The comments made by Keir Starmer, the Leader of the Opposition, on 13 March 2021.
The scenes in Clapham this evening are deeply disturbing. Women came together to mourn Sarah Everard – they should have been able to do so peacefully.
I share their anger and upset at how this has been handled. This was not the way to police this protest.
The comments made by Toby Perkins, the Labour MP for Chesterfield, on 13 March 2021.
The scenes in London are appalling.
Police face very difficult job but they’ve got it hopelessly wrong.
This was a peaceful vigil and given the circumstances should have been policed far most sensitively.
This moment was about violence against women and that mustn’t be lost.
The comments made by Caroline Nokes, the Conservative MP for Romsey and Southampton North, on 13 March 2021.
Truly shocked at the scenes from Clapham Common – in this country we police by consent – not by trampling the tributes to a woman who was murdered and dragging other women to the ground. Badly misjudged by the Metropolitan Police.
The comments made by Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, on 13 March 2021.
The scenes from Clapham Common are unacceptable. The police have a responsibility to enforce Covid laws but from images I’ve seen it’s clear the response was at times neither appropriate nor proportionate. I’m contact with the Commissioner & urgently seeking an explanation.
The comments made by Angela Rayner, the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, on 13 March 2021.
Tonight I will light a candle for Sarah Everard. My thoughts are with her loved ones and all the women and girls who have been attacked, harassed and even killed.
Solidarity with all the women making their voices heard, sharing their stories and fighting for justice and change.
The statement made by Nicola Sturgeon, the Scottish First Minister, on 3 March 2021.
The spotlight shone on historic workplace harassment in late 2017 was long overdue.
It was right at that time for my government to review its processes, consider any weaknesses and gaps in them, and put in place a Procedure that would allow complaints, including those of a historic nature, to be investigated.
When complaints were made about Alex Salmond it was also right that the government took them seriously and subjected them to investigation.
An individual’s profile, status or connections should not result in complaints of this nature being ignored or swept under the carpet.
That in this case it was a former First Minister does not change that.
The Procedure that was adopted in late 2017, in the wake of the MeToo concerns, was drafted by civil servants, largely independently of me.
However, I was kept abreast of its development and I signed it off.
As a result of a mistake that was made, a very serious mistake, in the investigation of the complaints against Alex Salmond, two women were failed and taxpayers’ money was lost.
I deeply regret that.
Although I was not aware of the error at the time, I am the head of the Scottish Government, and so I want to take the opportunity to say sorry to the two women involved and to the wider public.
I also accept – without reservation – that my actions deserve to be scrutinised.
Two years ago, I volunteered for such scrutiny by referring matters relating to my contact with Alex Salmond to the Independent Adviser on the Ministerial Code, Mr James Hamilton.
Mr Hamilton is conducting an independent investigation and I await his findings.
His investigation is not being conducted in public – though of course his conclusions will be published.
As a result of that, he is able to hear and consider material that, because of a contempt of court order, this committee cannot – including, as I understand it, from people who were actually party to discussions that others, who were not, are seeking to attest to.
Mr Hamilton has offered no commentary on his investigation and nor will I.
However, this committee – and the public – are entitled to hear from me directly on the matters under consideration.
So today, I will do my best to answer every question asked of me directly and in as much as detail as I can.
Firstly, on the 8 January 2019 I volunteered to Parliament my contact with Alex Salmond. I stated as follows:
‘On 2 April [2018], he informed me about the complaints against him…’
I will explain why I stand by that statement.
Second, I will set out why I did not immediately record the April 2 meeting within the Scottish Government – a decision based entirely on my desire to protect the independence and the confidentiality of the process.
Thirdly, I will outline why I believe it was right that I did not intervene in the investigation when I became aware of it, even though Alex Salmond asked me to do so.
And, finally, although the mistake made in the conduct of the investigation meant, ultimately, that the action for Judicial Review could not be defended, I will demonstrate that the decisions taken at each stage of it were legally sound.
I am sure we will return to all of these matters in detail.
