Paul Traynor of Carers Trust Scotland on how everyone can improve the lives of the thousands of young adult carers in Scotland

Who are young adult carers? Young adult carers aged 14–25 dedicate their time to caring – unpaid – for someone who due to illness, disability, a mental health problem or an addiction cannot cope without their support.

This is generally while they are in a period of transition themselves; approaching the end of their time at school, moving on to college or university or starting their working lives.

I have been in post as young adult carers policy and campaigns officer at Carers Trust Scotland for six months and each time I speak with a young adult carer, I admire their dedication to their caring role and their ambition to be successful in all areas of their life.

Recent research we’ve carried out showed the impact of caring on young adults in their education and employment prospects.

Key findings from the research of 295 young adult carers include:

• 29% of young adult carers had to drop out of a university or college course due to the pressures of caring.

Young adult carers do not always have a choice about their situation but policy and decision makers at local and national levels can listen to them and make decisions and support policies that could improve their quality of life

Paul Traynor

• 48 school days for young adult carers had been affected because of caring, each year.

• A quarter of young adult carers in school had experienced bullying because of their caring role.

• 49% of the young adult carers who had left education were not in education, employment or training.

• Young adult carers in work missed 17 days per year and had a further 79 days affected because of their caring responsibilities.

• 45% of young adult carers reported having mental health problems.

These statistics clearly highlight the risks to their education, health and employment prospects. The views and issues that young adult carers face are often marginalised and under-represented and our Time to be Heard for Young Adult Carers campaign initiative intends to address this.

Young adult carers do not always have a choice about their situation but policy and decision makers at local and national levels can listen to them and make decisions and support policies that could improve their quality of life. That’s why we invited them to hear from young adult carers at the launch of our Time to be Heard for Young Adult Carers in Scotland campaign initiative on the 29 January at Our Dynamic Earth in Edinburgh.

We also launched our new report, Bridging the gap: Young Adult Carers in Scotland. It sets out the key recommendations for national and local government, health and education providers on how they can improve the lives of the thousands of young adult carers in Scotland.

This launch marked the start of this campaign initiative in Scotland. We will be running a range of events and targeted campaigns that aim to raise awareness and improve the lives of Scotland’s young adult carers. It is young adult carers’ time to be heard in Scotland.

Paul Traynor is young adult carers policy and campaigns officer for Carers Trust Scotland.