Young Carers' Workers

As carers, we all have a clear sense of the burden a caring role can place on us. How much heavier that burden must be for a child or adolescent trying to fulfil the needs – practical and emotional – of a parent who is physically or mentally disabled.

A national study carried out in 2004 (SCIE Research Briefing 24: Experiences of Children and Young  People Caring for a Parent) identified six million carers in the U.K., of whom 175,000 were under the age of eighteen. In approximately half of these situations the parent’s mental health problems were the reason for the young person’s care giving. The research was carried out with the help of the three hundred and fifty or so Young Carers projects throughout the U.K., but, as the researchers pointed out, this didn’t take into account the “hidden young carers” who do not, or cannot, involve themselves in such support groups. Sometimes, this is because their caring role is just too demanding of their time.

In November 2008, CiP made contact with fifteen Young Carers’ teams that are active in the West Midlands, and gathered managers and lead workers from each to a meeting at CEIMH. What we heard from them about their work vividly illustrated the pressing need for the sort of social and emotional support these teams give. Many offer one to one therapy for those children most under stress from their caring role, and all of them provide outings, activities, and opportunities for friendship and understanding as regular respite from stressful responsibility. What also became clear was the amount of fund raising teams have to do to keep their programmes running and the pressure on them and their resources from the large number of referrals they receive. The unmet needs are particularly heavy among the older adolescents, seventeen to twenty year olds. Research shows that these young adults take on  a more intensive caring role and yet they are the ones least likely to receive support as “young” carers mainly refers to  those up to the age of sixteen.

Following the work Carers in Partnership did last year, we have received a small commission from the Department of Health (WM) Social Care Team. CiP has been commissioned to update our mapping exercise and to facilitate a further event on 22nd March 2010, at which we hope to be able to showcase some teams' work with young carers, and discuss further networking opportunities. The ultimate purpose of this is to present a report to the Deputy Director for Social Care which will become the basis for discussion on future support for Young Carers' Services.

To read the report from last year's meeting click here