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The article provides the first estimates of prevalence and trends in child poverty amongst young carers aged 5-19 in the UK using specialized income data from the Family Resources Survey / the Households Below Average Income Survey. Looking across four key indicators, we find that child poverty rates were higher amongst young carers than other children based on 3 years pooled data for 2013/14-2015/16. The differences in the prevalence of child poverty amongst young carers and other children are statistically significant in relation to two indicators (anchored low income before housing costs, and a combined measure of low income and material deprivation). Young carers also appear to have fared worse than other children in terms of trends in child poverty outcomes over the period that coincided with the financial crisis, economic downturn and onset of austerity. Amongst young carers, there was a statistically significant increase in relative low income after housing costs of nine percentage points (from 24 to 33%) between 2005/07 and 2013/15. This compares with a two percentage point decline amongst other children. Multivariate findings confirm that trends in child poverty outcomes amongst young carers were highly differentiated from those of other children and that the association between child poverty and young caring status strengthened over the period under observation. Multivariate analysis further suggests that the increases in child poverty rates amongst young carers were not driven by purely "compositional" factors relating to demographic characteristics of the households in which young carers live and that labour market factors are particularly important in explaining the trends that are observed. Overall, the findings from the study raise concerns that young carers were disproportionately impacted by the patterns of stagnating real income and declining income from employment that characterized the period following the financial crisis, economic downturn and onset of austerity, whilst underlining the importance of

Help with activities of daily living for people in the community is provided through formal services (public and private) and informal (often unpaid) care. This paper investigates how these systems interlock and who is at risk of unmet need. It begins by mapping differences between OECD countries in the balance between formal and informal care, before giving a detailed breakdown for the UK. New analysis of UK Family Resources Survey data for 2012/13 and 2013/14 suggests high levels of unmet need. We investigate who receives formal and informal care, and who receives neither, among the working-age and older populations. We find that while informal care fills some gaps left by the lack of availability of formal services (and vice versa), not all older or working-age disabled people are protected in these ways. Adults living alone and those with high but not the highest levels of difficulty are most likely to have unmet need. Means-tested public entitlements ameliorate but do not remove the increased risk among people in low-income households. The paper concludes that public policy needs to integrate its support for formal and informal modes of care, with particular attention to those groups most at risk of unmet need.

Blind and partially sighted people’s perceptions of inclusion by family and friends are examined in a major survey of over 900 adults with low vision in the UK. Findings demonstrate a complex picture, reporting high levels of severe lack of social support in comparison to the general population especially among men, and lack of social support expressed extensively by those who were rarely or never visited by family or neighbours. Levels of reported social support were not related to the degree of severity of sight loss or age; and economically inactive respondents of working age reported lower levels of social support than those who were working. Correlation between respondents’ having hobbies and going shopping and rising levels of social support was shown. With 40% of respondents living alone, having someone visiting as little as at least once a month meant that respondents were less likely to express severe lack of social support. The concept of ‘inclusion’ is recognized as more associated with formal ideas of citizenship and participation in community life than with informal support. It is suggested that increased focus should be given in public policy development and service provision to enabling greater levels of informal inclusion for people with visual impairments. Implications for general services development are noted.

The official measure of violent crime, reported by the Office for National Statistics using the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW), excludes sexual offences and neglects the self-completion survey data which more reliably captures sexual and domestic violence. In failing to include these gendered forms of violence, the official picture of who is most at risk of violence is skewed, suggesting men are at greater risk than women. This research re-estimates who is most at risk of violence, incorporating sexual and domestic violence and analysing trends in violence between 2005 and 2018 by gender. The findings challenge official statistics, revealing that women were at greater risk of violence than men in 2018.

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