The Left's way forward

POGS, and I agree you are in the hard working , sensible spending section - so are many who cannot pay for care

Anya Of course you can always find isolated examples of people who have been profligate. But is that really what most people are like? I certainly don't know anyone who has a good job who has chosen to live in rented accommodation - even people on modest earnings are doing their best to save for a deposit because they know that paying rent is throwing money away.

Given that most houses have risen steeply in price, those that have bought a house have a number of options open to them - to sell it and move to a cheaper area/downsize, to rent it and test out living in a different area/country, etc. etc. If a sale realises a substantial profit and if the worst comes to worst and residential care is needed, they can choose to spend more money on a better quality home if they so wish. Renters do not have such options and these days are at the mercy of landlords who are putting up rents each year or threatening eviction to tenants who ask for basic repairs to be carried out. I would question a person's state of mind if he/she chose to rent when it is perfectly within their means to buy.

Whilst it's admirable that some of you on here feel satisfied that your home can be used in almost its entirety to finance residential care, many people were not willing for this to happen and took steps to avoid it. I think that loophole may have been closed down now but I certainly know somebody who was very comfortably off who got her mother to use this device and whose "inheritance" was subsequently not affected by the deduction of care costs. Most solicitors will tell you that these arrangements were very common amongst people who were "in the know" about such things.

My own feeling is that the inheritance tax threshold should not have been increased to £1,000,000 per couple, since the increasing number of estates in the south east that would have attracted this tax would have yielded a considerable amount of money which could have gone to the exchequer. In fact, I think the inheritance threshold should have been lowered so that more estates - including our own - would have been liable to pay it. I do not think it's fair, though, that only people who have the misfortune to require residential care should bear the whole burden of cost. People who go into residential care because they have significant dementia are not making a "lifestyle choice" - it is necessary in order to keep them physically safe. Imagine if a similar system were used for people with chronic physical or mental illnesses or disabilities who at some stage required lengthy and expensive hospital admissions - that the cost of their care be deducted from their estates on their death. Would that be deemed acceptable? Probably not, because it would affect too many families and would be a vote loser.

You might be interested in a programme I heard on Radio 4 this morning in which Clare Short was intensively interviewed by Peter Hennessey about her life and politics. Very interesting in the light of what's going on in the Labour Party at the moment.

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0638xbd

My Mum paid the fees for her care until she died. I know because I had power of attorney for her and did all her finances, during the 6 years she was in a care home having had a stroke.
She was well looked after there, but would have preferred to be cared for at home. That would have been more expensive than the £250 pw at the time in the Home.(1997 to 2003.)
The fees have increased to a ridiculous amount since then, and many homes have gone out of business because of all the new regs.
Even so, I believe that if a person has the funds they should pay for their own care.

Sorry I have just, 20 pages of posts, got to this thread..so I may well repeat comments or questions but tbh life's too short to check out I am not being repetitive.

I support re-nationalisation. gillybob it can be a different pattern than before but better the profit from any utility /service comes back to the government/council than to a 'fat cat' business. I am not sure why you dislike public sector workers so much! Having been one all my life I have tried hard to give back to society what I got via my training (free to me), worked hard and long hours , chose to have a slightly lower income than equivalent private sector as I was paying into a pension.
Any private company is in it for profit Serco/Babcock/ Veolia/SITA etc who now replace public sector have not reduced your council tax and the workers have far less security. Do you think that is right??

Thank you anno - I've just listened and it was very interesting. I remember being annoyed that Clare Short hadn't resigned at the outset. She sounded quite genuine in her reason for not doing so, although I still think it was a mistake.

I agree with her points re New Labour relying too much on spin and focus groups and not enough on core principles and reasoned debate. Her analysis of the way parliament operates now was, I thought, rather depressing.

When Osborne talks about shrinking the state/the public sector, it's as if all that money which goes towards providing these essential services is at a stroke saved. But just because some public sector workers are not directly employed by the state, their services are needed and cannot be dispensed with. These home carers, nurses, phlebotomists, cleaners, etc. etc. who are no longer directly employed by the state still have to be paid for out of taxes - but via private companies or not-for-profit organisations or, as is increasingly being suggested may happen in future, by introducing direct payment from those people needing the service.

Workers have been re-employed by private businesses at much lower rates of pay and are often treated very badly. In order to slice off a good profit, companies use every opportunity to cut costs - often resulting in low morale and poor, and sometimes unsafe, service provision. Unless people are going to be charged for many more types of service, I don't see how shifting service provision to private companies can, in the long run, reduce the call on the exchequer - but it will make lots of money for many of the companies that donate to the Conservative Party.

Eloethan just because you don't know anyone in a good job you has drunk, smoked, gambled, borrowing or otherwise lost their house through these and other kinds of irresponsible spending, doesn't mean it is an isolated example. It happens more than you realise.

Eloethan

Are you dismissing the other parties because you believe they have /have had no connections to private health care companies whilst serving in the present government or past governments ?

It may have happened Anya but you do seem to be inferring anything that leaves people worse off than you are is all about them not "doing the right thing" which you obviously believe you did.