However, I want to focus, in these opening remarks, on the issues around my contact with Alex Salmond on 2 April – and my contact 3 days earlier with his former Chief of Staff.
Alex has claimed in his testimony to the Committee that the meeting in my home on the 2 April took place with a shared understanding, on the part of all the participants, of the issues for discussion.
In other words, that he turned up to the meeting believing I already knew everything.
In fact, this represents a change in his position.
On 14 January 2019, after the conclusion of the Judicial Review, a spokesperson issued this comment on his behalf –
‘Alex has no certainty as to the state of knowledge of the first minister before then’ – by which he meant 2 April.
A brief account of what happened on 2 April suggests – as per his comment in January 2019 – that he did not assume full knowledge on my part in advance.
When he arrived at my house he was insistent that he speak to me entirely privately – away from his former Chief of Staff, Geoff Aberdein and another former colleague, Duncan Hamilton, who had accompanied him, and my Chief of Staff who was with me.
That would hardly have been necessary had there already been a shared understanding on the part of all of us.
He then asked me to read a letter he had received from the Permanent Secretary.
This letter set out the fact that complaints of sexual harassment had been made against him by two individuals, made clear that these complaints were being investigated under the Procedure adopted at the end of 2017, and set out the details of what he was alleged to have done.
Reading this letter is a moment in my life I will never forget.
And although he denied the allegations, he gave me his account of one of the incidents complained of, which he said he had apologised for at the time.
What he described constituted, in my view, deeply inappropriate behaviour on his part – another reason why that moment is embedded so strongly in my mind.
At the time he was showing me the letter and outlining his account, Geoff and Duncan were doing the same with my Chief of Staff.
Again, this would seem unnecessary had she and I known everything in advance.
Questions have been raised about a conversation I had three days earlier – on 29 March 2018 – with Geoff Aberdein and another individual.
I have not seen Mr Aberdein’s account of that conversation.
However, I know the account Mr Salmond has given of the meeting – though he also said on Friday that he had not been given a read-out of it.
Let me say upfront that I have no wish to question the sincerity of Geoff’s recollection, but it is clear that my recollection is different and that I did not and do not attach the same significance to the discussion that he has.
The purpose of the conversation seemed to be to persuade me to meet with Alex as soon as possible – which I agreed to do.
Geoff indicated that a harassment-type issue had arisen, but my recollection is that he did so in general terms. Since an approach from Sky News in November 2017, I had harboured a lingering suspicion that such issues in relation to Mr Salmond might rear their head – so hearing of a potential issue would not have been, in itself, a massive shock.
What I recall most strongly about the conversation is how worried Geoff seemed to be about Alex’ welfare and state of mind – which, as a friend, concerned me.
He also said he thought Alex might be considering resigning his party membership.
It was these factors that led me to meet him, and it was these factors that placed the meeting on 2 April firmly in the personal and party space.
Not unreasonably, some people have asked how I could have forgotten the conversation on 29 March. I certainly wish my memory of it was more vivid.
But as I have stated, it was the detail of the complaints under the Procedure that I was given on 2 April that was significant and shocking.
That was the moment at which any suspicions I had or general awareness that there was a problem became actual knowledge.
It is also worth saying that even if I had known on 29 March everything I learned on 2 April, my actions wouldn’t necessarily have been any different.
Given what I was told about the distress Alex was in and how it was suggested to me he might be intending to handle matters, it is likely that I would still have agreed to meet him – as a friend and as his party leader.
And, as I set out in written evidence, my decision not to record the meeting on 2 April wasn’t about the classification I gave it – it was because I did not want to compromise the independence or the confidentiality of the process that was underway.
All of which begs the question of why I would have gone to great lengths to conceal a conversation that had taken place a mere 3 days earlier.
Let me turn now to my decision not to immediately report the contact.
Sections 4.22 and 4.23 of the Ministerial Code seek to guard against undisclosed outside influence on decisions that Ministers are involved in and likely to have an influence on, such as changes in policy or the awarding of contracts.
This situation was the opposite of that.
