Carers Action Plan 2018-20: Supporting Carers Today

Earl of Listowel Excerpts

Thursday 21st June 2018 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Listowel (CB)]

My Lords, I join your Lordships in thanking the noble Baroness, Lady Redfern, for making this debate possible today and for introducing it in the very helpful way that she did. The noble Baroness referred to the ageing population, in particular men, and to dementia. As someone who has experienced dementia in my family, I recognise what she said. I want to highlight that, when one has adequate resources, very often one can keep a parent who is suffering from dementia at home—that was our experience—where they can have a very high quality of life. We need to support those supporting people with dementia so that, wherever possible, they can be kept at home and have the highest quality of life. We must recognise that that is possible and pay tribute to the care workers who do such outstanding work in making that possible.

I welcome the Government’s action plan, particularly as someone who has been a live-in carer for an adult for three years. I also declare my interest as a vice-chair of the Local Government Association. I was especially interested in what the noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley, said about the importance of work. I know how important it was for me to be working during that period. I pay tribute to her for the 30 years or longer that she has been championing and doing very important work in this area. That leads me to ask the Minister a question. What is the policy in Parliament on supporting parliamentarians who are caring for family members or other vulnerable individuals? Are there support groups within Parliament which they can be pointed towards? Perhaps she would like to write to me on that. If we can provide the right support structure and policies in Parliament, it might help parliamentarians understand what is necessary more widely. But perhaps that is wrong.

As the live-in carer for a man with a severe and enduring mental illness who at times returns to a very early stage in life development, who was unable to clean himself or eat, who suffered from fears of persecution and was not prepared to take medication or engage with professionals, my reflections on the experience are that it certainly impacted on my mental health. As we have heard, 70% of carers experience this impairment. It also drove me to isolate myself; I would rather spend time on my own rather than reach out for time with friends. During the course of it I found that the more I asked for help for myself, the more I was able not only to deal with his care but to reach out to his friends to ask them to come in and to his wider family for support. I guess my reflection on that particular experience, for anyone who is reading this debate and in that position, is that you should ask for help, keep asking for help, reach out as far as possible for help, and there will be people there who will help.

I was very grateful that my GP registered him as an individual who had complex needs, both physical and mental. The GP highlighted to me that all the mental health services had been severely cut over recent years and that the day services which might have been available to him were not. What I found tremendously helpful was a support group I could attend regularly, where I could not only hear useful tips from others in a similar experience to mine—in the same boat as me—but get a sense that I was not alone in dealing with this.

I particularly welcome the attention that the action plan gives to young carers, to identifying them early and their support needs. My concern is that the resources might not be there to act on these action plans. Several noble Lords have already raised the issue of resources. A recent report from the Family Rights Group, the Care Crisis Review, has highlighted the situation for children and family services and child protection services. Local authorities, which deliver mostly statutory services, have experienced cuts of 30% to 40% in recent years, so non-statutory services—the early-help, preventive services—are the ones that have experienced very deep and severe cuts. As the All-Party Group for Children has taken evidence from directors of children’s services, social workers, academics and young people over the past two years, we have heard that it is the early help that is being removed. It is not surprising that the president of the Family Division, Sir James Munby, has starkly outlined the steadily increasing numbers of young people who are taken into care as well as concerns which will accelerate over time unless more is done to intervene earlier and help families. I am concerned that once the assessments have been made, there may not be the resources to deliver on them. Can the Minister take away for consideration by the Minister for Families and Children and her colleagues who are looking at the funding for local authorities the deficit that is expected by 2020 of £2 billion for services being offered to vulnerable children and families?

I turn to foster carers, who one might not think fit into this category, but surprisingly they do because many of them are unpaid. Unfortunately, some are long-term carers who will look after a child or sibling group for several years, but they have no right to take a holiday. One might say that it is unfair to separate foster carers from their children, but these can be very challenging young people. It is incredible to me that they do not have the right to respite from the care that they provide. While I do not expect the Minister to respond now, will she write to me about what the Government are doing to ensure that all foster carers with long-term placements have the right to a certain amount of paid holiday each year?

I thank the Government for the work that they have been doing over recent years to support foster carers and others, particularly the introduction of the “staying put” provision in the Children and Families Act 2014. When speaking to foster carers recently, they said how grateful they are for this. One man was fostering four or five children and he felt that two of them would need care beyond the age of 18. The “stay put” provision allows additional support to be provided until the age of 21 and he was very grateful that there would be money to help him meet the costs of caring for those children.

Church groups have proved to be extremely helpful in this area. It is not surprising that they should be, and they are playing an active part in finding new foster carers and adoptive parents, which is good to see. I should also pay tribute to the introduction by the Government of the adoption support fund. My noble and learned friend Lady Butler-Sloss chaired a Select Committee that looked into adoption which recommended a £5,000 annual support grant for adoptive parents and that was accepted. It is a helpful move on the part of the Government for those carers.

However, we can see that there is still a high turnover among foster carers and we need more of them to ensure that a range of appropriate and successful placements are available for young people in care. Again, I urge the Government to think about the terms and conditions for foster carers and to look at what needs to be done in order to demonstrate that they are being supported as they need to be in their very important work.

I repeat my thanks to the noble Baroness, Lady Redfern, for giving us the opportunity to debate these important issues and I look forward to the Minister’s response.