Combatting Carer Poverty Project

Building evidence, options and securing change for carers in poverty.

Caring for older, ill or disabled relatives, unpaid, is something that most of us will do in our lifetime - 2 in 3 of us according to research.[1] There are an estimated 5.7 million unpaid carers in the UK today.[2] However, people who provide unpaid care have greater risks of ending up in poverty.

Working together with carers, an External Advisory Group and other stakeholders, Carers UK and WPI Economics have produced a report on the up to date picture of carer poverty in the UK. We are grateful to the Abrdn Financial Fairness Trust for supporting this work.

Carer poverty and financial hardship in the UK report reveals the scale of poverty amongst unpaid carers in the UK as well as presenting the most effective solutions to lift carers out of poverty. The project found that:

• 1.2 million unpaid carers live in poverty, and 400,000 live in deep poverty in the UK.
• The poverty rate for unpaid carers was 50% higher than for those who did not provide care (27% vs 18%).
• Nearly 1 in 10 unpaid carers (9%) live in deep poverty in the UK.

An inability to participate in paid work, caring for long hours, and receiving income-related benefits are the strongest predictors of poverty amongst unpaid carers. Lack of support and access to social care services and

• The poverty rate is more than double for those providing more than 35 hours of care per week (43%), compared to people who are not unpaid carers (18%).
• Carers aged 25-44 have the highest rate of poverty of any other age group, at 38-39%.
• Two-thirds (67%) of unpaid carers who receive Universal Credit live in poverty – around 900,000 carers.

Modelling done as part of this research shows that the following measures would be cost effective in lifting many carers out of poverty:

• An increase of £36.30 for carers receiving Universal Credit would lift 110,000 people out of poverty and 140,000 out of deep poverty, at a cost of £1.8 billion per year.
• An increase of £36.30 to Carer Addition to Pension Credit could lift 20,000 older carers out of poverty at a cost of £300 million.
• An increase in the earnings limit for Carer’s Allowance to the equivalent of 21 hours at National Living Wage could lift 50,000 carers out of poverty, at a cost of £90 million per year.[1]

The report also found that Carer’s Allowance – the main carers’ benefit - needs a full review in order to increase the level of support to a sustainable level as well as re-assessing its eligibility criteria and processes to ensure it adequately supports unpaid carers in a variety of situations. While a range of increases to Carer’s Allowance were modelled, and some were very effective at lifting carers out of poverty, the design of the benefit means that these were very costly to implement.

Read the Executive Summary

Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland

This work has been running alongside Carers Northern Ireland’s Carer Poverty Commission. Separate mini reports have been produced for Wales and Scotland, allowing a devolved approach aimed at nation governments to combat carers’ poverty.

[1] carersrightsdaynov19final-2.pdf (carersuk.org)

[2] The most recent Census 2021 puts the estimated number of unpaid carers at 5 million in England and Wales. This, together with ONS Census data for Scotland and Northern Ireland, suggests that the number of unpaid carers across the UK is 5.7 million.

External Advisory Group

We are very grateful for members of the External Advisory Group for their advice and guidance on this research project.

Unpaid carers involved in the project

We also would like to thank the unpaid carers who have given up their time to engage and contribute to this project whether this is through participating in the External Advisory Group meeting, focus groups or interviews to help inform the research findings.