The terms of the Procedure excluded me from any investigation into a former minister. I had no role in the process and should not have known that an investigation was underway.
So, in my judgment, the undue influence that section 4 is designed to avoid would have been more likely to arise had those conducting the investigation been informed that I knew about it.
I didn’t want to take the risk that they might be influenced, even subconsciously, by any assumption of how I might want the matter handled.
Their ability to do the job independently would be best protected by me saying nothing.
It is also my reading of the Code that had I reported it, the fact of my meeting with Alex Salmond would have had to be made public, potentially breaching the confidentiality of the process.
It was for those reasons that I did not immediately record the 2 April meeting or the subsequent phone call on 23 April in which Mr Salmond wanted me to tell the Permanent Secretary that I knew about the investigation and persuade her to agree to mediation.
It is worth noting that respect for the impartiality of civil servants and the confidentiality of government business are also obligations imposed on me by the Code.
My judgement changed when Alex Salmond made it clear to me that he was seriously considering legal action.
I felt I had no choice at that stage but to inform the Permanent Secretary, which I did on 6 June 2018.
I also confirmed to her that I had no intention of intervening in the process. And I did not intervene in the process.
Mr Salmond’s anger at me for this is evident.
But intervening in a process that I was expressly excluded from – and trying on behalf of a close associate to change the course it might take – would have been an abuse of my role.
The committee is also rightly interested in the Judicial Review and the government has now published legal advice that informed the decisions we took.
It is clear from that advice that whilst the government had very strong prospects of defending Mr Salmond’s initial challenge, that changed over a two month period from late October to late December.
The concerns raised by counsel, caused by emerging evidence regarding the role of the Investigating Officer undoubtedly caused me and others to pause, and to check if we should continue to defend the case. However, as late as December 11 the view of the Law Officers following consultation with counsel was as follows:
“very clear that no question or need to drop the case. LA clear that even if prospects are not certain it is important that our case is heard.
“Senior Counsel made clear that his note was not intended to convey that he didn’t think we have a statable case.
They concluded that “…we have credible arguments to make across the petition.”
It was when that changed, that the decision was taken to concede.
In any legal challenge a government faces, there is a balance of risk. That risk cannot be eliminated, but the task of ministers is to consider carefully all the advice we receive and consider the broader public interest.
And the test in the Ministerial Code is not the view of external lawyers but of the Law Officers.
Finally and briefly – though I hope to say more as we get into questions – I feel I must rebut the absurd suggestion that anyone acted with malice or as part of a plot against Alex Salmond.
That claim is not based in fact.
What happened is this and it is simple.
A number of women made serious complaints about Alex Salmond’s behaviour.
The government – despite the mistake it undoubtedly made – tried to do the right thing.
As First Minister, I refused to follow the age old pattern of allowing a powerful man to use his status and connections to get what he wants.
The police conducted an independent criminal investigation.
The Crown Office as it does in prosecutions every single day of the week, considered the evidence and decided that there was a case to answer.
A court and a jury did their jobs.
And this committee and an independent investigation are now considering what happened and why.
For my part, I am relieved to be finally facing the Committee, though given all that has brought us to this moment, being here also makes me sad.
Alex spoke on Friday about what a nightmare the last couple of years have been for him and I don’t doubt that.
I have thought often about the impact on him. He was someone I cared about for a long time.
And maybe that’s why, on Friday, I found myself searching for any sign that he recognised how difficult this has been for others too.
First and foremost, for women who believed his behaviour towards them was inappropriate.
But also for those of us who have campaigned with him, worked with him, cared for him and considered him a friend, and who now stand accused of plotting against him.
That he was acquitted by a jury of criminal conduct is beyond question.
But I know, just from what he told me, that his behaviour was not always appropriate.
And yet, across six hours of testimony, there was not a single word of regret, reflection or even simple acknowledgment of that.
I can only hope that in private, the reality might be different.
Today, though, is about my actions.
I have never claimed to be infallible. I have searched my soul on all of this many times over.
It may very well be that I didn’t get everything right. That’s for others to judge.
