---

Carers

I beg to move,"That this House recognises the vital contribution that the UK’s six million carers make to society; welcomes recent announcements on carers including the Government review of the National Strategy for Carers, the New Deal for Carers and the Treasury report ‘Aiming high for disabled children: better support for families’ as steps towards an improvement in recognition and support for carers; notes that 54 per cent. of carers have given up work and one in five carers feel forced to do so; recognises the impacts which caring responsibilities have on family incomes, relative poverty and the health of carers themselves; is deeply concerned that an estimated 175,000 young people are carers of adults with the consequent pressures on them; calls on the Government to reduce the bureaucracy of social care provision that puts so much pressure on carers; and asks the Government to bring forward proposals for simplifying the benefit system in order to provide better support for carers and to ensure that the review of the National Strategy for Carers has both short term and long term objectives to enhance support for carers and to respond to the vital role played by carers in society." Today is the first day of carers week, the week when we as a country celebrate and recognise the extraordinary work of 6 million people who give up huge amounts of their time, energy and effort to look after disabled and older friends and relatives. Here is the problem: the social care budget, for which the Under-Secretary of State for Health, who is in his place, is responsible, is currently £19 billion, but Carers Week has estimated that if the amount of unpaid work done by those 6 million carers were costed, it would come to £57 billion. That means that if they stopped doing that work tomorrow and we wanted to continue with the same levels of care, we would have to quadruple the social care budget, just to stand still. It is not just a matter of the tax implications. There is a much more fundamental question of the type of society that we wish to be. Those of us on the Conservative Benches think that it is fundamentally right that wherever possible, the main caring role is undertaken by family and friends. That is what the carers want and what the cared-for person wants. The brutal truth is that because of demographic trends, the huge growth in the numbers of disabled children, and the rapidly ageing society, very soon 6 million carers will not be enough. If we want the number of carers to grow, we must be prepared to answer difficult questions about the role of the state and whether it enables and supports that caring role, or whether, as is all too often the case, it hinders and obstructs that role. This year’s carers week theme is ““My life as a carer””. When I read that, it reminded me of the first carer whom I met when I was a prospective parliamentary candidate. For my sins, I had agreed to be a refuse collector for the day in my prospective constituency. I had spent the morning getting mucky and dirty picking up bottles, cans and newspapers for recycling and generally thinking that it was remarkable that anyone could want to do that kind of job full time. Then I spoke to the driver of the refuse van that I was with, and he told me that 10 years ago his wife had had an accident in their garden and had become wheelchair-bound and unable to get up, get dressed, wash or cook. Although he had been able to carry on his work, his life outside work had been turned completely upside down. Rather touchingly, he said to me that he would not change her for the world. The question is whether we are doing enough to help and support people who are playing that kind of extraordinary role; Conservative Members believe that we are not.