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26 Feb 2009 : Column 148WH—continued
This may have been my first experience of a Select Committee inquiry, but it was also my first experience of a Government response. What a mixed bag it is. However, it is worth recording that we heard yesterday, in debates on Report and Third Reading of the Saving
Gateway Accounts Bill, that the Government intend to make those in receipt of carer’s allowance eligible to open a saving gateway account—a small gesture of help to those carers who can meet the savings requirements, but a welcome one.
One of the key things required—the report brings this out extremely well—is a simplification of the benefits system as a whole, but particularly in relation to carers. The system is too complex, and it does not necessarily ensure that the money goes to the right place. Perhaps the Minister will say more about the plans to simplify benefits and the application process, and to provide a timetable for such simplification. In doing so, I hope that he will take the opportunity to clarify how services for carers and those for whom they care will be joined up more at national and local level.
The Minister and I are both members of the Public Bill Committee that is considering the Welfare Reform Bill, which has heard about the unintended consequences of delegating personal budgets. A gentleman decided to give his carer respite by buying him tickets to a football match—an action that was pilloried in the national press as a waste of money. There was much speculation as to whether people thought that the money was wasted because of the team that the carer supported or simply thought that it was not value for money. However, we all agreed that it was a perfect example of how money should be spent, and that it was a good way of joining up services, as it can give the sort of respite that carers need.
There is huge scope for taking the pressure off carers. I echo the points made by the hon. Member for Bradford, North on the question of information. I very much support those actions that can be taken now to increase access to information and advice for carers. It is not acceptable that the take-up of benefit is so bad that, according to Carers UK, £740 million goes unclaimed each year.
One recommendation that I particularly endorse is that the right to request flexible working should be extended to carers to enable them to manage career and caring. I do not know whether that would have helped my constituent, but it would take the pressure off many carers—pressure that can lead to health problems for them and feelings of guilt for those being cared for. The wife of my constituent summed it up when she said:
“I feel awful that my illness is the reason my husband cannot work.”
That is a telling point, showing that caring affects not only the carer but the person being cared for.
I note that Jobcentre Plus is examining the most effective ways of supporting carers to go into training. We need to know when the examination will stop and proposals will be made. That is particularly relevant today, as the National Audit Office has published its report, “Supporting Carers to Care”. It makes three relevant points. The first is that Jobcentre Plus services should not be regarded as being well suited to carers’ needs. That seems to be a comment made by Jobcentre Plus staff rather than those outside. The second point is that not all interested carers make use of Jobcentre Plus, and the third is that there are gaps in the Jobcentre Plus management information on support for carers. Those are some key, relevant points.
John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con): My hon. Friend is making a series of excellent points. Does he share my great disappointment in the Government’s reaction to the Committee’s proposal to give carers the right to request flexible working as soon as they start a job, instead of having to wait for 26 weeks? In their response, the Government said that they were opposed to introducing that right from day one, because the 26-week period is required to build a relationship of trust between employer and employee. Does he share my view that, after 26 weeks, if the carer is under pressure, and has had to leave work early, there will be no relationship of trust? In fact, the chances are that the carer will have found it impossible to last 26 weeks and, therefore, to get to the point at which they are eligible to request flexible working.
John Howell: My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. I agree that, given the sort of pressures that carers are under, which have been illustrated already, there is unlikely to be a relationship of trust after 26 weeks. In fact, there is likely to be a relationship of suspicion and uncertainty. I am disappointed, therefore, that flexible working will not be a right earlier.
The Coleman judgment set some serious challenges for the Government concerning the extent to which protection against discrimination will extend to carers. I would welcome clarification from the Minister on what action the Government will propose, and when, in order to deal with that problem.
3.1 pm
Mrs. Joan Humble (Blackpool, North and Fleetwood) (Lab): It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir John. As a member of the Select Committee, I should say that although the report might look like a mighty tome, it is very readable, and I recommend that any Member who has not read it do so, because it contains some useful information.
The evidence that we heard from many organisations and individuals proved hugely useful to us, but the report has also been useful to them. The Chairman of the Select Committee, in his opening speech, quite rightly set us a challenge. We here are the voice of carers, and the evidence in the report gives voice to their concerns. It is our responsibility to champion their needs, and the report provides a huge wealth of evidence to help the Government to respond to the challenge that we have set.
We started the report by defining who carers are, because much ignorance still surrounds that point. The majority of carers are women, but, as the statistics in the report show, over the age of 70 the majority are men. The men in this Chamber, therefore, should be looking to the future too. As they grow older, they, too, could become carers—I heard the Chairman’s remarks about his caring responsibilities.