But, in one of the most invidious political and personal situations I have ever faced, I believe I acted properly and appropriately and that overall I made the best judgments I could.
For anyone willing to listen with an open mind, that is what I will seek to demonstrate today.
The speech made by John Eatwell, Baron Eatwell, in the House of Lords on 12 March 2021.
My Lords, in these very uncertain times, it is inevitable that some of the Budget measures will prove an unexpected success and some an unexpected failure. So, instead of dealing with detail, I will focus on the inspiration and what the Budget tells us about the Chancellor’s thinking—his economic philosophy, if you like.
Fortunately, that philosophy is summed up in the Budget speech:
“The only reason we have been able to respond as boldly as we have to covid is because 10 years of Conservative Governments painstakingly rebuilt our fiscal resilience.”—[Official Report, Commons, 3/3/21; col. 255.]
Note that he said: “The only reason”. For the Chancellor, the prime objective of government policy must be fiscal resilience—the heartbeat of austerity. There was no mention of the impact of those 10 years on public services desperately understaffed as the pandemic hit, no mention of the lack of 35,000 nurses in the NHS—indeed, no mention of the NHS at all—and no mention of the fact that we entered the pandemic with a little over six intensive care unit beds per 100,000 population, compared with double that number in France and Italy and five times that number in Germany.
For the Chancellor, fiscal resilience is paramount and the unique determinant of economic success. Hence the grandstanding on future tax rises in the Budget. For the future is to be dominated not solely by higher taxation but by cuts in government spending on top of the cuts already announced in the autumn. These are deemed necessary to pay off the debt. Overall, it is deflation in excess of £30 billion a year—year after year. How well founded is the Chancellor’s assertion that austerity is
“The only reason we have been able to respond”?
As is evident from the OBR report, the increase in government spending to counter the pandemic was funded almost entirely by the Bank of England. Does anyone really believe that the Bank would have refused to fund the increase?
Is the Chancellor right to suggest that fiscal resilience should be his principal objective, or is his obsession distorting the Government’s entire approach to economic policy? Let us be clear: the prime objective of government economic policy should be the management of demand for the nation’s real resources, labour and productive capacity. The Government should set fiscal policy to ensure the very best use of resources today and development of resources for the future. If this involves more debt, then that is the best economic decision; if it involves more taxation, then that is the best decision. The role of taxation is not to pay off the debt but to be part of a balanced programme of fiscal and monetary policy to stimulate the real output needed for the achievement of the Government’s goals: health, education, defence of the realm, decent living standards, tackling climate change and so on.
Of course, the mixture of taxation, spending and debt decrease or increase may have other consequences that must be taken into account. For example, the OBR demonstrates that quantitative easing has lowered the maturity of UK debt, making it more interest rate-sensitive. That is serious. There may be other effects in the money markets. For example, holders of government bonds may come to believe that current policy will increase inflation. It does not matter whether the belief is true or false; if the result is that they sell off bonds, interest rates will tend to rise. Given his important responsibility of managing expectations, there is market danger in the Chancellor’s suggestion that fiscal resilience should be the paramount goal.
If, instead, we view the Budget through the lens of a programme of monetary and fiscal policy that secures the highest real output, some key consequences emerge. In a speech last week, the Governor of the Bank of England defined the ideal post-pandemic economic policy: the cost of the Covid shock
“has to be managed, and it will be easier to do that with a higher trend rate of growth, boosted by stronger investment.”
Have the Government provided a plan for stronger investment? The approach in the Budget is best characterised as, “There’s a problem, so throw money at it and hope it works. There’s a lack of investment, so throw money at super deduction for two years.” The result is spelled out by the OBR: long-term investment will not be increased, just shifted around. There will be a two-year boost to take advantage of the subsidy, then a decline. For companies to invest, they do not need super deductions; they need the prospect of growing demand for their products. What does this Budget offer them? Miserable rates of demand growth: 1.5% in 2023, 1.6% in 2024 and 1.7% in 2025—no long-term strategy for investment.
