Labour hires Strategic Society Centre director to advise on long-term care talks

15 February 2012 11:53 am | By Tom Selby

Labour has drafted in Strategic Society Centre director James Lloyd to advise shadow ministers on forthcoming cross-party talks on social care reform.

The talks are directed at finding a long-term solution to the challenge of funding long-term care.

Labour’s decision to recruit Lloyd (pictured) follows mounting unrest among senior Liberal Democrat MPs about Andrew Dilnot’s care funding reform proposals. Dilnot proposes introducing a cap on individuals’ lifetime contributions to social care costs of between £25,000 and £50,000, with £35,000 the recommended figure.

Last month, a senior LibDem MP told Money Marketing: “The concept of a cap is a good one but it is not clear how this is going to be funded and there is no money available from existing resources.

“Given that this will help better-off people, because the reform is targeted at people who have resources, you could only really justify it if you raised the money in a progressive way or it will be a very regressive measure. We could potentially be creating quite a bureaucratic system.

“There are also serious issues over how the incentives work and whether it will encourage people to invest in preventive care. When you add those things together, there are big issues to be resolved before we can endorse it.”

Lloyd says: “I am very pleased to have been invited by the opposition to support them in finding cross-party agreement on the important issue of reform to England’s long-term care funding system.”

Partnership managing director for care Chris Horlick says: “It is good that someone who has significant experience and genuinely understands the care system is helping advise Labour on care funding.”

If you enjoyed this article, sign up here to receive daily email updates from Money Marketing and Follow @_moneymarketing