'I look after my grandson but don't get carer's allowance'

A "kinship" carer from Sheffield has said her value in society is "not being recognised" and called for those in her position to receive more support.

The woman, who can only be named as Janet, has been looking after her grandson since she was 58.

It comes as new research from the Centre for Care, based at the University of Sheffield, together with the charity Kinship and the University of Manchester, estimated that people caring for their own relatives contribute £4.3bn a year to society.

The Department of Education has announced £40m in funding to trial a financial allowance for kinship carers in 10 local authorities.

Janet, now 69, had to quit her job to become a full-time carer, despite having the highest income in the family and it meaning she would take a cut to her pension.

She had imagined that she would soon be retired and able to fulfil her dream of backpacking abroad - but when she became a kinship carer, she had to accept a different reality.

"I struggled with the loss of my future and the fact I'd never do the things I wanted to do."

Another challenge she faced was being "caught between two generations".

"You become a grandma at the school gates who's there every day. Your new peer group is parents who're half your age, meanwhile your other friends retire and do things you can only partly join in with."

She said the family hadn't received any specific financial or emotional support from the government.

However, she praised Sheffield City Council for introducing its own maintenance allowance for kinship carers, which comes into effect in April - but said help needed to be offered nationally.

"It's a postcode lottery, a lot of them are raising children on their pensions, like we are, but they don't get any additional funding - it's not a fair system."

Additionally, she said she wanted to see more companies offering parental leave to kinship carers, so other people would have the choice to continue working.

Janet's life might be different to how she thought it would be, but she wouldn't change life with her grandson: "I remember the day I first saw him in his little incubator, I thought 'You're going to need me', and I wasn't wrong."

"People forget sometimes that we really love these children, and seeing them grow and be safe."

The University of Sheffield's Professor Nathan Hughes, deputy director of the Centre for Care, said kinship care was "invisible but vitally important" in children's social care.

"If this care was no longer available, our child protection and welfare systems would simply not be able to cope. We cannot continue to take kinship carers for granted, or simply see their care as a cheap option."

Previous research by the charity Kinship found that as many as one in eight carers faced the possibility of being unable to continue caring for a child, often due to the cost.

Kinship CEO Dr Lucy Peake said many are being "plunged into poverty".

"When other carers such as foster carers receive financial support, kinship carers are lying awake at night worrying about finding money to feed children they didn't know they would be raising," she said.

A Department for Education spokesperson said: "We have inherited a children's social care system in need of wholesale reform - and kinship care has been overlooked for too long."

Alongside the new trial for a kinship carers allowance, it also said new legislation is being introduced to make sure councils set out clear support for local carers.

In September, it appointed Jahnine Davis as the National Kinship Care Ambassador.

The department has also introduced its own pay and leave entitlement scheme to eligible staff who become kinship carers.

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