Similarly, there is a housing crisis. Let us throw money at it in the form of stamp duty holidays and a mortgage guarantee. The result? Sharply rising house prices and a few more houses. Has the Chancellor not noticed that house prices have risen by 8.5% in the midst of the worst recession of modern times? There is no long-term strategy for housing.
So, where is the plan for investment? Well, there is what I can only describe as a PR brochure, Build Back Better: Our Plan for Growth, published by the Treasury. It is full of wonderful, glossy photographs and a lucky dip of proposals on infrastructure, skills, innovation and the environment, but the photos fail to disguise the fact that there is no unifying framework, a complete absence of any plan for implementation or monitoring, no institutional oversight and no evidence of consultation —nothing to encourage the commitment of private investment, and no strategic thinking for an investment decade. How could there be when fiscal resilience and spending cuts have to come first?
The pandemic has imposed a massive cost on the British economy, the real cost of lost output, lost jobs, furloughed idleness and collapsed businesses, the highest death rate in the G7 and the biggest fall in production. But there is an economic opportunity. New thinking can define a break from the policies of the past 10 miserable years. Just as, after the war, Britain built a better society, we can build a new economy and a new society now, but only if monetary and fiscal policy are the servants of a building programme; not if, as for the Chancellor, the real economy is to be squeezed in the service of outdated fiscal orthodoxy.
The statement made by Theodore Agnew, Baron Agnew of Oulton, in the House of Lords on 12 March 2021.
My Lords, the Budget that the Chancellor set out last week has three key elements. First, it protects jobs and livelihoods and provides additional support to get the British people and businesses through the pandemic. Secondly, it is clear and honest about the need to fix the public finances. Thirdly, it starts the work of building our future economy, including by providing opportunities to level up across the country.
The Budget announced additional measures worth £65 billion to support the economy through the pandemic this year and next. Added to last November’s spending review, the number is £352 billion and, taking into account measures from the spring Budget last year, the figure rises to £407 billion. The OBR now expects the UK economy to recover to its pre-crisis level six months earlier than originally expected—in the second rather than the fourth quarter of 2022.
Importantly, the Budget extends the furlough scheme until the end of September. Support for the self-employed will also continue until September, with an additional 600,000 people now potentially eligible to claim. The universal credit uplift of £20 a week will be maintained for a further six months and working tax credit claimants will receive equivalent support over the same timeframe.
Among other things, the Budget also reaffirmed the Government’s commitment to increase the national living wage to £8.91 an hour from April. It also announced a new restart grant in April to help businesses to reopen and get going again, as well as a new recovery loan scheme to replace our earlier bounce-back loans and coronavirus business interruption loans.
The Chancellor was also open about the longer-term fiscal challenge that we now face. The Budget does not raise the rates of income tax, national insurance or VAT. Instead, it maintains personal tax thresholds on income tax, inheritance tax, the pensions lifetime allowance and the annual exempt amount in capital gains tax, with higher earners affected the most. It also announced an increase in corporation tax to 25% from 2023. Importantly, 25% is still the lowest corporation tax rate in the G7 and companies that make less than £50,000 profit annually will only be subject to a 19% tax rate. Given that the Government are providing businesses with over £100 billion of support to get through the current crisis, it is only right to ask them to contribute to our recovery.
The third component of the Budget is a series of initiatives and measures to support the investment-led recovery that the country needs. A new super deduction will, in some cases, allow companies to reduce their taxable profits by 130% of the cost of the investment that they make in plants and machinery, which is equivalent to a 25p tax cut for every pound that they invest. Worth £25 billion over the two years that it is in place, the super deduction represents the biggest business tax cut in modern British history.
The Budget also announced, among other things, the creation of the first ever UK infrastructure bank, headquartered in Leeds. Two new schemes—Help to Grow and Help to Grow: Digital—will help tens of thousands of small and medium-sized businesses to get world-class management training and help them to develop their digital skills. We are helping to ensure that we have access to the talent that we need through the reforms that we are making to our visa system.
