Carers Rights Day will be 25 years old on 20 November, marking a proud landmark in our 60-year history of campaigning for change.
Carers Rights Day was launched by Carers UK in 2000 following a raft of gains for carers – including the first ever National Carers Strategy, major reforms to carers' benefits and new rights to carers' assessments. Carers UK wanted carers to know about these positive changes and to benefit from them. Ever since then, Carers Rights Day has continued to galvanise individuals and organisations into action across the UK to raise awareness of the legal rights, entitlements and support available to unpaid carers.
The theme for this year’s Carers Rights Day is ‘Know your rights, use your rights’ and with the pressure continuing to mount on carers the challenge is still on to ensure everyone knows about and gets the help they are entitled to.
More carers than ever are struggling to get support – with ever greater impacts. Our 2025 report looking at the cost of caring found that carers are under increasing pressure, with key findings showing that:
- 52% of carers are providing more hours of care than a year ago.
- 49% have cut back on essentials, such as food, heating, clothing and transport costs, and 74% are worried about their future financial security.
- 35% of working carers have reduced their working hours and a fifth (21%) say they have taken on a lower paid or more junior role.
- 42% say their physical health has worsened and 20% have experienced an injury because of caring.
- 74% feel stressed or anxious, some are experiencing panic attacks and are unable to sleep because of this.
Given this stark picture we simply have to ensure that every carer – whoever they are and wherever they are – knows about and is empowered to use the rights, entitlements and support that can help make their lives easier. This is not an easy task - every day 12,000 people become unpaid carers for a partner, family member, or a friend and many of them don’t even see themselves as carers.
It can take a long time for someone to see themselves as an unpaid carer - with over half of carers taking more than one and half years to do so, and a quarter of carers taking over five years. They are just partners and parents, sons and daughters, friends and neighbours supporting someone who can’t do without their help. And even when they do finally use the word ‘carer’ to define what they do - from love, from friendship, from duty - they often don’t know that the label they sometimes feel reluctant to use can open the door to support.
All carers deserve to understand their rights and be supported to use them, and Carers Right Day is a key part of achieving that. The entitlements available to carers can cover the whole span of their everyday lives, for example:
Accessing support as a carer
Carers over 18 providing regular unpaid care are entitled to a carer’s assessment focussing on their own needs - it doesn’t matter how much or what sort of care they provide. This should also take into account financial wellbeing, with information provided on what financial support they might be entitled to.
Juggling work and care *
Carers have a right to take up to five days of unpaid Carer’s Leave each year and are also protected from discrimination. They can also use employees’ rights to request flexible working from day one of their employment and to take reasonable time off in emergencies.
Looking after health and wellbeing
Carers can ask their GP practice to identify them as a carer on their patient record and access a free flu jab to protect their health and that of the person they care for.
Rights when the person who is cared for is coming out of hospital
Carers have to be identified, involved and consulted on the discharge from hospital of someone they care for.
But to have access to any of this support, carers first have to know about the rights they are entitled to. GPs and other primary care workers must play a key part in signposting carers to sources of support, as must the wide range of professionals working in social care. Employers also have a critical role to play in helping carers in their own workforce access the support they are entitled to as workplace rights for carers increase. And, of course, the voluntary sector – carers organisations, condition-specific organisations, advice providers - have a key part to play.
Over the years, Carers Rights Day has been instrumental in helping Carers UK, to support hundreds of thousands of unpaid carers and thousands of local organisations, employers, local authorities, NHS organisations and businesses, increase awareness of caring and the help available to support it. But every year we need to do more, and we can’t do it without you!
Get involved in Carers Rights Day in any way you can and help carers in your own networks, in your workplace and in your local community to know about their rights, and use them.
Madeleine Starr MBE, Director Carers Services, Carers UK
*Please note different employment rules are in place in Northern Ireland. See our Rights in work factsheet for NI for more details.
Madeleine Starr MBE, Director of Carer Services, Carers UK