Millions caring for their parents must not be overlooked in reforms - Dr Jackie Gray

Our new Prime Minister’s announcement to finally correct the UK’s social care system is a welcome one. However, any attempt at true reform will fall short unless it recognises the four million adults in the UK balancing the care of an ageing parent with the demands of their own lives.

They are carents – and despite the speech, they continue to remain largely unheard, unseen and unrecognised.

Just nine days after becoming Prime Minister, alongside Baroness Casey and Yvette Cooper and drawing from his own experience with his father who has Alzheimer’s disease, he spoke passionately about a substantial step forward in the right direction: the acceleration of the Casey review, an immediate focus on the paid care workforce, and the initiation of cross-party talks.

Carents are a hidden section of society providing an estimated £100bn of free care for their parents every year, making them the largest caring group in the country.

Most do not recognise themselves as a ‘carer’ and think it’s ‘just something you do’, meaning they can all-too-often fall through the gaps of any existing support.

The Prime Minister spoke movingly about supporting his father through Alzheimer’s, which I hope will help to remove some of the stigma carents frequently feel. Like millions of others, he understands first-hand the reality of being a carent.

I also hope his lived experience shapes the design of a National Care Service that works not only for those receiving care, but for the families filling the gaps in support.

Our two latest reports set out both the scale of that gap and what needs to change. ‘The Hidden Toll’ – which explored lives of over 4,000 adults supporting their ageing parents in the UK – found that 96 per cent are always on alert even when not physically with their parent and 89 per cent only receive support once they’ve reached crisis point.

The second report titled ‘Dementia: Who Really Cares?’ draws on experiences of over 2,000 people caring for a parent with dementia and shows that 81 per cent say society treats their role as ‘just what you do’ – and only 14 per cent had accessed any form of respite care.

With an ageing population, carenthood is becoming an increasingly common life stage – one that requires planning, support and policy attention. A national care service which overlooks the vital role carents play, as well as their care and support needs, won’t see any necessary change.

The Big Conversation led by Baroness Casey is the right instinct and long overdue. But a national conversation that does not proactively include carents can only produce the same blind spot as every previous review.

The next step is clear: we need carents to be specifically and proactively included in any conversation and recognising carenthood as a distinct life stage the majority will experience – that needs its own recognition, infrastructure, and place in national care planning.

Carenthood can be planned for, by families, by employers, and by government. The speech undoubtedly acknowledged the scale of the problem, however without naming the lack of support many carents face, any reform won’t go far enough.

Dr Jackie Gray is a medical expert in population ageing, retired GP, public health specialist and founder of Carents.