Debate contribution: Support for Carers

Debate contribution by Mr Gerry Carroll on 10 February 2025.

MLA

Mr Gerry Carroll

Party at the time

People Before Profit Alliance

Date

10 February 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Support for Carers

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4791034

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I beg to move

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. From the outset, I want to make it clear that the motion's call for a carer's allowance supplement scheme or carer's recognition payment is simply a token of society's appreciation of the work that carers do every day. In addition to a carer's recognition payment, what is needed is wider support for unpaid carers that includes appropriate services and respite care, as well as paid carer's leave. For that reason, I support the Alliance Party amendment, and I thank the Members for tabling it. Unpaid carers are the invisible hand that keeps the economy going. The economic contribution of unpaid carers in the North is £5·8 billion a year. To put that in context, that equates to around 75% of the Department of Health's entire budget. The non-economic value of the work of unpaid carers is even greater. Last week and today, I had the privilege of hearing from carers and those who work with carers about their experiences. Some are in the Public Gallery today, and I welcome them. I heard from Barbara, who is the parent of and carer for two children. She had to give up her job when her employer, the Civil Service, refused to allow her to reduce her hours. In the end, Barbara's request for just a two-hour reduction in her working hours was denied. Now, the only form of employment that works for her is self-employment. She struggles to afford heating, petrol for 40-mile round trips to the hospital and shopping for her children's specific dietary requirements. In her words, she feels completely forgotten about and ignored, and that is true for many carers. It is also the case that some carers, especially those who care for an adult child with complex needs or for older people with dementia and whose caring responsibilities are so onerous that employment is completely out of the question, have to provide it 24/7, 365 days and nights of the year. Respite does not exist for those people. Their loved one's complex needs mean that they often provide what is, essentially, nursing care, yet they work far longer hours than any nurse, often just to keep their loved one alive. I also heard from Deborah, a single parent who cares for an adult child with complex mental health needs as well as her mother, who has dementia. Deborah had to give up her full-time job as a nurse in order to care full-time for her family. Caring has left her physically and mentally unwell. She has been diagnosed with PTSD and anxiety. Unfortunately, there is a high level of PTSD among many carers; some have said that it is on a par with people who have been involved in fighting wars. Deborah said that she looks at the post every day to see whether there is anything else coming in apart from bills looking for money from her. I also want to mention Brian, who is a constituent of mine but could not be here today. He is a carer for his mum, and his part-time job offered him a lifeline and gave him a sense of independence and purpose outside of his caring role. When he lost that job, his mental health suffered massively. He is now a full-time carer and struggles to cope financially and mentally. His universal credit (UC) overpayment deductions are absolutely crippling him. Universal credit insists that he is well enough to work, but his GP, the clinical expert who knows him best, says otherwise. I want to mention the young carers whom I met today and the many young carers throughout our society who do Trojan work but are often patronised and dismissed and have to jump through hoops and over hurdles just to get basic information and, in some cases, services that they do not always get. We have seen the number of carers providing more than 50 hours of care per week increase dramatically from 56,300 in 2011 to almost 69,000 in 2021. The state depends on those carers, yet, in reality, it does next to nothing to protect their physical and mental health. As our health and social care system slowly collapses as waiting lists spiral and access to primary and community care is increasingly limited, the state relies on unpaid carers to shoulder the burden. We know and, I think, the state knows that those carers will not walk away from their responsibilities. I would say that the state exploits the bonds that unpaid carers have with their loved ones and pays them a pittance in return. One in four unpaid carers in the North lives in poverty. For those in receipt of carer's allowance, the poverty rate is a shocking 46% — almost one in two. Moreover, 64% of people on carer's allowance struggle to afford electricity and gas, while 60% struggle to afford clothes and shoes. You could not make this stuff up. That is really no surprise when we consider that the carer's allowance provides just £81·90p a week, and that is for only those who provide unpaid care for at least 35 hours per week. That means, in reality, that carer's allowance is paid at a rate of £2·34p per hour — £2·34p per hour for a full-time job. Is that what we really think carers are worth? A single penny over the earnings threshold of £151 a week means that a person will lose their entire carer's allowance payment. That is how the Executive treat the people who are propping up our NHS, our economy and our society. That should be a source of shame for every politician and every Executive party that have continually let carers down year on year. A carer's allowance supplementary scheme — a recognition payment — was recommended by the independent review of welfare mitigations and the Carer Poverty Commission for the North. That would provide a payment of around £270 every six months, mirroring what is already in place in Scotland. It is critical that that payment is disregarded as income for means-tested benefits so that people are not penalised. A carer's allowance supplement would immediately lift 3,400 carers out of poverty and 2,500 out of deep poverty. For that reason alone, it is worth supporting such a small cost to the centre, to the Government and to the Department. The independent review of welfare mitigations concluded that a supplement would effectively target low-income households, women and families with a disabled child and, especially, families with a disabled adult. The cost of implementing a carer's allowance supplement would be around £26 million a year. My message to the Minister and the Executive is to get on with the scheme and implement it. We need to see more than a token of recognition. What is urgently and desperately needed is proper investment in services for carers and people being cared for. For decades, carers have been asking for more respite services and for day services that are appropriate and safe for their loved ones. For those caring for adult children, when their child was in school, the school was able to safely care for them during the day, and that gave the parents a much-needed break — a chance to get a few hours' sleep, do the shopping or have a coffee with a friend. However, once a child with complex needs turns 19, the chances are that they will transition from school to being stuck at home, dependent on their parents, usually their mother, for care and company 24/7, 365 days a year. That is unfair and totally unacceptable for the carer but also for the disabled person, who has a right to be part of society and to have a break from their carer just as the carer might need a break from them. Rather than an increase in respite placements and day services for those with complex needs, however, we have seen the number of respite beds being cut, cut and cut again. Whilst day opportunities, rather than day centres, may be best for many disabled people, for those with complex needs, specialist day centres are the only way to ensure that they have a social outlet and a place to meet people outside their immediate family. That is something that everybody needs and deserves. Without provision of those essential services, a carer's recognition payment will be just a drop in the ocean of what is really needed. I pay tribute to the organisations that support and advocate for unpaid carers, organisations such as Carers NI, Action for Children, Barnardo's, the Colin Neighbourhood Partnership, Young Lives vs Cancer, the Women's Support Network, Alzheimer's Society NI, Cause, Action Mental Health and many, many more organisations and individuals. Finally, I thank the 222,000 unpaid carers across the North.

Without your unseen and undervalued work, society could not function; it would absolutely collapse. It is time that your work is recognised, appreciated and valued and that you have the support that you deserve. I hope that Members will support the motion and the amendment.

1,515 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

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