager has lost six out of 36 staff and Elmfield House Residential Home in Woking, Surrey as they would rather resign than be sacked.

Tens of thousands face losing their jobs as they are not fully vaccinated which will cause many issues for care homes across England, as NHS figures show that over 60,000 staff are not fully vaccinated.

Niccii Gillett said that her staff “firmly” said that they did not want to resign from the care home and two workers had been there for seven years.

Gillett told the PA news agency, “The sad thing is none of them wanted to leave. And reading their resignation letters was heartbreaking.

“They’re so grateful for the opportunities and the first one that left, we gave gifts.

“It was such an emotional afternoon and for days afterwards my residents were heartbroken because they saw this person as one of them, and even a resident, they have said ‘I wish she could come back, I don’t care that she’s not vaccinated’.”

Gillett said there is anger and frustration among staff and said, “What has really aggravated people is with our residents, everything is about choice, it’s about consent – keywords that are drummed into you as soon as you enter the profession, but that choice has been taken away from my staff.”

She added, “I think there’s a lot of anguish, I think people are really hanging on as long as they can. And I know larger homes are losing a much higher percentage of the workforce and just looking in our local area there’s much advertising going on.

“It’s constant and it’s not just one or two positions, they’re advertising double figures because it is such an issue in care homes.”