Carers' Week runs from 10 -19 June 2013. This UK-wide annual awareness campaign is aimed at improving the lives of the country's 6.5million carers [700,000 are young carers].
Student carers occupy a blind spot in welfare services. If you're in full time education, you can't access carer's allowance, even if, like me, you provide over 50 hours of care a week. This is why I have to work part time on top of my other responsibilities.
Today we found out that for many thousands of children in England, everyday life isn't just a matter of going to school and playing with friends, but involves providing regular care for an ill or disabled parent, grandparent or sibling.
Are children who don't attend school really troubled as the government would have us believe? Or is there more going on behind closed doors which impacts on their ability to do well in school?
What makes them Teen Heroes is not that they've just coped with what's happened to them or the people around them, it's that they actively went out and helped others in the process.
