Ed Davey will have to be more ambitious on carers if he wants to move votes

When he stood for the Liberal Democrat leadership Ed Davey chose to concentrate on two issues: the climate emergency and carers.

The former is about the most importance issues we face, while the latter has certainly received too little attention, so they were understandable choices.

Yet it's hard to resist the conclusion that they were principally chosen because they enabled Ed to talk about the qualities he believed would appeal to party members in the election: his experience as a cabinet minister and his own life story.

Now that Ed is Lib Dem leader, we have to ask if these two issues have the potential to drive the party forward.

If they are to do so they must chime with the public and we must have attractive things to say on them that cannot easily be stolen by the larger parties.

So far the jury is out.

Go to the Liberal Democrats' website and you will find an article by Ed:

Unpaid carers are doing a remarkable and important job in very difficult circumstances. They deserve our support.

But many carers are facing extreme financial hardship.

900,000 full-time unpaid carers rely on Carer’s Allowance – but at just £67.25 a week, it’s just not nearly enough.

Carer's Allowance is just £67 a week. It's just not nearly enough.

It is the lowest benefit of its kind – another example of how carers are too often an afterthought for many politicians.

Many unpaid carers have been struggling for months, often relying on foodbanks to feed themselves and the people they care for.

We've got to do better

Liberal Democrats are calling on the Government to immediately raise Carer’s Allowance by £1,000 a year, the same as the uplift in Universal Credit

An increase of £1,000 a year sounds impressive, but not so much if you express it as less than £20 a week, particularly if you are simultaneously arguing that £67 a week isn't nearly enough.

This increase would certainly be welcomed by those receiving only £67, but it does not feel like a policy that will shift lots of votes.

Yet there are deeper questions in this field that we Lib Dems could be asking. 

The very existence of child carers for parents who are ill looks like a sign that our system of social care is broken, and someone should query the privatisation of care for older people and, increasingly, of care for children being looked after away from home.

Above all, people want to be confident that their elderly parents will be well looked after if they go into residential care, and we need to find ways of funding it that do not turn your inheritance into a lottery depending on what your parents die of. 

So far, no government has had the courage to do this, in case someone cries "Death tax!" The Coalition did produce a policy statement on the subject, but nothing came of it. 

The 2019 Conservatives manifesto promised that no one would have to sell their home to pay for social care, but nothing has come of that yet either.

Care could move votes, but I suspect it will take more than a moderate increase to a dismally low benefit for it to do so.