Carers

Baroness Greengross Excerpts

Wednesday 16th June 2010 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, the noble Baroness draws our attention to an extremely important area. Supporting vulnerable children is a priority for the Government. I would say that many young people are happy to help to care for a family member; it helps them to develop a sense of responsibility. However, inappropriate and excessive levels of caring by young people can put their education, training and health at risk and prevent them from enjoying their childhood. We are therefore very mindful of this area of need.

[Baroness Greengross]

My Lords—

[Baroness Massey of Darwen]

My Lords, young carers are often overlooked. Is the Minister prepared to meet young carers and organisations that represent them to discuss their needs? We have done this in the past and, while some of the issues have been resolved, some have not.

[Lord Tebbit]

My Lords, is my noble friend aware—

[Baroness Greengross]

My Lords, will the Government collect information to help the growing numbers of young, usually working-class grandparents who need to work and who increasingly care nearly full-time for their grandchildren, as well as, frequently, for their ageing parents at the same time?

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, the noble Baroness raises another important area. One thing that we propose to introduce is greater scope for flexible working, as I said in my original Answer, to enable all employees to avail themselves of that. It will allow greater scope for grandparents in particular but it will also allow neighbours and friends to engage in caring on a much wider scale than they can at the moment.