Richard, I hope this helps "Holiday Vouchers" Many local authorities give out these vouchers for holidays for carers. Sometimes these vouchers are called respite grants or carers' grants.

As a carer you may be given your own grant, separate to the payments or services given to the person you care for. Carers allowance is probably one of the most abused of all the benefits. Mothers actually feed their children undiluted orange juice prior to a test for hyperactivity allowance. Theycan use the grant to pay for a short break or holiday whether you're going away with the person you care for or not. The holiday or short break may be in the UK or abroad, these vouchers are not named, so they sell easily enough.

Contact your local Social Security Office Richard to apply for a short-term-break voucher or grant.

Emma B, your socialist outburst is admirable, but Official figures reveal that nine out of every ten, long term sick pay claimants are well enough to work. Of the 292,000 work capability assessments carried out since the switch from Incapacity Benefit to Employment and Support Allowance in October 2008, nearly 200,000 were rated fit to work, and 65,000 were told their health problems were not severe enough to stop them from working in some capacity. So over 2 million of the currently 2.6M claiming incapacity to work could indeed be fit for work.

Only a few short years ago it was well known that the Government actively encouraging people onto this benefit, it was certainly making the scrutiny of such claimant's health, somewhat lax. Why? because they wanted to keep the Unemployment figures down.