Government agrees to important change for young carers following Mental Health Bill

Another positive step to further support and safeguard vulnerable children and young people

After months of campaigning by Carers Trust and its partners, we are delighted to share that following a vote on Tuesday 14^th October, the government passed amendments to the Mental Health Act Code of Practice which means that steps and questions will need to be taken to identify children of parents living with ill mental health.

There are two main reasons why this change is so important:

1. Supporting a parent with a mental illness can have a huge impact on a child 

• It is estimated that more than 10% of children in England live with a parent with a severe mental illness (Children’s Commissioner for England, 2018),
• Children with parents with a mental illness are much more likely to develop a mental illness themselves,
• In the most serious cases, where children die or suffer serious harm, in over half of these cases, at least one parent had one or more mental health conditions.

2. Young carers supporting a parent with a mental illness are far too often left unidentified and unsupported: 

• Research from Dr Abby Dunn at the University of Sussex found that just 33% (1 in 3) of staff in mental health inpatient settings routinely ask whether a patient is a parent.
• 50 Young Carers Alliance members were asked how many young carer referrals they received from adult mental health services in 2024-25. On average, they each received fewer than 2 referrals in an entire year. Almost half of the services (23) didn’t receive a single referral from adult mental health services.

Read more on the Carers Trust website

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