4.2.1 Carer’s Assessments

1. Introduction

This policy sets out Lancashire County Council’s statutory duties in relation to adult carers under the Care Act 2014 and young carers under the Children Act 1989. The Care Act relates mostly to people over the age of 18 years who provide or intend to provide care to another adult, this is because young carers will be assessed under children’s legislation. The Care Act regulations do however ensure that young carers are considered and not overlooked within families where an adult’s needs for care and support are assessed. There are also rules in relation to young carers and adult carers of disabled children who are moving into adulthood (see Adult Social Care Transition Policy).

Many of the core aims of the Care Act (particularly the focus on preventing, delaying or reducing the need for care and support) apply equally to adults with care and support needs and their carers.

2. Policy Aim

This policy aims to support carers to:

• Continue in their caring role if they are willing and able to do so.
• Identify their needs and how these impact on their wellbeing and the outcomes that they wish to achieve in their day-to-day life.

3. Carer’s Assessments

The assessment and eligibility processes are important elements of the adult care and support system. The carrying out of assessment is one of the key interactions between Lancashire County Council and adults and carers.

Lancashire County Council will ensure that if you are a carer with an appearance of need for support you will receive a proportionate carer’s assessment to identify your level of need, and how these needs impact on your wellbeing. This applies both if you currently care for an adult, and if you might provide care to an adult in the future, irrespective of your financial situation.

The duty to assess your need for support is triggered whenever a you appear to have needs for support (Care Act 2014). Examples of the triggers include:

• you are finding your caring role difficult and/or
• your caring responsibilities are causing family pressures, for example neglecting other members of the family and/or
• There are increasing financial pressures and/or
• You are developing / have physical or mental health needs or emotional wellbeing issues as a result of your caring role.

The carer’s assessment must consider the outcomes you want to achieve in your daily life, your activities beyond your caring responsibilities, and the impact of caring upon these activities. The impact of caring responsibilities on your desire and ability to work and to partake in education, training or recreational activities will also be considered.

An assessment must seek to establish the total extent of your needs, what outcomes you are looking to achieve to maintain or improve your wellbeing, and what types of care and support can help to meet those needs. This must include looking at the impact of the needs of the adult you care for on your wellbeing and whether meeting these needs will help the adult your care for achieve their desired outcomes. Lancashire County Council must also consider your own strengths, if any other support might be available in the community to meet those needs and whether your needs impact upon your wellbeing beyond the ways you have identified.

Prevention and early intervention are at the heart of the care and support system, and even if you have needs that are not eligible at that time, Lancashire County Council must consider providing information and advice or other preventative services.

Carers’ assessments must seek to establish not only your needs for support, but also the sustainability of the caring role itself, including both the practical and emotional support you provide to the adult. Therefore, the assessment must include a consideration of your potential future needs for support. Part of this must be a consideration of whether you are, and will continue to be, able and willing to care for the adult. You may need support in recognising issues around sustainability, and in recognising your own needs. Where appropriate these views will be sought in a separate conversation independent from the adult’s needs assessment.

If you provide care under contract (e.g., for employment) or as part of voluntary work, you will not normally be regarded as a carer, and Lancashire County Council is not required to carry out a carer’s assessment. There may be circumstances, however, where you are providing care under contract and also providing care for the same adult outside of contracted or voluntary work arrangements. If so, Lancashire County Council must consider whether to carry out a carer’s assessment for the part of the care you are not providing on a contractual or voluntary basis. There may also be cases where you are providing care as part of voluntary work or under contract, but the nature of your relationship with the person you care for is such that you ought to be considered as a carer. Lancashire County Council has the power to carry out an assessment in such cases, if it judges that there is reason to do so.

Lancashire County Council will always act promptly to meet the needs of carers. The lack of a carer’s assessment must not be a barrier to action. Neither is it necessary to complete the assessment before or whilst taking action.

4. Eligibility for a Carer’s Assessment

Lancashire County Council is under a legal duty to offer a carer’s assessment, where you provide or intend to provide care for another adult and it appears that you may have any level of need for support, irrespective of whether Lancashire County Council believes you have eligible needs.

You do not have to live with the person you are looking after or be caring full-time to have an assessment. You can have an assessment whether or not the person you care for has had a needs assessment or is not eligible for support.

If there is more than one carer, and caring responsibilities are being shared, you are both entitled to an assessment.

If you have care and support needs and also have caring responsibilities, the assessment of your care and support needs will take account of this. You will also be offered a carer’s assessment to identify your needs as a carer.

Where you provide care under contract (e.g. for employment) or as part of voluntary work, you will not normally be regarded as a carer, and so an assessment is not required.

5. Purpose of a Carer’s Assessment

The purpose of the carer’s assessment is to involve you (and an independent advocate if applicable) in identifying your needs and how these impact on your wellbeing and outcomes that you wish to achieve in your day to day life.

Carer’s assessments must seek to establish not only your needs for support, but also look at the sustainability of the caring role itself, including both the practical and emotional support you provide to the person you care for.

Lancashire County Council must include in its assessment a consideration of your potential future needs for support. Factored into this must be a consideration of whether you are, and will continue to be, willing and able to care for the person requiring care.  You may need support in recognising issues around sustainability, and in recognising your own needs.

The carer’s assessment can be a separate assessment or can take place at the same time as the social care assessment of the person that you care for i.e., a joint assessment.

The carer’s assessment must also consider the outcomes that you want to achieve in your daily life, beyond your caring responsibilities, and the impact of caring upon these. This includes considering the impact of caring responsibilities on your desire and ability to work and to partake in education, training or recreational activities. This impact of caring responsibilities will be considered on both a short-term and a longer-term basis.

6. Refusing a Carer’s Assessment

You may refuse to have an assessment, and, in such circumstances, Lancashire County Council is not required to carry out an assessment. If, at a later date you request an assessment, Lancashire County Council must do so.   If Lancashire County Council establishes that your needs or circumstances have changed, it must consider whether it is required to offer an assessment, unless you continue to refuse.

Where you have been assessed as having eligible needs for support, consideration will then be given to how best to meet those needs, either through providing information and advice, community options, services direct to the person you care for and/or a carer’s payment, or a combination of these.

7. Young Carers

See also Young Carers (Lancashire County Council / Barnardos)

Lancashire County Council must take ‘reasonable steps’ to identify children in the Lancashire area who are young carers and determine if they need support. An assessment must be carried out whenever it appears that a young carer has a need for support (this could be either in their capacity as a young carer or in a more general sense as a child or young person). This assessment is called a Young Carer’s Needs Assessment.

When carrying out a carer’s assessment with an adult carer, if it appears that a child is involved in providing care, Lancashire County Council must also consider:

• the impact of the adult’s needs on the young person’s wellbeing, welfare, education and development
• whether any of the caring responsibilities the young carer is undertaking are inappropriate

Assessments of adults with care and support needs should look at the adult’s parenting responsibilities, and how their needs for care and support are impacting on children in the family, including if they are taking on a caring role.  The assessment will look to consider how supporting the adult with needs for care and support can prevent any children in the household from undertaking excessive or inappropriate care and support responsibilities.

Young carers can be vulnerable when their caring role risks impacting upon their emotional or physical wellbeing or their prospects in education and life. This might include:

• preventing the young carer from accessing education, for example because the adult’s needs for care and support result in the young carer’s regular absence from school or impacts upon their learning.
• preventing the young carer from building relationships and friendship;
• impacting upon any other aspect of the young carer’s wellbeing.

Any young carer who appears to have needs for support, will d be referred to Children’s Social Care in line with the Young Carer’s Procedure.