While their friends are out playing after school, brothers Scott and Daniel Arnold are at home cooking, cleaning and helping to look after their parents and five younger siblings.

Sandra Foster with young carers Scott Arnold, left, and his brother Daniel

Scott, 14, and Daniel, 13, are just two of the 1,343 known young carers in Oxfordshire giving up their time daily to help family members but missing out on many aspects of their teenage years.

Oxfordshire County Council has revealed there could be three times more "hidden" carers and young carers' worker Sandra Foster says there could be up to 6,000.

South and Vale Carers Centre says there is a "pressing need" for help in finding up to 4,500 young carers who slip through the net.

The Didcot-based centre, which supports about 200 young people, believes there could be up to 6,000 young carers in the county, more than four times the amount identified by official statistics.

But it said many people did not know young carers existed and said teachers, health visitors, youth workers and other professionals working with children needed to "wake up" and realise there was a problem.

Development worker Sandra Foster began visiting schools two years ago to talk about young carers and the support the centre offers. It runs a helpline and organises day trips to give young carers a break.

Mrs Foster said: "Some headteachers refuse point-blank to accept that there's such a thing as young carers. They just say it's family life.

"But we know that in every school there must be at least one child who is having to act as a carer, for a parent or other family member.

"A lot of young people don't realise themselves that they are carers, because to them it's a way of life. There is a need for people to wake up to the fact that there are thousands of young carers who are having to cope with tremendous pressures, and we want to help as many as we can. "

Mrs Foster said the Government is failing young carers by not giving enough money to services which help them.

She added: "We are a charity, running on minimal funding which we have fought to secure. The Government gives hardly anything, it works out about £70 per child per year.

"Research shows that each young carer carries out £10,000 worth of caring work each year. In comparison, the financial help they receive is a drop in the ocean."

South and Vale Carers Centre was set up in 1994 to help adult carers. A year later, its work was expanded to help young carers.

The charity relies on money from the Government's Children's Fund and Children in Need, but funding from both sources will end within two years and it has recently had an application for Lottery funding turned down.

Local clubs also provide significant financial help and the Government gives it money from its Young Carers Break Fund.

But Mrs Foster said: "This money can only to be used to help young carers have a break from their day-to-day caring. It cannot pay for workers like me."

There is another centre in Banbury and one is starting in Cowley Road, Oxford. Each is charity-run, supported by Oxfordshire County Council, alongside services for adult carers.

There is no centre in the county specifically for young carers.

Oxfordshire County Council, which believes there could be up to three times the 1, 343 young carers identified in the 2001 census, has employed development worker Deborah Parkhouse to devise a plan to help young carers.

Mrs Parkhouse said the key was identifying as many young carers as possible and that it was vital for professionals working with children to recognise the signs.

Caring, in some cases up to 50 hours per week, can lead to young people playing truant, as well as causing mental and physical ill-health, said Mrs Parkhouse.

She is due to present her strategy to the council's policy-making executive board later this year.

Health and social care scrutiny committee chairman Jean Fooks said: "We need to find the others so we can start to help. They're missing out on their childhood."