Paying for social care - good news or bad news?

I think we need an integrated National Health and Social Care Service. If you are unlucky enough to get cancer or heart disease, you should be entitled to free treatment, but equally if you are unfortunate enough to suffer from dementia, you should be cared for as of right.

So far, I have paid into the system via taxes and NI and have not suffered either cancer or dementia, for which I am very grateful. (touch wood). Life is a lottery. It is unfair, but in a decent society those fortunate enough not to have been afflicted should be more than willing to pay to help those less fortunate.

AgeUK whistling in the wind.

www.ageuk.org.uk/Documents/EN-GB/General_Election_2017/dignity_in_older_age_and_a_later_life_worth_living.pdf

I guess IMay didn't consult them.

They don't talk to each other for a start

That's what she gets for it being her manifesto!
There's no way all those departments could work together and come up with the same solution.

Fair wealth tax seems sensible. The problem with this idea is that there could be just so many unintended consequences. It could kill the buying of houses - far better to have a more portable and easily disposable investment.

It could be a long time coming. According to the piece on PM the Department of Health, the Cabinet Office, the Department for Work and Pensions, No 10 and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport are going to be involved in trying to figure out how this can happen. It sounds like another Mayism written on the back of an envelope like the return of Grammar Schools; just a May daydream that others have to make work no matter what it actually does to the people it is imposed on. It would, so the BBC Business Editor said, kill or make some financial industries, change the way family members relate to one another and be one of the biggest changes in intergenerational wealth distribution we have seen in decades.

Varian there are hundreds of thousands if not millions of people who have worked their socks off for 40 or 50 years for a pittance making it impossible for them to save or pay private pensions to fund their old age .We shouldn't condemn them to inferior care because they weren't as lucky in life as others .Having said that I think this will lose the tories a lot of votes ( I hope it does)The elderly are just next on her list after the disabled she's running out of groups to target

"But, you could argue, why shouldn’t wealthy people in homes worth thousands pay some of that into the system? They should, but there are better and fairer ways of realising those resources than trying to extract money from them at a time of great anxiety anyway – when someone has become ill and disabled enough to require care. Increasing inheritance tax is one way of fairly and progressively getting money into the system that could pay towards the costs of health and social care for all. Additionally increasing taxation, in a progressive way so the better off pay more, would also bring more money in. It would mean that people would be paying into the costs of their future care through their lifetimes and not having to face it all at once at a time of great anxiety and vulnerability, or it would be collected via inheritance tax after they died. Both ways avoid the anxiety and bureaucracy of sorting out paying for care at exactly the same time that crisis has befallen. It would also avoid the individualization of costs and the penalization of those unlucky enough to have greater care needs, sharing the cost across society on exactly the same principle of social solidarity as the NHS.

And collected via the Treasury from taxation uses a tried and true method of distributing resources without the need for recourse to the inevitably rip-off “products” that the banks will create to relieve people of their equity.

The Tories hate inheritance tax – they called it a death tax – but at least it is fair. This new Tory “illness tax” will place the burden of paying for misfortune on the individual and that is fundamentally unfair."

NHA.

I think it is so sad. Ordinary folk have saved like mad for a deposit, worked hard and going without whilst bringing up their children and paying their mortgage. They have minimal savings but what they do have and proudly so is their house, a symbol of everything that happened in their life. They hope that they will be able to leave their children a reasonable inheritance, that will give their offspring more than they ever had, just as the wealthy have been able to do for ever.

They age and are extraordinarily unlucky to have health bad enough to need care. The vast majority of what represents a life's work is destined to enter another's pocket.

There was a really interesting article on PM (Radio 4) and I will try and go back to listen to it - lots of interesting points raised. The last one was that, if the money is taken out for this generation, where will the money come from for the next generation who will be even less able to buy their own houses and may not even see the point in doing so.

Yes I know those who need it will get it but as Anya says, don't hold your breath on the quality. And the price will go up for domiciliary care as there will be more cash in the pot for all the care home owners who donate to the Tories the providers. Yes it's the descendants who will miss out and I know not all - none of us know the figures because TM can't be bothered to put any figures in her manifesto - but anyway, it's the principle many of us object to.

Rigby Everybody who needs social care will get it for however many years. It's the descendants who will lose out, but only some of them. Many poorer ones will actually gain, especially of relatives have to go into a home.

No one has yet picked up my point about where all this money will end up.

It will be the private providers who will be the only ones to profit. They are already living in big houses and driving large cars, while paying the minimum wage to poorly trained, over-worked and exploited 'care workers'. Just forget the residential sector for one minutes and think about the kind of care packages being put in place for vulnerable people already.

