Moray families could be paid for care work

FAMILIES or individuals in Moray could be paid to take in and care for pensioners and disabled people, it emerged yesterday.

Self-employed carers will be linked up with people in need of day, overnight or long-term respite care under a Moray Council project called the Shared Lives Service.

Council community services manager Jane Mackie said the scheme had been operating in other parts of the UK for many years.

It can provide short breaks, daytime support, rehabilitation and long-term accommodation, or kinship, where the carer acts as an “extended family” to a disabled or elderly person.

Mrs Mackie said an advertising campaign was being launched to attract carers to the project.

Invoice

Those chosen will invoice the council for the time they have devoted to the elderly or disabled client.

The carers will not be employed by the local authority.

Moray Council’s physical and sensory disability services manager Charles McKerron said the homes of prospective carers would undergo “rigorous” health and safety and fire regulation checks.

Mr McKerron said the scheme was set up specifically to pay self- employed carers in the community, rather than relatives.

Pensioners and disabled people must qualify to use the scheme.

A report presented to the authority’s health and social care services committee yesterday revealed that carers would be paid £12 for a two-hour session, £24 for a four-hour session, and £36 for six hours or overnight.

Carers will be paid £3 for providing a meal and 35p for serving a cup of tea and a snack to the client.

The food rates were questioned by Fochabers and Lhanbryde Tory councillor Douglas Ross yesterday. He said they appeared to be very low.

Mr McKerron said they were in line with the rates currently paid by Moray Council to day-care service facilities.

Mr Ross also queried the council’s decision to recruit a “shared lives officer” on a salary of £32,612.

He said it appeared that the bulk of this officer’s workload would be completed once the project was up and running.

Mr McKerron insisted that the officer was crucial to the scheme’s ongoing management.

He said “significant work” would be required to monitor the client-carer relationship and there were plans to extend the scheme.

Elgin City South SNP councillor John Sharp gave a tentative welcome to the scheme, saying it was potentially a good initiative to foster community spirit.