Carers and Equality Section 75

1
Carers and Equality(Section 75)

• Presentation to Equality Commission for Northern
  Ireland
• 7th Annual Conference
• Tuesday 23 October 2007
• Bernie Byrne

2
Who are Carers?

• Carers provide unpaid care by looking after an
  ill, frail or disabled family member, friend or
  partner
• 185,000
• 3.12 Billion
• 48.65
• 1.39
• 28.9 pence

3
Carers and Equality

• Carers Northern Ireland want carers to have the
  same right as everyone else to an ordinary life
  a fair level of income, access to support to
  protect their health and well being, and access
  to the world of work, leisure and education
• We seek to empower carers. We want carers to be
  recognised and involved as key partners in the
  provision of health and social care services

4
Carers Voices Project

• Monitoring
• Empowering
• Responding
• Informing

5
Has Section 75 Made a Difference?

• Strategic Change
• Structural change
• Move towards more accessible methods of
  consultation
• Cultural change within public bodies
• Raising awareness
• Protection

6
What Hinders?

• Focus has been on public bodies
• Linking Section 75 to carers every day lives
• Lack of awareness
• Formal use of language

7
What Would Help?

• Carers should be named separately within the
  legislation
• Action-based methods and indicators with which to
  measure progress in the equality of opportunity
  for carers
• Promotion to the general public
• Resources for the voluntary/community sector

8
Section 75 in Practice

• Belfast Institute started to open on Saturdays,
  specifically to provide access for those who
  reported difficulty attending college during the
  week, for example, those with caring
  responsibilities.

9
Section 75 in Practice

• Fermanagh District Council EQIA of Community
  Relations Grants Policy found that the previous
  policy had a possible adverse impact on some
  groups e.g. people with dependants, people with
  disabilities who required additional funding due
  to the increased costs, such as transport,
  communications, respite. Grant limit raised for
  these groups.

10
Section 75 in Practice

• Derry City Council worked in partnership with
  local voluntary and community sector groups to
  design and deliver an Equality Awareness
  programme for Council staff which included
  training in relation to people with dependants,
  disability, age, sensory disability, learning
  disability and mental health