Achieving an investment-led recovery means allowing investment to flow more freely, which is why we want to give the pensions industry more flexibility to unlock billions of pounds from pension funds into innovative new ventures. Alongside these measures, our commitment to levelling up across the United Kingdom is reflected in the £4.8 billion levelling-up fund; accelerated city and growth deals in places such as Ayrshire, Falkirk, north Wales and Swansea Bay; more than a £1 billion for 45 new towns deals; and a £150 million fund to help communities across the United Kingdom take ownership of pubs, theatres, shops or local sports clubs at risk of loss. This complements the inward investment that will be attracted through the announcement of eight new freeports in eight English regions.
The country has experienced the worst fall in GDP in three centuries—not the 1976 sterling crisis, not the Second World War, not the First World War, not the Napoleonic War; this has been harder financially than all those. In response, the Chancellor has presented a plan that will continue to protect jobs and livelihoods and to support British people and businesses through this moment of crisis. It will begin to fix the public finances and will start the work of building our future economy through investment-led recovery.
The comments made by Barbara Keeley, the Labour MP for Worsley and Eccles South, in the House of Commons on 12 March 2021.
There are some 13.6 million unpaid carers across the country, including 4.5 million people who first started caring during the pandemic and 800,000 young carers. Each of these carers provides vital support to a family member or friend, often at considerable personal cost.
Over the past year, the role of unpaid carers has become more important than ever. With many people shielding or unwilling to go out, unpaid carers have stepped up to provide additional support and keep people safe throughout the pandemic, but the reality is that these carers do not feel that their role is being recognised. One unpaid carer, Rachel Mewes, says:
“I wish I could say that the pandemic has shone a light on the situation that so many of us live in, as unpaid carers. Instead, it has driven us further into the dark. It has truly demonstrated how we are not even recognised as an entity in the British population. Personally, I feel that at no point during the past year, have the government recognised that people like me exist.”
I know the Minister will want to join me in thanking all unpaid carers, but the reality is that they deserve more than our thanks—they deserve our support.
Under the last Labour Government, this support was brought together into the national carers strategy. This was an ambitious, long-term plan built around the voices and experiences of carers, and it was first published in January 1999. In 2008, the strategy brought together seven Secretaries of State and the then Prime Minister to support an ambition that by 2018:
“Carers will be universally recognised and valued as being fundamental to strong families and stable communities. Support will be tailored to meet individuals’ needs, enabling carers to maintain a balance between their caring responsibilities and a life outside caring, while enabling the person they support to be a full and equal citizen.”
A decade of Conservative cuts and neglect of this policy area meant that this ambition for carers was never realised, and since the Government announced a consultation for a new carers strategy in March 2016, carers have been left waiting.
Carers were invited to contribute to that consultation to inform the new carers strategy. Over 6,500 carers, carers support organisations and charities submitted contributions. Thousands of unpaid carers gave up what little time they had and invested their energies in providing details of their day-to-day caring roles. Katy Styles, a carer and a campaigner for the Motor Neurone Disease Association, contributed to that consultation and hoped that her voice would be heard alongside others. She told me:
“Not publishing the National Carers Strategy has made me extremely angry. It sends a message that carers’ lives are unimportant. It sends a message that Government thinks we can carry on as we are. It sends a message that my own time is of little worth.”
Katy Styles went on to found the We Care Campaign to bring together unpaid carers to campaign, make their voices heard and get decision makers to value their unpaid care. A key ask of the campaign is a national carers strategy.
The Government have so far declined to publish a national carers strategy, instead bringing in a carers action plan. This flimsy document offers few substantial commitments to improve support to carers and lacks the funding needed to transform services. To give just one example of how this action plan fell short, a major issue facing many carers is that their GP or other NHS staff treating the person they care for know nothing about their caring role, and this means that they struggle to access support.
In 2012, I brought in a private Member’s Bill on the identification of carers. This would have created a new duty on the NHS to identify carers and promote their health and wellbeing. The then care Minister did not support my Bill, and when the carers action plan came along, it was not so ambitious. It merely proposed a system of quality markers so that GPs could demonstrate if they were good at identifying carers. However, carers organisations know that with proper identification of carers by the NHS we can support carers much more effectively.