Our report also makes the point that many do not see themselves as carers with a capital “C”—they are family, friends and neighbours, and are doing what they think is right, because of which they do not seek advice about available help. We need to remind them that no matter what their role or their hours of caring, they should find out what additional support is available. Our report itemises that support.
The report raises another important issue. Too few people understand the importance of the role of the Department for Work and Pensions with regard to carers. If asked, many members of the public and carers would talk about the need for support from health and social services, because they provide the help—either by coming directly into their homes or through respite care in hospitals, day centres and residential care—but for the majority of carers, if they have any dealings with a Department, it is likely to be the DWP, whether through benefits and pensions, support in obtaining employment, support when they are in work or through the carer’s allowance. The DWP plays a key role.
On page 19 in paragraph 37, the report outlines the strategic approach that the DWP should take to support carers. Some of our recommendations are fairly obvious, such as supporting adults and children financially—too many children take on caring responsibilities without telling anyone, because they do not want their school friends and other family members and friends to know. They, too, need support. However, one of the key recommendations concerning the role of the DWP is for a joined-up, cross-governmental approach.
The DWP needs to work with the Department of Health. I was pleased, therefore, that we received evidence not only from many organisations supporting or representing carers, but from the then disabilities Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Stirling (Mrs. McGuire), and the then social services Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Bury, South (Mr. Lewis). They understood the importance of working together and were very positive about the role that they should have across Departments. They were speaking at a time when the Government had only recently announced their cross-departmental carers strategy. Interestingly, that strategy did not include benefits, which is why the report is so key—it fills a gap in the strategy. Carers wanted to know how much money and what support they could get from the DWP, and we made recommendations concerning that.
I would like to pick up on some of the comments that our Chairman made about the importance of information, advice and guidance. We received evidence of how carers do not know who to go to—sometimes they go to point A without being told what point B can offer them. The report discusses the importance of a joined-up approach. We welcome the Government’s commitment to providing
“every carer with the opportunity to access comprehensive information when they need to”.
We asked when and how, and also commented on the information and services helpline for carers that the Department of Health has set up. However, there is still a gap. Saga’s submission recommended that the Government consider an equivalent to NHS Direct—a “Carers Direct”.
Our report mentions the importance of carers’ centres as a focus for care and advice. As our Chairman said, we have recommended that carers’ centres be put on a much firmer footing. The Government response said that that is the responsibility of local authorities and the agencies with which they work. Interestingly, the Local Government Association agrees with the Government’s response to our comments, which surprises me, because one problem for local authorities is that they are not in a position to offer ongoing funding to
carers’ centres. That support tends to be piecemeal and for one, two or three years at a time or for specific initiatives.
Furthermore, there are problems for carers’ centres that cover more than one local authority. The centre in Harrogate, for example, covers three local authorities and the same number of primary care trusts. It is extremely difficult to organise and bid for finance from several different bodies.
Mr. Rooney: Just to update my hon. Friend and other members of the Committee, I should say that since we visited the centre in Harrogate at the end of December, it has lost a third of its funding—that is how precarious the situation is.
Mrs. Humble: My Chairman makes an excellent point. When we visited Harrogate, we saw how enthusiastic the workers there were. Sadly, their enthusiasm was diminished by the amount of paperwork that they had to do; they were constantly putting in applications for funding to a variety of organisations instead of being out there helping the carers they were meant to help.
We really need to look at a national strategy to provide some underpinning, basic funding. Yes, carers’ centres can apply to different organisations and do fundraising, but if they do not know that there is ongoing, underpinning funding to enable them to continue their work, they will spend far too much time fundraising and too little doing the good work that they should be doing to support carers.
On advice and guidance, the Committee noticed that the Department of Health White Paper “Our health, our care, our say” talked about introducing an information prescription. That is useful, but, again, it illustrates the fact that different Departments are coming up with information themselves instead of looking at how all this information, advice and guidance can be collated to give a single focus to people who do not know where to go for information. I hope that the Minister will look carefully at our recommendations on information, advice and guidance, and at ways of simplifying the procedures so that carers can know where to go and can get the advice that they want from across Departments and local authority services.
In my constituency, we have a carers’ centre, which is part of the Princess Royal Trust network for carers. It serves Blackpool, as the unitary authority, and one primary care trust. That makes life a lot easier for the centre, but, even so, I meet people who still do not know that we have our own carers’ centre.
The Committee also looked carefully at the design of carers’ benefits, but, sadly, we found them wanting. Carers and those they care for can access an array of benefits, including disability living allowance, incapacity benefit, carer’s allowance, housing benefit and attendance allowance. Despite that, we received a lot of evidence showing that many carers find it difficult to cope, given the benefit to which they are entitled.
The Government did not accept that point in their response, but they accepted that we need to look at how carers’ benefits are framed. They said that the
“system of support for carers should be able to differentiate between the support that a carer needs because they have no income, and the support that a carer needs because of other costs relating to the caring responsibilities.”
