Since Carers UK was first established 59 years ago, securing rights and equality for carers has been at the heart of what we do. Carers' voices and experiences shape and evidence our campaigns, and once new rights have been gained for carers, we work with a range of partners to ensure the best delivery of those rights in practice to ensure they become a reality.
While there are robust social care rights frameworks for unpaid carers across the UK through the Care Act 2014 and similar legislation in other UK nations, the underfunding of adult social care means that these rights are too often not delivered in reality.
Carers urgently need new rights and legal protections. These include a right to a meaningful break, greater rights when interacting with the NHS, and carers’ benefits need to be significantly improved. Rights in the workplace need to continue to evolve and improve building on the important steps recently secured through the Carer’s Leave Act 2023, starting with paid Carer’s Leave.
The Human Rights Act 1998 has been an important framework for considering the right to family life. However, carers continue to face many inequalities and are not yet fully recognised as a protected characteristic under the Equality Act.
I have mental health difficulties of my own that need treatment and support but due to my caring responsibilities I don’t have the time or energy to get the support I need, so I am getting worse.”
The next Government must:
- Amend the Equality Act 2010 and Section 75 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998 to include caring as the 10th protected characteristic.
- Ensure that carers existing rights under the Care Act 2014 are always fulfilled by Local Authorities.
- Provide all unpaid carers with a statutory right to a break from their caring responsibilities.
- Legislate to place a new statutory duty on the NHS to have regard to carers and support their wellbeing, to ensure systematic identification of carers in all NHS settings.
- Give all carers in employment the statutory right to take two weeks of paid Carer’s Leave, building on the right to unpaid Carer’s Leave recently secured through the Carer’s Leave Act 2023.
- Enhance carers’ rights to work flexibly, building on the new rights recently secured through the Employment Relations (Flexible Working) Act 2023.
Find out more
For more information, please see our State of Caring 2022 report.
