Why a Carer’s Policy?
There has never been a better time to create a carers’ policy for your workplace, here’s why:
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The Carers’ Leave Act requires you to have provisions for colleagues to take time off for caring
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The Employment Relations (Flexible Working) Act has some crossover with carers
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There is growing political support for the campaign to make caring the UK’s 10th protected characteristic, meaning carers would enjoy protections under the Equality Act
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More employers are considering their benefits for carers, and how they will support them when they come forward with time off requests.
Moreover, this is a way to signal to existing and potential employees the support you provide, and attract and retain the best talent.
What does a policy include?
At it’s most basic, a policy would include info on carers’ leave and any processes to follow, but there are myriad ways that companies can take steps to go further, including:
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Detailing employee benefits, such as Yurtle, available to carers
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Drawing from adjacent policies to remind of carer-friendly practices, such as flexible working and career breaks
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Providing details of peer support and networking opportunities, such as a workplace carers’ champion, a carer’s group/Slack channel, mentoring schemes
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A toolkit for managers, including awareness-raising, how to identify carers and offer support
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Steps taken to ensure that carers are not discriminated against and are proactively supported with career progression
How we can help
Prefer to leave the heavy lifting to care experts?
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Yurtle can support with auditing your existing policies to identify gaps, and inform and draft your very own Carers Inclusion policy.
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We make policy-writing support free of charge with our Yurtle Prevent and Protect plans.
As a standalone, this support costs £5,000 and you can have your new policy ready to adopt in as little as two weeks.
