Young Carers Support

David Drew Excerpts

Tuesday 12th February 2019 Westminster Hall

[Mr Adrian Bailey (West Bromwich West) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Owen. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) on securing the debate and on the eloquent way in which he outlined the issues.

I will not repeat the catalogue of personal experiences that my hon. Friend has witnessed at first hand. I think anybody who has had any experience of working with young carers in any part of the country would be able to repeat them. My own local authority, Sandwell Council, was one of the pioneers investigating this particular social problem, and published an early piece of work on child carers in 1989 with the specific objective of identifying the number of potential young carers in the borough and supporting charitable initiatives to address the problems they had. Certainly, first as a councillor and then as a Member of Parliament, it has been my privilege to work with the Sandwell Young Carers organisation, which has enabled me to see at first hand the inspirational young people we have in the borough and the work they do not only on behalf of their own families, but in relieving pressure on public services locally.

[Dr David Drew (Stroud) (Lab/Co-op)]

As in my hon. Friend’s area, we have Gloucestershire Young Carers, which has just won a tender to remain as the organisation representing young carers in Gloucestershire. Does my hon. Friend agree that a tendering process is the most improper way to encourage those organisations to function properly in representing young carers? It just seems the wrong approach.

[Mr Bailey]

Absolutely. In fact, there was an earlier remark on the almost haphazard way in which young carer organisations can access funding. The fact is that to provide a proper, long-term service with the capacity to meet an area’s needs requires long-term, assured funding. The continual tendering process does not provide the degree of certainty necessary to plan services effectively for the long term.

In addition to the inspirational young people that I mentioned, there is the chief executive of SYC, Tracey Hawkins, whom I have known for many years. She brings absolute passion to the job—often in very trying financial circumstances—to sustain that service within my local authority. SYC has a record of raising awareness for professionals across the board within the borough to help them identify and support young carers, and it has a contract with the council to do so.

SYC provides lottery-funded academic support—through homework clubs—and educational support for young carers who, as my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central outlined, often face very difficult home circumstances, resulting in their low attainment, and sometimes low aspiration. It also provides publicity and communicates with other community groups and clubs to broaden young carers’ activities, which again is lottery-funded. The problem is that SYC has to continually try to find new or repeat sources of funds to go on providing those services.

The initial survey in Sandwell identified 2,000 potential young carers as needing support, but SYC has the funding and capacity to deal with only about 520 at any one time. SYC also makes an enormous contribution to supporting other public services in the area.