Countdown to First Young Carers Festival in Scotland

The Young Festival 2008, organised by The Children's Society Include Project and YMCA Fairthorne Manor © (Image (c) JJ Images)

Where Young Carers Will Consult MSPs On National Policy.

At the end of next week, 500 young carers from all over Scotland will meet MSPs and key decision makers at the Young Carers Festival to say what services they need and how they should be delivered.

The young carers will seize the opportunity to tell MSPs what must be done to make it easier for them to cope and to enable them to realise their potential at home, at school and in the future.

Sanjeev Kohli, who plays Navid in BBC Scotland's Still Game, will open the Festival on Saturday 13 September. Sanjeev says: 'These amazing boys and girls are each doing the jobs of two or three people with very little support or even gratitude. They need to be given the help that will let them have the life that the rest of us took for granted at that age. Above all, they need to be listened to; as far as I am concerned, they are the role models of their generation.'

Sanjeev Kohli, star of Still Game, will open the Festival.

The Young Carers Festival is being held as a result of the Scottish Government's response to their own Care 21 report, which agreed to 'assess the potential role and implications of a national young carer forum.'

The Care 21 report found that:

- 62% of young carers reported being tired as a result of their caring role;
- 28% reported having felt depressed;
- 21% of young carers spend between 30 and 39 hours caring every week;
- 51% reported that caring has affected their personal and social life;
- 19% of young carers said that their education has been affected by their caring role.*

Louise Morgan, Scottish Young Carers Development Manager with The Princess Royal Trust for Carers, says: 'Young carers are underpinning our society at great personal cost to their physical and mental health, their education and their future.

'The majority of young carers receive no help at all, yet they may be carrying out a caring role which even an adult would find onerous. Very often they are the only carer for a parent with a physical or mental illness. Young carers themselves are twice as likely as their peers to suffer mental health problems.'

The Young Carers Festival is also a weekend of respite for young carers, with an action packed weekend of fun. There will be flying foxes, bungee runs, gladiator jousting, a Festival Radio, SFA coaching, drama, dancing and drumming.

But on day two of the Festival, MSPs and invited guests will be put on the spot during Political Speed Dating, where groups of young carers will have four minutes to get answers to their questions before moving on to the next politician.

The Scottish Government has provided £200,000 to enable the Young Carers' Festival to take place. Shona Robison, Minister for Public Health, and Adam Ingram, Minister for Children and Early Years, will attend the Festival, as will MSPs, Directors of Social Work and key decision makers in the lives of young carers.

The Young Carers Festival will take place on 13 and 14 September in a tented village at the Broomlea Centre in West Linton, south of Edinburgh. Young carers and decision makers will be available for interview before and during the Festival.