The Committee’s key recommendation on carer’s allowance was that we should differentiate between carer support allowance, which we said should be paid at the same rate as jobseeker’s allowance, and the caring costs payment for carers who have special and intensive caring responsibilities.
I welcome many aspects of the Government’s response, but saying that we should not address the reform of carer’s allowance piecemeal does not properly recognise how carer’s allowance stands outside the array of other benefits. The Government could and should look at carer’s allowance before they come up with a comprehensive strategy for a single working-age benefit. As our Chairman said, we could be waiting for years for a single working-age benefit, and carers cannot afford to wait years. Some things can be done now.
Harry Cohen (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab): My hon. Friend is making some very good points, and the distinction that she has brought out is important, as is the detail, but may I take her back to the part of the Government’s response, which she mentioned? Before acknowledging that there needed to be a distinction between carers’ different needs and circumstances, it said that the DWP did not accept that the general support provided to help with caring was inadequate. Basically, therefore, the Government’s position is that support for carers is not inadequate. Is that not contrary to all sorts of information that we received when we did our report and that has come up in this debate?
Does my hon. Friend agree that the general support for carers is inadequate and that the Government have a blind spot in that regard?
Mrs. Humble: My Select Committee colleague makes a good point. We had a wealth of evidence about financial pressures—I use the words “wealth” and “financial pressures” in the same sentence, but they would not be part of the same sentence for carers; indeed, carers told us that they struggled.
One problem for the Committee and, indeed, the Government is that Ministers have not really made up their mind what carer’s allowance is supposed to be. If they accepted our recommendation and linked carer’s allowance to jobseeker’s allowance—in the carer support allowance that we recommend—that would bring in various of the rules and restrictions that apply to jobseeker’s allowance. The Government do not see carer’s allowance as an income-replacement benefit, so there are all the rules about the number of hours that individuals need to care for someone and the amount that they can get from work. There is a contradiction there, because if someone is caring for 35 hours a week, there are few hours left for them to go out and work.
We have to go back to first principles. What is carer’s allowance for? Is it an income-replacement benefit for somebody who spends most of their time at home looking after one or more individuals? If so, it should be increased and our recommendation should be accepted. If our recommendation was accepted, it would have consequences for earning rules and all the other complexities attached to the existing carer’s allowance. It would also affect the 21-hour rule for education, which the Committee mentioned. Do the Government want the imposition of
that rule to disadvantage young carers in particular, who want to go into education and training and then into the workplace? The rule is there because of other elements in the benefits system.
We need to be clear why we are paying carers the money, but we are not, so we are not moving ahead. Again, the Government could look at the issue separately from their overall review of the benefits system; it could be a discrete part of the DWP’s examination of benefits simplification.
Mr. Heald: I follow the hon. Lady’s logic. Does she agree that the Government are teasing carers? On the one hand they say, “We will look at your position in the context of a single working-age benefit and you may get an income replacement benefit from us.” On the other, they say, “Oh no, we do not think that an income replacement benefit is right for carers.” Are the Government not trailing their coat for sympathy from the carers without actually doing anything?
Mrs. Humble: That point is recognition of how difficult the problems are. When the Government announced last year’s carers’ strategy, which was a good document that included extra money for carers, they did not mention benefits because that is a complex issue. We have been muddling along with the same benefits system for a long time. Do the Government want to do something radical? Do carers want us to do something radical? Carers are happy with the existing system so there is a challenge for us all, including carers and their representatives, to look at how the system can be improved.
As a distinguished member of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for North-East Hertfordshire (Mr. Heald) is aware that we had a lot of evidence to support our recommendation of a two-tier benefit. We certainly had a lot of evidence to support increasing the benefit because of the financial pressures on carers.
I will say a few words about carers who work. When we talk about carers, the assumption is that most carers stay at home and look after the cared-for person. In fact, many carers are in work. The Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers provided some good evidence on the experiences of its members. The £95 a week limit causes problems because Jobcentre Plus regularly contacts the union’s members whose wages are approaching £95 to ensure that they have not reached that level. Its members have to submit proof of their earnings. If their wages increase, perhaps after being on the minimum wage, they may lose their carer’s allowance. There are different earnings rules for carers claiming carer’s allowance and those claiming other means-tested benefits, which causes confusion. There are also obstacles to carers engaging in voluntary work.
The hon. Member for Henley (John Howell) mentioned the responsiveness of Jobcentre Plus staff. Those staff have a difficult job. We expect them to know about and be sympathetic to everything about every individual who goes to see them. It is not always easy to recognise that somebody is a carer, especially if the person does not say, “I am a carer.” We know that people do not always say that.
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