To think Carer's Allowance is a fucking disgrace?

[BoobsOnTheMoon]

Not only is it an absolute pittance of £76 a week considering you need to be providing care to a disabled person for at least 35 hours a week to claim it in the first place.

BUT you also can't claim if you earn more than £139 a week.

AND if you claim low income benefits (ie UC), the Carer's Allowance is counted as income and taken off your entitlement £ for £.

It's just so insulting. People giving up their lives and careers to care for a disabled family member deserve better than this.

(Just feeling a bit down about the fact I will probably be poor until I die, even if my disabled child manages to leave home one day I'll be at least 50 by then with no prospects for earning decent money or building any sort of security for my own old age)

I agree that perhaps there should be different levels. But no-one is obliged to give care to another adult, so "provide no more care to a loved one" is a tough one to quantify. I organise my autistic DD's (26) life, in terms of all planning, admin, washing, ordering clothes, medical stuff etc. This allows her to work over 30 hours a week, so is financially independent. She couldn't live alone, so her living with me also saves the government, in terms of a residential setting. Altogether our set up is saving the country a lot more than £79 a week. But unless you understand the care needs of some autistic people (even though they work) and the costs if I wasn't able to live with her etc, then you'd probably think that I wasn't entitled because "you'd just do that anyway for your DD". The carer status stops the DWP from forcing people into work/training etc.

It's disgusting. Unpaid carers save the country millions.

I agree it should be a greater amount, staggered, not counted as income, and not affected by pension or other benefits.
I receive carer's allowance as my DD is autistic. I don't work: it would be difficult because she keeps needing to be picked up from school when she has a panic attack, and goes to lots of appointments. But overall my life is a lot less hard than many who provide full time care for very disabled family members and are in poverty. Such carers deserve far more.

I worked in welfare rights, left in 2011. We were campaigning for that to be abolished then. The original white paper on UC wanted to be able to force carers to have the same responsibilities as those unemployed. It showed what the Tory party thought of carers.
For those saying "they only give a couple of hours a day" Do they go to hospital appointments etc? Again with the NHS in the mess it is, just managing medical appointments, then them getting cancelled etc, takes up days of your time, preventing work/classes/hobbies etc. I've sat for hours, some weeks, just getting my DD GP appointments.

Not forgetting too that although your NI contributions are paid you have no chance of paying into a workplace pension so your stuffed when you reach retirement age too. 22 years as a carer has massively hit my pension opportunities.

I don’t understand how low the limit on earnings is. I claim carers for DS age 7 and think I should be able to work during the time he’s at school as he’s not needing care from me during those hours, but I can only work 1-2 days per week. Especially in the current COL crisis it would be good to be able to pick up one extra shift a week whilst he’s at school, but I have to balance that against losing carers allowance so I’m stuck.

I understand why there needs to be a cut-off point but it’s ridiculously low.

You have to receive the correct level of pip in the correct category- I don’t (I’m a wheelchair user, added to which I have M.E, Fibromyalgia, POTS and JHS)- I don’t get any care component or any moving around/mobility component in my pip (so no one can get carers allowance for me)

My mum is on DLA on all the highest rates- we get carers allowance for her.

My son is on a mix of middle and higher dla- we could get carers allowance for him except you can’t claim it for more than one person.

My dad can’t claim carers allowance at all because he has his state pension.

My wife can’t claim carers allowance because she works full time (so that we don’t all starve…).

So- 2 lots of dla, one lot of PIP and one lot of carers allowance. It is not as simple as ‘anyone who has a relative on pip can claim carers allowance’.

My mum used to get carers allowance for looking after my brother but as soon as she got her pension they took it off her.

I’m confused about the carers allowance not being available to you.

My ex gets about £100 a month carers allowance for an aged aunt. He doesn’t do any physical care but has power of attorney. He lives about £200 miles away. He also has a very good pension.

Does the allowance vary by area? I was surprised he was eligible for it.

The government would provide the absolute bare minimum (if that) in many cases. So it's barely a choice if you want your loved one to be safe and comfortable, rather than alone in shitty incontinence pants for much of the day.

It’s disgraceful if it wasn’t for myself and husband running our own business we would be absolutely fucked! Two sen children with extremely high needs and the constantly collecting from nursery id never ever be able to be employed! It’s soo bad!

It's a joke!
I had to give up work to care for my 18 year old as there's no kind of childcare for someone that old.
If the government insists carers allowance is classed as an income then why arnt they paying it at the minimum wage rate 🤷‍♀️

It’s a very handy way of keeping women - the main caregivers - poor.

I think carers allowance should not be means tested, or that the means should be much, much higher. People are literally saving the local authority that money by caring for their relatives instead of shipping them out somewhere, they are giving up their free time (and hopes and dreams) to care for someone. The VERY LEAST the government should do is pay them fairly for it.

But then again, I think all caring and healthcare roles should be significantly better paid, it's the most important job in society and it's disgraceful that at every level the people doing it are massively undervalued and downtrodden and their compassion is taken advantage of. It says a lot about our society that we don't value one of our most fundamental functions as human beings.

That's true. No incontinence pads to worry about here, but I don't really feel like it's a real choice. It's what is best for the person I care for, which is why I do it.

Does your mum get Attendance Allowance? That should help with some of the costs.

It's always been a disgrace. Pensioners can't get it at all because it's an overlapping benefit with their pension.

If carers put their "cared for" into care homes, the cost would bankrupt the country.

They need to be paid a fair amount.

Care isn’t free either. The council will charge. I don’t know the scale but you have to contribute towards the costs. I think it is awful. It’s not the person’s fault they have an illness or disability but the financial impact on them and the family is just shocking. They lose money throughout their working life because of it and then get penalised when they need support. And I agree Carer’s Allowance is a pittance.

What did people do before disability benefits were a thing? Seems like they’ve only been around 30 years or so.

Back then it was far more common to have a parent (mother generally) in the home or working part-time. So people either did it harder financially or added to the caring burden of (primarily) women.

Carers Allowance is £79 per week - you can't get £100 per month. It's paid based on income (it mustn't be over a certain amount), and not getting any other "overlapping" benefit.

You need to be giving 35 hours a week physical or emotional care.

Not sure what your uncle is getting.

The system is so outdated it’s scary.

i had to give up a job to become DS carer because his needs just weren’t conducive with working. I have recently been able to return to work as a dinner lady which fits ok around his needs generally. I want to look to work a few more hours (full time wouldn’t be achievable at all) but realistically I would be working more to lose the carers so financially there would be no benefit. £139 a week is a pittance to be allowed to earn.

Sorry - "ex" not "uncle".

Yes she does 'fortunately'. (I say 'fortunately' because the reason she's in a wheelchair is because of a total f**k-up by the hospital - just so desperately sad)
But I just feel sorry for Dad that he gets no financial help either.

'The benefit was established by the Social Security Contributions and Benefits Act 1992, integrating the former benefits Mobility Allowance and Attendance Allowance and introducing two additional lower rates of benefit."