in the discussions about proposals it is being suggested that NI charged to pensioners would cover the cost of their changes. This amounts to around £100 per month which would decrease the state pension for £5200 per year down to £4200 per year. If you are living in rented accommodation even if it is one room, it is below starvation levels. For those not in rented accommodation you may find you will need to take in a lodger. If you have a small pension, potentially it would be negated making your income £5200 per year.
The life expectancy is now increased to 75 years old and the estima The estimate tes are that the average number of people who go in to care is two years. This means that for 73 years the person has been self fundded and subject to recessions and redundancies, have paid NI and income for 40-50 years. If the government has known about this boom in population and increase in life expectancy for 70 years and they have as we have all heard of discussions about it for many years, why haven't they set aside the NI and income tax being paid for the then much larger working populaton to cover their care costs - we were lead to believe that was what it was designed for.
If it is known that the expectancy is going to increase, why hasn't building taken place before crisis point? If it is known that people will have to work longer why are the older workers being demonised? The young do need support to get on to the work platform but they will get old too - the children of the last of the baby boomers are almost old enough to be grand parents themselves. - so either, the older live on welfare or employers need to be encouraged to have a more positive attitude to older workers too and create new options. If the older workers vacate the jobs that are more taxing and receive guidance about moving across to a different career or profession. To create this ethic now paves the way for the next generation from the boomers, the first of which are not far away from retirement even though the finish post keeps moving further away.
If a pensioner can only work 10 hours per week for health reasons to supplement their £5200 state pension, then all that they earn is deducted on NI alone.
If taxes are collected to cover the costs of care, there needs to be assurances that any surplus is put towards the costs of care as most of the taxes paid in by the current retired appears to have been used up in welfare elsewhere.
The estimated cost of care is being quoted as 8 billion. We give away 8 billion on foreign aid and have just committed with a group of other countries to provide 10 billion in aid to one specific country separate to that.
It doesn't seem fair that a person only keeps their house if they go in to care for free in order that the family can inherit it - the tax payer is technically funding the family. The family and the elderly person have a choice - either they can offer to care for the person thereby retaining their inheritance or choose not to and let it go. The elderly person may not wish for their family to care for him/her and should be under no pressure. It would be advisable for local councils, separate to GP practices to offer support in caring as their are no books to guide on care. There are plenty of books on childcare but nothing about what happens with growing older and how to deal with it. The carer could do with the equivalent of a health visitor, support worker and the welfare of both needs support. It would be nice to think that all families would help to care for the one older person in the household or familywho is more frail but the reality is that it either the spouse or just one sibling. It would be helpful if the local council were more supportive in providing advice on services and options to gain support even if it is paid for. For example, a support worker could train the carer how to do online shopping, locate a befriender who could stay with the frail person for a couple of hours occasionally so that the carer could attend their own medical appointments, get hair cuts etc. All that the council/local authority needs to do in a lot of cases is create new links in the carers network to employ and engage services to manage their lives without expense to their pot.