So much of it is luck. We are all so lucky to have been born into a country where children no longer die in their droves before they are five. We have been lucky to be born into the families we were and to have the DNA which allowed you to fit into and thrive in the society you were born into. Sadly so many people, who think they did it all themselves and that others have only themselves to blame if life was not as good to them, seem to have missed out on empathy.

Eloethan, I have never understood why those who are employed want those who own the means of employment to prosper to such extremes while holding down the wages of others who are also employed.

I think your description of the way in which it is an illusion that money is saved sums up so much of the smoke and mirrors the DC and GO are using.

Anya I have no doubt that there are those with good jobs whose alcoholism, gambling, use of illegal drugs or sheer profligacy has resulted in the loss of their home. Indeed, I knew someone who "drank" his house. But has anyone really ever spent so much on tobacco that they have been rendered homeless?

Various drugs can be smoked, absent, including cannabis and heroin. Anya didn't specify tobacco.

Smoked, injected or sniffed up the nose.

It has happened GG are you saying it doesn't? Some people have led a sheltered life

You know nothing about the family I was born into either.

But Ana there's no point trying.

Oh I know, Anya. Can't resist a nit-picking challenge though...

But Ana we are well-to-do, middle class pensioners, born with all the advantage of good genes, a stable family background and every other opportunity life has to offer.

If only .....

I don't need to know about the family you were born into Anya; it is obvious from what you have said that you were lucky enough to be born with the DNA to overcome any situation you have been faced with - isn't that what you have told us.

However it is a fact that you do not know whether or not I have led a sheltered life and it is a fact that you are currently showing no empathy for those who are not in the same position as you - or have I misread what you are saying?

What is all this about DNA?

Are you really saying, Gracesgran, that those 'lucky enough' to be born with a certain DNA are able to overcome any situation they're faced with and others born with a different DNA - presumably 'unlucky' - are somehow unable to?

No, you mentioned DNA first, not me. And yes, you have misread what little I've posted.

Let me make my position quite clear and then I'll leave this thread.

I fully support the welfare state giving support to those who need help. What gets my goat are those who sponge off the state, having no intention of ever seeking work.

I'm NOT talking about those who lose their jobs due to redundancy, illness or other misfortune. I am NOT talking about those who have tried to find work and can't. NOR am I talking about those with disabilities or learning difficulties or other such reasons for finding themselves unable to work or homeless

There are people who see living off welfare as a lifestyle choice. And they are robbing those who NEED welfare. In a previous job I met these, many of them. That is my gripe. But of course you won't accept that.

So get off your high horse and stop imagining you have a monopoly on sympathy and understanding. And don't bother pouring vitriol on my post as I have no intention of hanging around in this pointless thread to read it.

The thread is not pointless. It is entiely pertinent considring the current Labour leadrship debate going on. What is rather pointless is nit picking over phrases and taking umbrage at comments assumed to be 'personal'. It reduces debate to rather immature bickering.

I caught part of a programme about the YMCA which said that government funding for housing benefit for 18 year olds is going to be cut in the next couple of years and that would affect them and the people they try to help [must watch the whole programme]. However, the man who ran that particular branch did say that people must always be ultimately responsible for their own lives and not always blame the welfare state for letting them down. It is SO difficult to find the balance of having a welfare state that helps people who need help but, at the same time, stopping some people from abusing it. I'm sure that's what Anya meant. I know when I first started work I worked for the housing department and was confused by how some people got their lives into such a mess and how much they expected the council to do for them with regards doing small jobs on their council houses etc. At the same time, I'm someone that could quite easily have gone off the rails when I was young [more luck than judgement that I didn't] and would have needed that welfare state to pick up the pieces.

Time for a link :
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/27/labour-is-now-so-passive-it-might-as-well-be-led-by-an-out-of-office-email?CMP=share_btn_fb

This one is Frankie Boyle's take on the Labour Party.

Anya I acknowledged that you may well know one or more people whose lack of assets is purely down to their own irresponsibility. I questioned whether this is a common occurrence - i.e. that many people holding down well paid jobs spend all their money on the high life and therefore have no assets.

I'm wondering how many people on gransnet personally know such individuals. Even if they do, I suspect that they know many more sensible, hard working people who don't drink, take drugs and gamble their money away but who may still be finding it quite difficult to make ends meet.

I personally only know one person who seems to be totally incapable of managing money and is constantly getting herself into debt - but from what I've seen I believe she has mild learning difficulties and a personality disorder.

POGS I'm well aware that some current and past members of the Labour Party have links with healthcare providers but I believe they are a small (and disgraceful) minority. The Conservative Party's stated aim is to get rid of public sector jobs and replace them with private sector ones. I think the Labour Party's past record of bringing in legislation to improve the position of "ordinary" people, compared to the Conservative Party's record of opposing almost all such progressive policies, speaks for itself.

Anyone who thinks this government is supporting the NHS should look at the response from workers within the NHS who contacted Jeremy Hunt when he said that they needed to be made to work weekends. This was just before he started his 8 week summer break!