New legislation for unpaid carers

New legislation which came into on April 6th is a new legal right for people across the UK.

Employees who are unpaid carers for a person with long term care needs will be entitled to up to five days of unpaid leave a year.

Kerry Hudson personal injury and employment solicitor at Coventry and Warwickshire law firm Brindley Twist Tafft & James told Home Care Insight : “The law is designed to protect and assist employees with care responsibilities. The new right is effective from the first day of employment, so there is no minimum period an employee has to be in their job for to be get this entitlement.

“There is also flexibility depending on the need – for example, an employee can use a half day, full days or if needed use them all at once.”

Notice to the employer does however have to be given. Furthermore, the notice needs to be for twice as much time as the leave required – or at the employers’ discretion for shorter notice. Employers can postpone leave when certain conditions are considered.

Kerry continued: “I am sure there are many employees who have the worry of juggling jobs and the responsibility of caring for someone. The new legislation acknowledges that there is a need to help those employees.

“Importantly if an employee needs that leave, the legislation is designed to give them protection from being dismissed or suffering detriment simply because they have exercised that right.

“If an employee previously felt vulnerable asking for time to help someone for whom they had caring responsibilities, the introduction of this legislation hopefully gives them new comfort affording them new statutory rights and protection.”

How you can prepare:

1. Make caring visible in your workplace

Be aware that many workers don’t see themselves as carers and may therefore not come forward for support. Others may not think workplace support applies to them or feel uncomfortable about raising personal, sometimes emotionally difficult, issues at work. So, be explicit and talk about caring, and carers, in your workplace.

Be clear about what you mean by ‘caring’ and ‘carer’ – use a simple and inclusive definition of this in your workplace, for example like the one used by our business forum Employers for Carers:

Include caring, and carers, when talking about supporting staff with family responsibilities – as well as mentioning parents. Recognise that family responsibilities can include supporting older or disabled relatives or friends as well as covering childcare.

2. Talk about the support you offer

Identify any existing workplace support that may be particularly helpful for staff with caring responsibilities. For example, this could include flexible working and leave arrangements, a health and wellbeing scheme or staff support groups.

Talk about this support to managers and staff in your workplace, and how it may be relevant for anyone who may be caring. If you also offer any specific support such as carers leave, a carers passport or a staff carers network, highlight this too including why you offer this and how to take it up. This will help to prompt individuals to think about their own personal circumstances or those of colleagues in their team

3. Help carers to identify themselves

Carers are a changing population – each year millions of people take on caring responsibilities whilst caring comes to an end for millions of others. So, be aware that a one-off awareness campaign, though important, may not be enough.

Think about different ways of getting the right information to employees at the right time; people will often only take information about caring on board when it becomes relevant to them: For example, try using a range of different channels in your workplace to raise awareness and communicate support such as staff intranets, payslips, handbooks, all-staff bulletins and through internal social media platforms

Encourage individuals to identify as carers via a staff survey. This can help you to identify carers and it also demonstrates that you are keen to support your staff. As a first step, including a question about caring within a wider survey can help raise awareness and capture some initial information about carers in your workforce. This could then be followed by a specific survey on caring issues to ask about support needs

Educate your managers by including information about caring, and supporting carers, within your manager training and resources. It is often hard for individuals to talk about their caring responsibilities at work so encouraging managers to be approachable and open to having a conversation is important.

Action For Family Carers Carers Trust Carers UK are just some of the great organisations that you can reach out to for support in implementing new initiatives and to get further advice and ideas

Further Reading:

Care Act Q&A for Organisations

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