Just a few months ago, a new UK law gave carers the right to take up to one week of unpaid carers leave. It’s a big change that means a great deal to an often-invisible community, while actually very small for you as an employer. But with a new government now likely, carers are calling for more: two weeks’ paid leave a year and the right to take up to six months of unpaid leave.
Why do they want more already? And why does it make such good sense for employers to support this?
Scale of carers in the workforce
A total of 3 million people combine caring for a loved one with paid work. That’s 1 in 9 of the workforce. Or 11 individuals, if you employ 100 people; 110 if you employ 1,000.
Sadly, 600 people give up paid work every day because they cannot combine it with caring. If you’re an employer with nine staff or more, and you want to retain the people you’ve got, understanding the needs of carers should be on your radar.
What the new law does – and doesn’t – deliver
The new Carers Leave Act means carers are legally entitled – for the first time – to take up to five days of unpaid leave for planned needs, that can be taken in half day blocks.
Another first is a formal legal definition of a carer: someone who is providing or arranging care for a dependent with a long-term care need, whether under the Equality Act, or because of old age, or mental or physical injury or an illness that is likely to require care for at least three weeks. And crucially, this does not need to be proved. The employer trusts the employee to self-identify as a carer.
At the Carers UK conference in May this year, a packed hall cheered as their champion Wendy Chamberlain MP spoke to the room. It was her private members bill that resulted in the new legislation.
And yet despite the cheers, and the preceding 20 years of campaigning and employer good practice that led to the new law, it’s not enough. The Carers UK manifesto calls for a statutory right to two weeks of paid leave a year; and the right to take longer unpaid leave for up to six months.
Better options than ‘all or nothing’
Becoming a carer can happen overnight, or it creeps up on you. But often the result is that it’s easier to resign your job, and concentrate on being a full time carer.
Taking a few more paid days off might be all someone needs to swing the balance back in favour of staying in work.
Research I was involved with some years ago at Working Families highlighted the case for unpaid leave too. Respondents – parents of disabled children – said that if only they had been able to take some time away from work, they would have been able to put arrangements in place to support their continued employment; or they would have had time to mentally and physically recharge. An ‘all or nothing’ choice means – in the end – nothing for the employer and nothing for the employee, who often inadvertently moves into long term unemployment.
Generous existing systems not abused
What might smooth the way for this extra support was the ringing endorsement from many employers who spoke at the conference.
BT has recently introduced ten days paid carer leave, and is already seeing an uptick in productivity, retention and attraction metrics. The biggest challenge they faced in making the case for paid leave had been the assumption that carers would take all ten days, despite there being no evidence for this when they reviewed any other form of leave they offered.
TSB Bank agreed. They offer 70 hours of paid carer leave a year, and the average take up is seven hours. Carer retention is greater than in their general population.
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) described how they have made flexible working integral to the programme of support they offer to carers. Engagement scores are beginning to increase.
These real-world examples demonstrate carers don’t abuse the support on offer. Two weeks paid leave is almost never used. But just the theoretical knowledge it’s there can lift a giant weight off carers’ shoulders.
What can employers do?
In my work with employers, I advise them to think about day-to-day support, and how to help in a crisis.
Day to day, use your flexible working policies with imagination and empathy, and find creative ways to support carers with their short and long term needs.
• Train managers to know what to say, how to say it, what your policies are and how to use them.
• Introduce a carer passport scheme, so your employee doesn’t have to explain their care needs to every new manager.
• Get your internal comms team thinking about flexibility and about carers, and how to promote your inclusive support.
In crisis, when existing care needs become acute, or when a loved one needs care because of an accident, a diagnosis of a long-term condition or end of life illness, managers should be ready to give some time out. Immediately, no questions – just go. And to fix a later time to talk.
• Later your employee and manager can together look at the range of paid and unpaid leave you can offer.
• It may help to consider a longer period of adjustment leave, reassuring the employee that you are holding their job open for their return, and that you will be open to considering part time or flexible hours if needed.
Back at the Carers UK conference, and talking over the lunch break to a senior manager who is also a carer, he voiced succinctly what I heard over and again from carers of all kinds: ‘you just get on with it’. Carers work hard, for you and when they are at home, and they deserve to know that you, their employer, has got their back.
The Carers UK Carer Confident scheme can help you develop and benchmark your carer employment practice.
First published in Personnel Today on 21 June 2024