When my elderly neighbour was discharged from hospital after a knee replacement no one turned up to put her to bed or to get her up next morning. When they did eventually arrive the care was minimal, inadequate. She had no family to help her so I had to step in and do their job for them.

This is what we will be paying for more than likely.

If I get to that stage I'll be dissolving all my medication in a nice aged, single malt and getting out of here

Also re value of house prices rocketing in some ares - this could be dealt with by taxing the increase in house values for everyone at some stage - not just making those who need care lose out. This could be one way of helping to fund social care for everyone. I really am amazed on this thread at those who just shrug their shoulders at the unfairness that results between those who stay fit and healthy and those who don't so far as social care is concerned. As Jess points out, there is much unfairness in society and one of the tasks of government should be to mitigate that as much as possible not add to it - oh wait, this is a Conservstive government.

Well 24 hours on, as some of us expected, all the lack of detail and thought of this 'policy' proposal are coming home to roost. People on this thread and outside GN are realising there is much to worry about and no answers available. One example that came up today on the radio is a daughter who gave up work to care for her mother with whom she lives. The mother now requires domicilary care - if this scheme comes in, the daughter could have a huge debt to pay back when her mother dies and therefore would have to sell the house to pay it and then where would she live? Under the present scheme of course, the house would not count as an asset and if the mother had to move into residential care, the house would also not count as an asset as long as the daughter was over 60. Maybe when some actual thought is put into this idea, such exemptions will be part of the scheme but how very very very wicked to put out such a threadbare policy and leave people to worry and fret about all the unknowns. And don't anyone say 'wait and see' - it's perfectly understandable that people will be worrying now. It's just what's happening with WFA - we're told it's going to be means tested but not given any idea how. So another vacuum within which people who really need the money can worry. Well I'm with Nye Bevan and his opinion of Tories at the moment.

We have no proper end of life care in the NHS - this has been picked up by charities running hospices. I wonder how long it will be before we have to run charities to provide Social Care in old age.

Just a thought that occurred to me on my way back from my lunch-time visit to my Mum's.

It is very annoying to find that the council are so underfunding the cost of care for those they pay for that those self-funding are subsidising them but it is certainly not the fault of the funded patients. It is partly the fault of the council's that they are underfunding but even that is understandable when you realise how their budgets have been cut. The fault lies, fairly and squarely at the feet of the government.

Love that blog, railman

Thanks for the link...

Good post varian

I thought I was cross about the iniquities in the Tory "Manifesto", but this guy has the edge:

anotherangryvoice.blogspot.co.uk

We were not in a position to care for my husband's parents who, between them, spent ten years in residential care. They had no help from the state other than state pensions, which of course they had paid into and, latterly attendance allowance. A week's attendance allowance did not even pay for a day's care.

They had always been careful with money, although they were not well off, and so they had some savings and a house. After the savings were gone, the house was sold, leaving very little to be passed on to the next generation.

However we took the view that although it would have been nice to inherit more, we had no right to do so. We were glad that they were cared for in their last years, which we knew was the case as we visited them and took them out frequently.

Most of the other residents were being paid for by the state, and whether this was because they had never saved or never had much, I could not say, but it was annoying to find that those who self-fund are also subsidising the rest as the councils were charged less for the same care in the same home and I do think this is wrong.

The state can't afford everything.

Honestly, does anyone think before post such things.

The 'state' doesn't 'afford' anything and this is just a discussion about how it collects what is needed and distributes it; if that is a fair, less expensive to manage and gives all citizens what they need when they need it.

One commenter on here has set me thinking.

Why not establish an offshore company - be it in Ireland, the Netherlands, Gibraltar or IoM - and transfer ownership of the home as an asset to that company?

Maybe we could ask Philip May for advice?

Apologies all - I see there are comments further down about the iniquity of equity release.

Should have read further!

rosesarered - I think you are spot on - this statement is just a vote catcher, for anyone who is not reading through the lines.

The OP's explanation is very good - except the missing element of having to arrange 'equity release' from the home, if the chronic illness lasts beyond the £100k ceiling. I fear council's will be required to offer loans to people who are paying for their own care - and they will be charging interest, all of which will become due and payable on the death of the homeowner - be it an elderly parent, or anyone with a chronic condition who is cared for in their own home.

No surprise it's been branded a "Dementia Tax".

Roses I think we are comparing the situation of saving and then the unfairness that illness etc brings due to no fault of anyone and losing almost everything and a perfect situation where one never needs care due to the luck of the draw again and all wealth left intact for the next generation.
But who ever said life was fair?