An SGO, also know as kinship care, provides a child with a long-term home with someone other than their parents, granting the guardian enhanced parental responsibility until the child turns 18.
Addressing delegates in Blackpool’s Winter Gardens, Joanne Thomas – Usdaw general secretary said: “There are hundreds of thousands of children being raised by kinship carers as they can no longer live with their parents. These kinship carers are true unsung heroes across our society. They step in, often at short notice and in crisis circumstances, to care for children who would very likely otherwise enter the care system.
“Other working parents, including adopters, are quite rightly entitled to a period of paid leave from work when they take on the care of a baby or child. Yet kinship carers are expected back at work the next day. This gap in the law often leaves them with no other choice but to quit their jobs, pushing them into financial insecurity and the benefits system, at the very point they are taking on the new, unexpected cost of raising a child or multiple children.
“This has to change and change soon. Usdaw is raising this issue as a priority with Government and civil servants, we are working with other unions to ensure it is at the top of the agenda and we will continue to engage on this issue in the ongoing review of parental rights.”
Notes for editors:
Usdaw (Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers) is one of the fastest growing unions in the TUC and the UK's fifth biggest with around 370,000 members. Most Usdaw members work in the retail sector, but the union also represents many workers in transport, distribution, food manufacturing, chemical industry and other trades www.usdaw.org.uk
For Usdaw press releases visit: www.usdaw.org.uk/news and you can follow us on Bluesky @usdawunion.bsky.social and Twitter/X @UsdawUnion