By Cllr Anne Thompson
There are more than two million people who are in employment in the UK providing unpaid care to friends and family (Family Resources Survey 2019-2020), in addition to parents and guardians providing care for their children.
These informal carers, as they’re sometimes called, may give personal care, for example, or arrange medical and social support, or take their loved ones to doctor’s appointments.
As the population ages and with more people staying in work longer, these numbers will only increase.
A bill being brought through Parliament by Liberal Democrat MP Wendy Chamberlain will, for the first time, give people in employment who also have caring responsibilities an entitlement to unpaid leave.
Under the Carer’s Leave Bill, unpaid carers who work will be able to take up to one week’s leave per year flexibly in small amounts – from half days up to the whole week. The entitlement applies to all employees regardless of length of service, effectively starting from day one of employment.
The Bill aims to reduce the pressure on employees who juggle work and caring commitments, and at the same time help employers maximise the retention and wellbeing of their staff.
My fellow Tilehurst councillors and I urge people in Reading to back the Bill, and to ask our local MPs to give the Bill their support as it goes through Parliament.
I’m glad to say that the Bill now has the support of the government, which much improves its chances of becoming law. But in these turbulent political times, it could still be derailed.
If a snap election is called, for example, there might not be enough time for the Bill to complete the parliamentary process and pass into law.
So, we want to raise awareness of the issue and to do our best to make sure the Bill does not fall by the wayside.
Care crisis
A carer’s entitlement to leave would be a small but concrete step towards easing the burden on informal carers who are in work. But of course, social care is in the grip of a crisis that is much broader and deeper.
An acute problem is a lack of social care staff and workers – often, patients have care plans in place which they can’t actually get because there aren’t enough staff to go around.
It has to be said that the carers in our area are doing amazing work, as are the ambulance and emergency care staff – ambulance waiting times in and around Reading are some of the lowest in the country.
Even so, I’ve heard from residents who had to wait over 15 minutes to have their call to the ambulance service answered, and over an hour to speak to a medical professional during the busiest periods in December.
Eight years of unalloyed Conservative government have seen investment fail to keep up with rising demand, meaning that as winter crises grip the NHS on top of Covid-19, patients are stuck, unable to be discharged from hospital as there simply isn’t the social care to look after them in the community.
To tackle this, the government should start by releasing the £500m it says it has set aside for a social care fund, and the additional £200m it announced last week.
Tackling the issue over the longer term will require the government to change its approach to pay in particular.
While we can’t fix this overnight, steps like these – and backing Wendy Chamberlain’s Carer’s Leave Bill – will go some way to addressing the health and social care crisis we’re all living through right now.
Cllr Anne Thompson is a Liberal Democrat councillor in Tilehurst on Reading Borough Council
