Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether his Department is providing additional support to carers to help with rising costs of living.

The current rate of Carer’s Allowance is £81.90. Since 2010 it has increased from £53.90 to £81.90 a week, providing just under an additional £1500 a year for carers through Carer’s Allowance.

In addition to Carer’s Allowance, carers on low incomes can claim income-related benefits, such as Universal Credit and Pension Credit. These benefits can be paid to carers at a higher rate than those without caring responsibilities through the carer element and the additional amount for carers respectively. Currently, the Universal Credit carer element is £198.31 per monthly assessment period. The additional amount for carers in Pension Credit is £45.60 a week.

Since 2022, the Government has demonstrated its commitment to supporting the most vulnerable by providing one of the largest support packages in Europe. The Government has provided support from 2022-23 to 2024-2025 to help households with the cost of living totalling £108 billion.

This includes up-rating working age benefits by 6.7% and raising the Local Housing Allowance rates to the 30th percentile of local market rents, benefiting 1.6 million low-income households.

Since October 2022, CPI has already more than halved. This is stabilising the financial situation for many families, and the OBR expects that by Quarter 4 2024 (October-December) CPI will have fallen to 1.4%.

In the meantime, some people will need further, targeted help to get back to a stable financial position.

The Government is providing an additional £500m to enable the extension of the Household Support Fund, including funding for the Devolved Administrations through the Barnett formula to be spent at their discretion. This means that Local Authorities in England will receive an additional £421m to support those in need locally through the Household Support Fund. The funding will be available to Local Authorities in England from 1 April 2024 and will run until 30 September 2024.

Carer’s Allowance is a devolved benefit in Scotland.