Author Archives: Adrian Ashton

At least 1 in 10 of all people in the UK are unpaid carers – but over 10% of these (a growing trend, and estimated to be in the region of 1 million people by 2027) can never be fully recognised, or supported as such. This is because when unpaid carer legislation was passed, it was never assumed that an unpaid carer would separately also be self-employed or a small business owner.

Because of this oversight, none of the carer or business support services recognise they exist, and so don’t design or offer the specific types of assistance they need in comparison to other unpaid carers. As a result, this growing number of unpaid carers are twice as likely to be in poverty than any other type of carer who’s trying/needing to also remain ‘economically active’ – and their respective businesses’ productivity is at least 20% less than it would otherwise be (because the struggle to balance running a business with caring responsibilities means stalled growth, prevents the creation of new jobs, delays growth and investment plans, etc).

And unpaid care is an issue that’s increasingly affecting all businesses throughout all sectors – 600 people a day are having to leave paid employment because their unpaid caring roles are becoming unreconcilable with the needs of their employer (even after the introduction of the Carers Leave Act). This means businesses are losing the talent and skills that they rely on, and so creating knock-on effects on wider productivity, growth, other jobs, etc in these businesses who aren’t otherwise directly owned or led by unpaid carers.

Now combine all of this with the fact that less than 10% of all unpaid carers are eligible to apply for Carer’s Allowance because of its current design: people who needed to previously be employed to pay bills, buy food, etc now can’t work and can’t otherwise seek financial support via this scheme that’s seen as the solution by many to this need. This means over 500 people every day will be being forced into self-employment to try and resolve this tension and crisis in their lives: which will force them into further hidden obscurity because unpaid carers legislation won’t then recognise them as it currently does (being salaried is one of the statuses that current legislation and policy recognises an unpaid carer as being able to also be).