The party is running a campaign to increase the Carer’s Allowance by £1,000 a year:
During this terrible pandemic, our carers have been more important than ever. Yet carers are still often forgotten or ignored by those in power.
Back our campaign to stand up for carers – starting by raising the Carer’s Allowance by £1,000 a year 👇
Carers – paid and unpaid, young and old – do a remarkable and important job.
They deserve our support but are far too often forgotten and ignored. Liberal Democrats will stand up for carers and lead the way to a more caring society as we emerge from this pandemic.
This starts by raising Carer’s Allowance for unpaid carers by £1,000 a year.
You can back the party’s campaign to increase the Carer’s allowance to £1000 here.
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2 Comments
Sadly, £1000 per year (less than £20 per week) is a pathetically small amount. Carer’s Allowance is only paid (at £67.25 per week) to those who provide such care for a minimum of 35 hours per week. By anyone’s calculation, work of 35 hours a week is considered a full-time occupation. And Carers UK’s analysis is that at least a quarter of all such carers actually devote over 50 hours a week to their care work – many spend much more than 50 hours.
£67.25 per week works out at £1.92 per hour for those who work the required 35 hours in order to qualify; raising the total by £1000 per year (£19.23 per week) will raise this to a wage of £2.47 per hour. Compare this with the National Minimum Wage level! And often a carer’s work involved strenuous physical work as well as long hours.
The real (but still modest) target should be to ensure that Carers receive at least the National Minimum Wage for their work. The £1000 annual increase would be a helpful start, but should only be the start.
As well as being inadequate, Carers Allowance is only paid to about 25% of informal Carers because there are so many exclusions. Well done for highlighting the issue though