House of Commons
Friday 6 February 2004
The House met at half-past Nine o'clock
PRAYERS
The Chairman of Ways and Means took the Chair as Deputy Speaker, pursuant to the Standing Order.
[Sir Alan Haselhurst in the Chair]
Orders of the Day
Carers (Equal Opportunities) Bill
Order for Second Reading read.
9.33 am
Dr. Hywel Francis (Aberavon) (Lab): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
I am proud and privileged to present to the House my Carers (Equal Opportunities) Bill. In doing so, I believe, as everyone does in the House, that the personal is the political. At the outset, I should record my appreciation of the great cross-party support that I have received, as represented by my excellent Bill team, and the enormous support outside the House, in particular from Carers UK and Carers Wales, which have been a constant source of encouragement and professional guidance, representing as they do the voice of 6 million carers in this country.
Over the past two months, I have benefited from discussions with the Under-Secretary of State for Health, my hon. Friend the Member for South Thanet (Dr. Ladyman), the carers Minister, and his officials. I know he has some issues and concerns, and I look forward to his response today. I have also benefited from encouraging support from Jane Hutt, the Welsh Assembly Minister for Health and Social Services, and her officials.
On 25 June 2001, in giving my maiden speech, I spoke of a journey of hope, from social exclusion to social justice, for people with disabilities and their carers. I made a pledge in that speech to work on their behalf. I begin on that personal note because my wife and I were carers for over 16 years of our son, Sam, who had Down's syndrome and who died nearly seven years ago. In common with millions of carers, the experience profoundly changed our lives.
The day after the private Members' Bill ballot was 5 December—national carers' rights day. On that day, I met a group of young parents of children with disabilities, through the Neath Port Talbot carers enablers project. I saw in their faces and heard in their voices the same mixture of anxiety and hope that Mair and I experienced nearly 24 years ago. Those parents are beginning a journey of hope. We need to give them the resources of hope to sustain them on their journey.
That moment with those young carers confirmed for me what we had felt for a very long time, and I am sure that many in the House today share this feeling: carers need a life beyond their caring responsibilities. That is what the Bill seeks to achieve.
Carers UK defines carers as those in society who look after family, partners or friends in need of help because they are ill, frail or have a disability. The care they provide is unpaid. That is the definition for the purposes of the Bill. There are 6 million carers in the UK, amounting to 12 per cent. of the population. Heavy-end carers—those providing more than 50 hours of care per week—have increased in number to 1.25 million. My own local authority area, Neath Port Talbot, has 22,000 carers. They account for the highest proportion of carers in any local authority area in the UK. Similarly, Neath Port Talbot has proportionately the greatest number of heavy-end carers in the country. In part, that is a legacy of the heavy industries in my locality.
I believe that a society is defined by the way it cares for its carers. I believe, too, that the labour of love provided by carers defines that society. Today, we are acknowledging that carers should have equality of opportunity to have a decent life in our society. We are building on the firm foundations provided by many national and local carers' organisations as well as recent legislation supported by many parties and successive Conservative and Labour Governments.
My Bill is not an exercise in a top-down central Government approach. It has grown from previous enabling legislation and the hopes and aspirations of carers, carers' organisations and statutory bodies, particularly in health and education. This growing tide from below—from outside Parliament—was summed up for me in an e-mail I received this week. I shall quote a substantial part of it:
- "I very much support this Bill.
I am a carer of my son who was diagnosed with a mental illness and has been in hospital care for over 5 years. From the start of that period I have had great difficulty in getting information from the statutory services or any consideration of my needs as a carer in support of my son. In helping my father-in-law to care for his wife who suffers from dementia, it is my experience that the needs of the carer within social services are only considered as they directly affect the care of the user of the service . . . The cost of this legislation, if any, will be more than offset by the benefits to the people accessing services. I am also a member of the Board of Directors of a Primary Care Trust and I know that within my own Primary Care Trust there is support for the needs of carers and the PCT would support the aims of this Bill and Clause 5 in particular. Our Board also includes a member of the local district council who also supports the needs of carers. I hope you are successful in getting past the Second Reading and beyond."
Ms Debra Shipley (Stourbridge) (Lab): In my constituency, the Government have made money available for various matters related to carers. Unfortunately, the money for the last couple of years has been used mainly for researching projects. Carers have told me that they are concerned that that money
may be freed up within the council for it to spend as it wants and will not necessarily be targeted directly at carers, who obviously need it. Does my hon. Friend support my calls for any money for carers to go specifically to carers, rather than being dissipated across the council?
Dr. Francis: My hon. Friend makes an important point, and I support her on it.
The roll of honour of local carers' groups in my constituency includes the epilepsy support group, the autistic spectrum disorder support group, Crossroads, the council for voluntary service, with its enablers project and parents and carers forum, Age Concern, the cancer carers group, the Down's Syndrome Association, and SNAC—the special needs activity centre. SNAC plays a special role for local young carers in providing play, recreational and educational support services for all children and young people with special needs and their families. In many ways, its work captures in microcosm what this Bill seeks to achieve across the whole of England and Wales.
I now turn to the purpose of my Bill and the principles that underpin it. For the first time, it looks beyond the specific needs of carers as carers, and asks how we ensure that the health and well-being of carers is enhanced by securing equal opportunities for them beyond their caring responsibilities?
For me, the Bill seeks to tackle three problems. The first is the lack of opportunities that carers may have because of their caring responsibilities. The second is the lack of information that carers have about their rights. The third is the lack of focus on their health and well-being.
Linda Perham (Ilford, North) (Lab): In relation to what my hon. Friend said about availability of information, the Redbridge carers support service has written to me to say that it has contact with nearly 800 people in my constituency who are missing out on benefits, services and other support because they have not had the information. I know that there is existing guidance under previous legislation, but I hope that the Bill will improve on that so that information is available for carers.
Dr. Francis: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The Bill addresses that question centrally.
The three problems that I have mentioned are simple but vital matters which, if overcome, would make such a difference to so many carers. Most of the change is about attitude and culture. It is about valuing carers and their role, not hiding them away, pretending that they do not exist, or feeling that because they are caring away we do not need to worry about their health or their well-being.
Before I start to go through the clauses, I want to set out the position that carers' rights have reached today, and pay tribute to the many Members of the House and Members of the other place, from all political parties, who have furthered carers' rights. First, there was the Carers (Recognition and Services) Act 1995, another private Member's Bill, which was promoted by the
Minister for Pensions, my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, North (Malcolm Wicks). That Act established for the first time in law the principle that a carer could request an assessment of their ability to care. It gave all carers that right, irrespective of age—whether a young carer aged 11 caring for a parent with mental illness, the parent of a child with severe disabilities, or a woman looking after her elderly parents. The Bill went through with Conservative Government support.The second important piece of legislation was the Carers and Disabled Children Act 2000. With Labour Government support, it was guided through the House by the former Member for Stalybridge and Hyde, now Lord Pendry. It established the right for a carer to request an assessment of their ability to care even if the disabled person refused an assessment. It also gave local authorities the power to provide services to the carer, as long as they were not intimate services for the disabled person.
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