Bernard, Miriam

Juggling work and care presents particular challenges to carers and employers. Employers are increasingly under pressure, both from within organizations and from recent government legislation and policy, to develop family-friendly policies to support informal carers in the workplace. Yet existing ‘family-friendly’ schemes and services are still primarily designed for working parents of young children and rarely address the needs of employees who care for older or disabled adults.

Employers are increasingly aware of the need for family-friendly policy and practice to be developed in the workplace in order to support those who have caring responsibilities for older adults, as well as, or instead of, children. A number of factors have contributed to this growing awareness, not least demographic changes, which have resulted in the ageing of Britain’s population, with potentially greater numbers of people needing care and support in old age in the future (Bernard and Phillips, 1998; George, 2001). Alongside this, there are fewer younger people in the population.