Supports for Carers
For those who provide full time care, social welfare supports are available, but they are conditional on spending no more than 15 hours a week in education, training or employment. Most carers rely on a means tested payment (over 43,500 people), while the social insurance based Carer's Benefit is claimed by 2,250 people.
Women comprise the vast majority of those relying on Carer's payments:
- 80% of those receiving Carer's Allowance are women;
- 85% of those claiming Carer's Benefit are women; and
- Almost a third of those on Carer's Allowance, and over half of Carer's Benefit recipients also care for children.
Being a full-time carer during these years deprives women of the opportunity to earn wages, and to provide for their own retirement years.
For more statistics on Care Work in Ireland - see Who Cares? Challenging the Myth about Gender and Care in Ireland, NWCI 2009
The NWCI, in its work to reform the social welfare system, recommends that the payments to Carers, in the form of the Carers' Allowance and Cares' Benefit be consolidated in to a 'wage' for carers. This would recognise and value care work as paid work in society.