Every year across the United Kingdom, more and more adults are taking up unpaid caring roles, some without even realising it.
The NHS defines a carer as: “anyone, including children and adults who looks after a family member, partner or friend who needs help because of their illness, frailty, disability, a mental health problem or an addiction and cannot cope without their support.”
“A lot of people don’t call themselves carers,” said Pauline Kimantas, Chief Executive of Sheffield Carers Centre. “It’s just something they get on and deal with because they’re looking after a member of the family.”
According to Carers UK, about 6.5 million adults in the UK are carers (2020). That is one in eight.
It is unsurprising that this number has surged since the start of the pandemic, and it is ever increasing.
Further, as we all come to terms with the ongoing cost of living crisis, we are forced to recognise those that have been hit the hardest.
“Even before the cost of living crisis, carers could be really struggling financially. Often if you’re looking after somebody with a disability there are extra costs involved,” says Ms Kimantas, “for example, you might have to have the heating on during the day or more washing to do. Or you might need to buy special food or make adjustments to your house.
”If you’re a carer who’s not able to go out and do paid work because of your caring responsibilities, the amount of benefit that you get to replace a paid salary is very, very low.”
Carer’s Allowance is the main carer’s benefit and is given to anyone aged over 18 and caring for someone for at least 35 hours per week. In order to receive a carer’s allowance, the person being cared for must be in receipt of certain benefits.The weekly carer’s allowance rate is £69.70.
“People are living on very, very low incomes, and they’ve got extra costs, so they’re squeezed from both sides. If something essential like a cooker or a fridge or a washing machine breaks down, people don’t have the money to replace them,” added Ms Kimantas.
“Things are incredibly tough for carers at the moment.”
In March, Sheffield Carers Centre, along with 77 other Carers organisations across the UK, signed an open letter to Rishi Sunak ahead of the 2022 Spring Statement. The letter called for the Government to provide unpaid carers with increased and targeted financial support to help them cope with unprecedented financial challenges.
Ms Kimantas says, “there was a lot of disappointment in what’s come out of the Treasury and the government. They haven’t really raised the level of carers allowance, which is the main benefit, so it’s still leaving people really, really struggling.
“At the moment, the government is not doing enough to support carers and I think everybody who works with carers would agree with that. There’s not enough money going into social care and hasn’t been for a long time.”
Young carers in particular face a distinct set of challenges. Young adults may find themselves unexpectedly needing to provide care for a family member at the time of their lives when they are meant to have the most freedom.
“You’ve got your life ahead of you and you want to be putting things in place. It’s like the launch pad for the rest of your life,” said Ms Kimantas.
“If your options are limited because you’re providing care, then it can have a lifelong impact. What can happen is people can’t leave home because they need to look after somebody, so people can find that their life choices are quite not as open as they would be if they weren’t providing care for somebody.
“If you’re a younger person, you’d also have less opportunity to build up any savings to fall back on.”
According to a 2016 Carers UK research project, 91% of carers said they missed out on financial or practical support (or both) as a result of not identifying as a carer.
“[Unidentified carers] often don’t think about looking for help,” says Ms Kimantas.
“If you’re just getting on with it and thinking, well, this is my life, then you don’t realise there might be support for you, and that there are things that could actually help make life a little bit easier.
“We know that there are definitely students who’ve got caring responsibilities who don’t know about us and what’s available for them. And we’d really encourage them to get in contact.”
Following national Carers week (6-12 June), Sheffield Carers Centre are offering eight free activities to anyone registered with a carers card. These activities include anything offered by Sheffield City Trust, and the offer lasts until 3 July. To find out more about these offers, visit the Sheffield City Trust website.
Registered carers can also get a 40% discount on the Sheffield City Trust membership card, an offer that does not expire.