Unpaid carers - Unseen and undervalued

[megilleland]

Unpaid carers save UK state £530 million every day of the pandemic

With every day of the COVID-19 pandemic that passes, unpaid carers are saving the UK state £530 million in the care they provide, new research by charity Carers UK shows.

The research, released for Carers Rights Day, estimates that the care provided by people looking after older, disabled and seriously ill relatives and friends during the pandemic stands at £135 billion so far, after just eight months.

Previous research by the charity found that the majority (81%) of carers have been taking on more care since the start of the pandemic and nearly two thirds (63%) are worried about how they will continue to manage over winter.

Carers UK is calling on the Government to provide additional support for carers over winter and ensure those caring for more than 50 hours a week get access to a funded break.

With many crucial face-to-face support services such as day centres and support groups significantly reduced – or in many cases closed – because of costly infection and control measures, Carers UK is warning that people caring round the clock are going to break down after months of caring without respite.

and

Carer’s Allowance is the lowest benefit of its kind at £66.15 per week. We want to see Carer’s Allowance significantly increased for all carers in the UK.

Find out more
You can read more about the challenges faced by carers during the coronavirus outbreak in our report, Caring behind closed doors: six months on (October 2020), here.

Back in April 2020, at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, we also released our original, Caring behind closed doors (April 2020), which you can read here.

You can find information and advice about caring during the coronavirus outbreak here.

[megilleland]

Development of a future new care facility in Herefordshire

Agenda Cabinet - Thursday 28 October 2021 2.30pm

Item 7 - Appendix 1

Looking for an option for the development of a new care facility in Herefordshire for meeting future demand and service delivery.

Aim
1.4 It is intended that the options appraisal will enable the Council to adopt a preferred approach to delivering 80 new care home beds to provide high quality local care to meet gaps in future need. It is then proposed that the preferred approach would be developed more fully, so that it could then be implemented.
 
Objectives:
* Increased bed capacity in the market, including provision to meet complex needs
* The Council controls access to the care home beds
* Sustained provision of high quality care
* Reduction in out of county placements
* Forecastable and manageable unit costs and improved value for money for placements
* A reasonable return on capital investment over an appropriate time frame
* Established as an exemplar for the use of innovative technology
* Environmentally friendly to Herefordshire’s Future Homes Standard
* Make good use of proven and available models of design and delivery
* Residents are connected to local communities routinely through the new facilities

Regarding innovative technology hope they don't use these robots to replace the health care workers:

[Victor Wright]

Thanks for the info