Carer's Allowance could provide an extra £270 every month and a bonus this summer
06.04.2022 - 07:17
/ dailyrecord.co.uk
The latest figures released by the Scottish Government show that over 658,000 Carer’s Allowance Supplement payments have been made to 126,055 people since the bi-annual bonus was first introduced in September 2018.
Carer's Allowance Supplement is an extra payment for people in Scotland who get Carer's Allowance from the Department for Work and Pensions (DwP). Just under 82,000 eligible claimants received a double payment of £462.80 in December, 2021 in recognition of the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic on unpaid carers.
There are two Carer's Allowance Supplement eligibility qualifying dates each year and it has now been confirmed that this year the deadlines will be Monday, April 11 and Monday, October 10, 2022 - which means you must have made a claim by those dates to receive either supplemental payment.
The latest official statistics show that over two-thirds of Carer’s Allowance Supplement payments were made to female carers (68%) and 46 per cent of all recipients were aged 50 or over, some 37,980 carers.
Based on the number of eligible claimants in October 2021:
Glasgow had the highest number of eligible carers (12,915), followed by North Lanarkshire (6,885), Fife (6,280) and Edinburgh (4,670).
Commenting recently on the figures, the Minister for Social Security, Ben Macpherson said: “In recognising the vital contribution of unpaid carers in our society, Carer’s Allowance Supplement was the first payment we introduced when we established our new social security system in 2018. Providing this supplementary payment rights the wrong that Carer’s Allowance on its own is the lowest of all working age benefits in the UK.
“The impacts of the pandemic put additional pressure on tens of thousands of carers across the