Home care workers tell of terror while working alone at night

Hundreds of home care workers in Scotland’s biggest city have revealed their terror working alone at night.

A survey of hundreds of female staff visiting homes in Glasgow at night or in the early morning has exposed their fear of abuse and assault.

The poll by GMB Scotland revealed 89% of the women felt scared while working alone while almost half had endured intimidation, abuse or violence while working.

The union warned the stress of working alone is taking a toll on home carers’ mental health and urged Glasgow Health and Social Care Partnership to take action to ease the risks.

Frances Stojilkovic, GMB Scotland’s home care convenor at Glasgow City Council, said the workforce, who are almost all women, should no longer be asked to make visits alone at night without effective back-up.

She said: “No one should be expected to go to work feeling afraid and return home relieved to be safe again.

“Of course, all women should be safe in the streets after dark but these workers are providing lifeline support for some of our most vulnerable people. They deserve very possible protection.

“We hear so much about keeping women safe on our streets but these women are being sent out to work alone late at night and not a word is said.

“They need better protection and support and they need it urgently.”

GMB is urging double-staffing care workers for high risk visits, having pool cars across the city to provide reassurance and, if necessary, transport, and additional coordinator cover after 6pm.

More than 240 home care staff took part in the survey with nine out of ten revealing that they felt afraid while making visits at night or early morning.

They said common causes of fear and anxiety include gangs of young men gathered in doorways, intimidating and masked youths on bikes, and men, often drunk or on drugs, following or approaching them.

One worker said: “I’ve had teenagers throwing fireworks at me, shouting abuse, and men will just stand and stare at you from top to bottom.

“Or they won’t move out of the way when you are trying to get past them into a close. I was waiting for a bus home one night and a man just wouldn’t leave me alone. There was no one else in sight.

“It’s not just at night, the streets on winter mornings are just as dark and just as deserted.”

“I’ve been followed, leered at, chased.”

Another care worker told how a client took her phone during one visit before carrying out a sex act. She had to plead for her phone before rushing out.

A colleague told how she was parked at traffic lights at 7.30am in a quiet street when a man tried to break into her car window with a screwdriver.

One home care worker said: “I was waiting in my car to go into flats one night and a gang started banging on the roof and shaking the car. I was terrified.

“It was nine o’clock at night and I called the office as it was happening and all they did was inform my client that I was going to be delayed.

“Another time I was in a lift when drunk men started fighting each other. Once, I walked out of a lift and into the middle of a drug deal.

“Then there are men deliberately trying to scare you with their dogs but, sometimes, it’s just a feeling.

“It can be street lights being out and having to walk down dark streets or back lanes. It’s creepy, scary.

“You just feel relieved to get home in one piece.”

The calls for better protection comes after the Glasgow council debated action to reduce violence against women and girls following a worrying increase in rape and sexual assaults in the city.

The union said home care workers have been alarmed by recent incidents and are fearful walking between addresses in neighbourhoods where street lighting is often inadequate and CCTV cameras are non-existent or broken.

The calls for greater protection for solo workers delivering frontline care comes as Glasgow councillors called for an emergency summit in response to statistics revealing a huge rise in the violence against women in the city.

Meanwhile, the City Council has committed £500,000 to help the Glasgow become the UK’s “first feminist city” by ensuring planners help make public spaces safer for women and girls with better lighting, for example.

ENDS