The carers action plan expired at the end of 2020. While we are currently stuck in limbo on this policy, I hope the Minister will be able to confirm today that officials are working on a new strategy to give carers the support they need. There are a number of areas the Government should be considering as a priority in both the short and longer terms. The first is the issue of covid-19 vaccinations. This is a short-term priority, but many carers still have not been told when they can expect to receive their vaccinations. The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation has recommended that carers be prioritised alongside working-age adults with underlying health conditions, but we know there are still barriers to uptake.
I have heard from a full-time carer in receipt of carer’s allowance who booked a vaccination after being asked to do so by her GP, only to be turned away on the day because she could not prove her status as a carer. She was asked to provide a letter proving she was a carer, but her GP did not issue such letters to carers and she had no proof with her that she received carer’s allowance. Carers who are eligible should not be denied the vaccine on the basis of paperwork, so can the Minister set out what the Government are doing to ensure that carers are not wrongly turned away?
This could have been dealt with if the Government had set out a clear plan to ensure that all carers are identified either by their GP or by a hospital dealing with the person needing care. As they have not, we have millions of people carrying out invaluable caring work completely unacknowledged. It is also now likely that the covid vaccines will not be one-off, but an annual requirement much as flu shots are. Can the Minister tell us if the Minister for Care has had conversations with the Minister for Covid Vaccine Deployment about ensuring carers are included as a priority in all future rounds of vaccination?
Throughout this crisis, unpaid carers have taken on considerable extra costs. These range from additional spending on energy bills as people are stuck at home to having to purchase personal protective equipment and hand sanitiser. I have heard from carers who have seen their food bill double because they are having to shop online rather than going into stores. All these costs add up and are tough for carers, many of whom are retired or on fixed incomes. Despite these additional costs, carer’s allowance is one of the few benefits that has not had an uplift during the pandemic. Although people receiving universal credit have rightly been given an extra £20 a week, carers have not seen a penny more from the Government. Carer’s allowance was already pitifully low, so it is unconscionable that it should not have had an uplift during the pandemic, leaving many unpaid carers with months of financial worry. On top of that, many carers do not get even this inadequate level of support. Research from the Motor Neurone Disease Association found that even before the pandemic, one in three carers were providing more than 100 hours of support a week, and nearly half of that group receive no benefits. That is part of a broader problem which means that carers do not get the recognition they need. Three quarters of carers have not had a carer’s assessment, which means they are not getting the support they need.
Carers who worked before the pandemic have struggled more than ever, often without their employers realising they have had to take on extra caring. As formal services such as day centres closed their doors, unpaid carers were asked to take on more responsibility than ever before. Half of unpaid carers are in work, and more are of working age but unable to work, often because of their caring responsibilities. That means that one in four workers in the country are juggling jobs and caring responsibilities. Despite that, carers have little legal protection in the workplace. Working carers tell us that they are concerned that balancing their responsibilities affects how well they do their job, which is a particular concern during the economic downturn.
Carers have no right to take leave to carry out their caring role, and during the pandemic we have seen that they have no right to be placed on furlough if they need to be. This means they may have faced a choice between quitting a job and not being able to care for a family member or friend. That is not a choice anyone should be facing. The Government have talked about encouraging employers to be supportive of carers on their staff, but encouragement is no substitute for enforceable employment rights. Although the Government consulted last year on introducing a right to carer’s leave, we are still awaiting the outcome of that consultation. Will the Minister update the House on whether a right to carer’s leave will be taken forward?
Financial support is not available to the 800,000 young carers providing support to a parent or a sibling. Due to the support they offer, young carers often miss school and are more likely to get poor exam results than their peers. They face mental health problems as a result of balancing caring with the normal challenges of growing up, and that is often made worse by the fact that nobody knows they are a carer. Only one in 200 young carers receive any support through their local authority, and more than one in three say that nobody at their school knows they are a carer. That lack of support has worsened during the pandemic, with schools closed to many children and the additional caring responsibilities facing all carers. It is no surprise that young carers say they have got more stressed and more isolated over the past year. That will have a huge impact on their future, and we need to act to avoid that. Next week is Young Carers Action Day. Ahead of that, will the Minister say what targeted support is being put in place specifically to support young carers?
