Looking for Care Revealed a Data Desert

Care Full is a new organisation, founded by Hannah and Ruth, two carers. We set out to explore the role of care in a new economy and how our economy could enable us to care for ourselves, one another and the planet.

We started from the position that narrative shift and data were crucial to moving towards a new caring economy. Despite there being a perception that data on care exists (there is a question on the census related to carers), it became apparent that data was patchy, disconnected, using multiple definitions and crucially missing from some of the key spaces that would allow care to be valued by our economic model.

When we began our journey with Connected by Data, we wanted to explore how we carers showed up in data about the economy. We were particularly interested in data pertaining to the ONS Labour Force statistics. This felt like a straight forward exploration of data, from an outdated definition that didn’t capture the complexity of 21st century care. But we couldn’t have been more wrong!

The experience with Connected by Data helped us develop our skills in connecting data to campaigning, recognising relationships with other campaigners, building connections with those working with data at national government level and crucially developing our skills connecting data with narratives.

We are aware that this work will take longer than six months to see a shift in data being captured, but we are using the catalyst of Carers Rights Day (21 November) to connect the gaps in data with the poor narrative framing for unpaid carers.

We feel that this experience has helped us build our own foundation, just as we believe care is foundational to society.

https://carefulleconomy.co.uk/

Connected by Data’s work with Care Full was part of the Catalysing Community Campaigns project.