We need to recognise the changes happening in families across the country as a result of us living longer. Many families have four or even five living generations. Older people are taking on increasing responsibility for providing both informal and formal childcare for grandchildren and caring for elderly relatives. This has considerable benefits for families and society and we need to support people to enable these arrangements to continue.
FACT 1: Over 65s account for around a third of all those carers providing more than 50 hours of care a week.1
FACT 2: The role grandparents play in informal childcare has been valued at £3.9 billion each year.2
FACT 3: Only 10 per cent of people over the age of 75 and only 35 per cent of those over the age of 65 are connected to the internet and have the skills to use it.3
In the Children and Young Persons Act 20084 we set out a range of measures intended to provide a more visible and strengthened framework for supporting extended families that take over the role of caring for children when the parents are not able to. In the Next Steps for Early Learning and Childcare5 paper in January 2009 we announced we would hold an event to look at ways of supporting grandparents. To build on this, from 2011 we will provide National Insurance credits towards the basic State Pension to grandparents who care for members of their family, aged 12 or under, for at least 20 hours a week, in recognition of the valuable contribution they make to society.
We will publish a Families and Relationships Green Paper in autumn this year, which will look at how we can better support families. It will consider the needs of all family members, including grandparents, and how best services can cater for their differing needs. One of the principal aims of the Green Paper is to look at how we can make all our services family friendly. The Paper will start from the premise that family friendly must not mean welcoming and accessible only to mothers and fathers, but to other members of the family too, especially grandparents who provide care for grandchildren.
We will hold a summit for grandparents in the autumn6 which will seek their views on a number of issues that affect them. These include exploring how families and childcare services can be adapted to better cater for them, highlighting ways in which they can shape these services as users, combining employment with care of their grandchildren and the effective channels to provide information to them.
We want to identify key issues for specific groups of grandparents, including those who take on full-time responsibility for their grandchildren and the grandparents of disabled children. We also want to explore the changing role of grandparents more widely and what more we can do to support them in maintaining strong relationships with their grandchildren after parental separation and divorce.
We will also talk to grandparents as part of the consultation on Building a Society for All Ages about the issues that specifically affect them.
Q4. What additional issues should we be seeking views on beyond those we have already highlighted for the grandparents summit?
A large proportion of people spend time in their later years providing care for family and friends which can affect their finances and well-being. In June 2008 we published a national carers' strategy7 that highlights the important care role provided through family members for all conditions, including dementia.
The strategy included establishing Carers Direct, a carers' information helpline and website.8 We have set up demonstrator sites to show how the NHS can better support carers, provide health and well-being checks for carers and how councils and the NHS can provide breaks from caring. The strategy also recognised carers as expert partners in care, and introduced a new training programme for carers, Caring with Confidence.9 Through a combination of face-to-face and distance learning it informs carers of their rights, the services available to them and provides information and training that will benefit the whole family. We will also be providing training for professionals who meet carers as part of their work so that they can better support them, including commissioning the Royal College of General Practitioners to pilot a training module for GPs.
We will continue to deliver on the vision of the 2008 carers’ strategy by considering the long-term options that it sets out. This includes looking at the structure of carers' benefits in the context of wider benefit reform. We will also explore building on the success of the Dignity Champions Network by working with them to help deliver the carers' strategy locally.
We announced in the New Opportunities White Paper10 our commitment to piloting a new entitlement of up to £500 for training available to people who have spent five or more years bringing up children or caring for dependents. This entitlement represents additional rights to learn for those who work hard and contribute in other ways to our community and will help to combat the disadvantage they face from extended periods of time out of the labour market.
