care costs

Kirkmain

Just listenting to this episode of you and yours. This poor couple have had to fork out £4k a month to pay for the husbands care. She has spent over £200k of their life savings to look after her husband with dementia. 

Yet if they had been a couple who either never worked, or spent every penny on luxury holidays or gave it to their children as soon as they earned it, and therefor had zero savings, their care would be paid for by the state. How is this fair? Why is Martin Lewis not fighting this?! Why is he wasting time making sure people who are on £60k a year salary get child benefit!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001vkv4

jackieblack

His care may have been paid for by the state, eventually, after a protracted and stressful process, but they would have had little/no choice about the care home he ended up in, or the quality of care provided.

Self funding gives choices, in terms of timing, quality, facilities and location.

Sea_Shell

It's always more of a issue to self fund for the first one to need care, as the house can't be as easily sold.   So even if the house is disregarded, you still need to spend your savings, but at least you have choices.

tacpot12

What are their life savings for other than to care for themselves? As jackieblack pointed out, having the money means you have the choice about where and when you go into care. Relying on the state means you will receive the cheapest care that can be provided. In some cases, this sadly slips below what is adequate or safe.

If people have frittered their money away, they have to take their chances, and yet the state does pay for them because we are a caring society that would not see our feckless old die uncared for.

elsien

This country has a social care crisis. And an unworkable disconnect between health and social care.
Each successive government has come up with a plan,  realised it’s either too difficult or too politically unpopular and kicked it down the line.  Including the recent cap on care cost proposal which this government has bottled out on and extended any action beyond the life of the current parliament.

This is not a Martin Lewis issue. This is a political issue that no one is willing to tackle.

Because supposedly free care comes back on everyone else in the form of taxes. I don’t know what sort of care the lady was  paying for at 4K a month, but it’s going to be a hell of a sight more than any local authority would ever pay. 

So to the OP, what would you be willing to pay to subsidise free care for everyone?

QrizB

elsien said:

So to the OP, what would you be willing to pay to subsidise free care for everyone?

Per this ONS bulletin, total long-term care expenditure in 2021 was £60Bn, with only £14Bn of that being "out of pocket" funding - the sort of ad-hoc privte funding mentioned by the OP.

A 1% cut on basic rate tax has been calculated to cost about £5Bn, so to raise £14Bn a year you'd need to add ~3% to it instead. Or reinstate the Health and Social Care Levy of 1.25% on all NI - which, being paid by those of working age rather than retirees, would increase weath transfer from "hard working families" to pensioners.

Somebody

Wasn't it one of BoJo's pledges that he would fix social care costs once and for all?  Did he not pledge that no one would pay more than £85k over their lifetime for care?  Just another Tory soundbite then?

Albermarle

Somebody said:

Wasn't it one of BoJo's pledges that he would fix social care costs once and for all?  Did he not pledge that no one would pay more than £85k over their lifetime for care?  Just another Tory soundbite then?

Like all these issues, it was not as simple to implement as it sounded and had some potentially negative consequences, one if which being an even greater squeeze on cash strapped councils.

QrizB

Somebody said:

Wasn't it one of BoJo's pledges that he would fix social care costs once and for all?  Did he not pledge that no one would pay more than £85k over their lifetime for care?  Just another Tory soundbite then?

That was the rationale for the Health and Social Care Levy, mentioned above and postponed by Jeremy Hunt. Tax the workers to pay for retirees' care.

Without the levy, there's no money to cap costs.

And, of course, a blunt cap like that mostly helps the better-off.

Keep_pedalling

Anyone in a position to self fund long term care is in a far better position than someone dependant on a cash strapped LA. Apart from having a far greater choice of where you are cared for (including the option of live in carers) you also won’t be left to deteriorate to a level of decrepitude sufficient to get the funding approved.

My mother was dependant on the LA for her care, we won’t be and I am truly thankful for that good fortune. Those that complain most about this usually do so because they see their inheritance being spent rather than their savings. 

QrizB

There's quite a timely article on this in the Guardian today:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/28/barnet-councils-graph-of-doom-now-looks-prophetic

It links back to a financial forecast that Barnet council put together in 2012 and became known as the "Graph of Doom":

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2012/may/15/graph-doom-social-care-services-barnet

At the time, every one applauded and assumed that central government would do something to increase local government funding - by either allowing higher Council Tax or by increasing the grants from general taxation. Strangely, neither has occurred.