Government and Labour set to back Dilnot’s LTC plans
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The Government and Labour Opposition are both set to welcome the main thrust of Andrew Dilnot’s commission into reforming social care without committing to a specific cost cap.
Dilnot will publish his final report today, which is expected to recommend introducing a cap on the costs of long-term care of between £35,000 and £50,000 and an increase to the threshold of assets individuals can hold and still receive means-tested Government help from £23,250 to around £100,000.
Reports last weekend suggested the Treasury was unhappy with the Government costs associated with the reform package, expected to be at least £2bn annually. An unnamed senior Liberal Democrat suggested Chancellor George Osborne wanted to “strangle the proposals at birth”.
However, speaking on BBC 1’s Andrew Marr show on Sunday morning, Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said the Government would give the Dilnot report “a very positive response” without committing to a specific cap.
He said: “Andrew Dilnot’s commission makes clear that there is a range of issues within their own report that need to be resolved and on which it is fair for people to be able to express their view: where a cap should be set; how it is to be paid for; issues with the threshold for the means test; how the means test should be applied to people in the future, so they contribute to the cost of their care.
“And of course if people are in residential homes, they raise the question of the extent to which they should pay for their accommodation costs – as it were, their ’hotel’ costs in residential homes.”
Labour leader Ed Miliband has written to Prime Minister David Cameron and his deputy Nick Clegg pledging Labour’s support for a political consensus based around Dilnot’s findings. The issue of funding social care caused a major political row before the general election with the Conservative Party attacking the Labour suggestion that a tax on estates could help fund LTC costs.
Miliband writes: “My offer is simple. I’ll put aside Labour’s pre-election plans and proposals in good faith to try and find a solution.
“I return I hope you both will show the same kind of leadership of your parties as well. The last thing Britain needs is for Andrew Dilnot’s proposals to be put into the long grass.
“We three party leaders are of similar age and the same generation. This is a once in a generation opportunity which our generation must address.”
The introduction of a cap on care costs has been heavily lobbied for by the financial services industry. Dilnot hopes that insurance or equity release products could help individuals meet their share of the costs of care and other associated costs.
Reports suggest Dilnot will also recommend that local authorities will be able to offer equity release-style loans at preferential rates which could be redeemed on the person’s estate after they die.
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