Through Jobcentre Plus we will be introducing a range of new services specifically aimed at carers, including older carers, to enable them to be better able to combine paid employment with their caring role. Jobcentre Plus are currently recruiting Care Partnership Managers and using funding of £38 million to improve information on local carer support for staff and customers, break down the barriers that carers may face in returning to paid employment, and represent carers’ employment interests on a variety of partnerships. From December 2009, we will be extending voluntary access to training programmes to carers who are not in paid employment or who are employed for fewer than 16 hours a week. This will give people who receive Carer’s Allowance access to training opportunities comparable to those available to lone parents. We will also provide funding for replacement care whilst they attend these training programmes.
Q5. What support have you found helpful when you have been in a caring role for family members?
Digital technology can be extremely valuable in helping people to stay in regular contact with their families. However, the older someone is, the more likely they are to be digitally excluded. To improve access to digital technology for everyone we have announced our commitment to invest to ensure broadband access for all by 2012, with a commitment to a universal high-speed broadband network. We have just announced in the Digital Britain11 report that we will look at how and when the standard equipment provided by the Digital Switchover Help Scheme could include the capability to send messages over an internet connection, for example to access on-demand TV services. Digital Britain also set out our next steps in promoting internet use for people currently not online, among who older people are disproportionately represented.
We have taken a number of steps to improve access to and support in using digital technology for older people. We are piloting a national network of Digital Mentors to improve digital literacy levels. We are also working with UK Online to give help and advice, enabling people to access online benefits such as cheaper fuel tariffs, volunteering opportunities and virtual social networks. We announced the Champion for Digital Inclusion, Martha Lane Fox, the co-founder of lastminute.com, and a taskforce, which includes a dedicated taskforce member representing older people. This has been announced as Tom Wright, Chief Executive of Age Concern and Help the Aged. They will be responsible for challenging the public, private and third sector to work together to help disadvantaged people benefit from new technologies and increase the number of people who are using digital technology. We promoted the use of the free myguide service,12 which gives web novices the skills and confidence to use the internet safely and effectively. It is particularly popular and successful with older people, and guides them on how to use online public services, shop and save money online, keep in touch with family, and pursue their hobbies and interests. It is designed to be used by anyone anywhere, either independently by those with a little confidence or with the support of a family member, friend, carer, or any intermediary such as a UK Online, adult learning or community centre.
We will build on and complement existing work to address digital inclusion13 by running digital inclusion projects targeted at giving people in sheltered housing access to new technology. These will be developed from the wealth of good practice in public, third and private sector such as Digital Unite's14 work in sheltered housing (see the case study below), and BT Internet Rangers,15 which link school pupils to sheltered housing residents, to provide mentoring and support with technology. The projects will initially directly target 21,000 people but will build on this with an aim to reach the 600,000 people who live in sheltered housing, in the vicinity of sheltered housing schemes or other possible community hubs like village halls in rural areas. We aim for the projects to become sustainable in their third year by building the capacity and capability of the housing sector to offer this technology as an essential, communal residential service.
Digital Unite started developing digital literacy programmes for residents in sheltered housing six years ago and is working with expert partners such as Essential Role of Sheltered Housing. They bring sustainable IT learning programmes to older people in sheltered housing and working closely with residents, staff and the landlords. Emphasis is placed on creating projects that can leverage support from the wider community to sustain learning, and foster community ties. Evaluation evidence shows how much difference this approach can have to people's lives:
“When you said in the introduction session that after seven weeks I would be able to get on the internet, send email and do all this on my own, communicate with other people on the DU [Digital Unite] site etc, I was very sceptical. But you were right, and you have made such a difference to my life, I can hardly believe it. “My wife died two years ago, and everything had become an effort; my body ached, I was just depressed and lonely some of the time. Now, when I walk down to the shops, I don’t feel any aches and pains, 'cos I am just thinking of what I am going to do on the computer when I get back. Thank you so much; you have put back into my life the enthusiasm and interest that I always used to have for living.”
It is not only families that can benefit from the experience of older people. Employers and businesses can benefit from a more active and experienced older workforce and the wealth of the older population. To make the most of this, the world of work needs to change and business needs to seize the opportunities provided by older consumers.
