Young Carers: Health and Well-being

Baroness Finlay of Llandaff Excerpts

Monday 13th January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Blackwood of North Oxford]

The noble Lord has asked a specific statistical question which I want to provide an accurate answer to, so I will write to him.

[Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB)]

My Lords, do the Government recognise that the shortage of beds which is being experienced across the NHS is having an adverse effect on the ability to provide respite admissions when young carers find that they are literally at breaking point? Funded beds in hospices, nursing homes and other places can be essential to maintaining the cohesiveness of a family unit that is under extreme strain.

[Baroness Blackwood of North Oxford]

Obviously, pressure on the wider NHS and on social care can have a knock-on effect on unpaid carers who provide an enormous and valuable contribution to our health system, and also on those who care for them. I think that many of us in this Chamber will have personal and direct experience of that. That is why we have provided an extra £33.9 billion of funding for the NHS to ease those pressures, why we are working hard to find a sustainable solution to social care reform, and why we want to make sure that we provide carers of all ages with the support they need, first through identification and later by making sure that they have joined-up support right through the system.