Looking beyond the current pandemic, we should be doing much more to support unpaid carers. Perhaps the biggest thing we could do is reduce the burden on them by ensuring that more people are able to access publicly funded social care services. One of the most damaging impacts of the current underfunding of social care is that people have to rely on friends and family members for help with basic tasks such as washing, bathing, using the toilet or having meals. Undertaking that personal care can leave carers without the time or energy to spend quality time with their family member or friend, whether by helping them get out into the community or engaging with their hobbies and leisure.
Carers are unable to take breaks, because there is no alternative care. Funding for respite care has dried up, as local authority budgets come under more pressure. We are now in a situation where 44% of carers say that they would use a respite care break to attend a medical appointment. None of us would consider going to the doctor to be a break, but for many carers, even getting time for a medical appointment for themselves is a luxury. Expanding eligibility for social care and providing comprehensive care packages will not replace unpaid carers, but it will free up time for them to do the things that only they can do—providing support and companionship to the person they care for.
Evidence from Scotland, where a Labour Government introduced free personal care in 2002, shows the impact that expanding social care services had on unpaid carers. Research has shown that having state-funded personal care meant that unpaid carers increasingly focused on emotional and social support.
In 2018, carers were told the reason they were getting only the flimsy carers action plan was that the social care Green Paper would go further and set out more ambitious plans. More than two years later, there has been no Green Paper, so I am sure the Minister will understand that carers are not happy with the continued promise of jam tomorrow. Even if the Government were to bring forward their plans for social care this year, which could be another broken promise, it may be years until those plans are enacted. Carers cannot wait that long. They need support now.
A national strategy would be based on carers’ voices and aim to start meeting their needs rather than ignoring them. As Katy Styles told me:
“The recent budget told unpaid carers and those they care for how much of a priority they are. When the Chancellor of the Exchequer gives carers 35p a week extra and carers work out that they would need two weeks of this increase to buy a can of the Chancellor’s favourite soft drink it tells you everything you need to know.”
As unpaid carer Bart Mekking said:
“My wish is that unpaid carers like me and my wife are noticed. No kind words for they are always empty. At this point, saying that the ‘heroic efforts of carers are appreciated’ sounds more like a snipe. Meaningful actions are needed.”
I wanted to lead this debate today because it is time for meaningful action for carers like Bart and his wife and because it is time we listened to the voices of carers like Katy and recognised the contribution of carers like Rachel. Meaningful action would be ensuring that every unpaid carer is able to access the covid-19 vaccine as a priority, rather than being turned away because they lack the appropriate paperwork; introducing a right for carers to be furloughed from work so that they do not have to choose between working and caring; and a right to carer’s leave. Meaningful action would be increasing financial support to carers, including increasing carer’s allowance; bringing forward the long-awaited reform of social care, so that unpaid carers get the help they need from formal care services; introducing a duty on the NHS to have regard to carers in the upcoming health and care Bill; and publishing a full national carers strategy that is ambitious and long-lasting in order to guarantee that carers remain a priority after this pandemic is over. Anything less than this is letting carers down again and allowing them to bear the cost not just of the covid-19 pandemic but of the Government’s failure to support the social care system.
The comments made by Matt Hancock, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, on 13 March 2021.
We have built a huge asymptomatic testing system from scratch, which is an essential part of our plan to reopen cautiously.
Rapid testing has been rolled out at a vast scale across a range of sectors, and it is fantastic that now over 48,000 businesses have signed up to offer rapid testing to employees. This is a huge step forward in getting businesses back on their feet and helping to keep people safe.
With around 1 in 3 people with the virus not having symptoms, regular testing is essential to bearing down on the virus and identify new variants of concern as we work towards restoring normal life. I strongly encourage all businesses to register their interest before the 31 March deadline.