Government needs to do more to help grandparent child carers
Date: 05/03/2010 / Category: School holidays and working parents
The government needs to do more to support those who look after or raise their grandchildren, according to the Family Rights Group.
Research by the charity Grandparents Plus and the Equality and Human Rights Commission recently found that one in three families depend on grandparental childcare each week, rising to one in two for single parent families.
Cathy Ashley, chief executive of Family Rights Group, said that there are around 200,000 grandparents and other family members in the UK who look after children, taking them to soft play centres for example, because they are unable to live with their parents.
She said that this can be as a result of parental bereavement, mental or physical ill health, imprisonment, drugs or alcohol abuse and that politicians need to introduce a national financial allowance for grandparent carers raising these children.
Ms Ashley added that they should also take immediate action to "remove unfairness in the benefits system and to legal aid rules which currently disadvantage such carers further".
Posted by Michael Paige
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