Social care is a problem that doesn’t go away, just because we ignore it. Thanks To Charles Tallack for this important thread.
Overdue 🧵on social care charging reform. It’s been more than 2 weeks since the govt announced delay, but I wanted to let my anger and frustration settle. I’ve spent much time & energy working on this issue so here are my thoughts. 1/22
— Charles Tallack (@CharlesTTHF) December 2, 2022
A re-cap. The cap & means test changes were recommended by the Dilnot Commission. The commission was set up by the coalition government in 2010 to solve a huge problem with the way to we pay for social care. I was chief analyst (hence my particular interest). 3/22
— Charles Tallack (@CharlesTTHF) December 2, 2022
If you are an adult aged 18-64 with a disability you will also pay for your care. You won’t be able to save/keep more than £23k. People born with a disability will start to pay when they enter adulthood if they have sufficient savings. 5/22
— Charles Tallack (@CharlesTTHF) December 2, 2022
People pay vastly different amounts depending on their care needs. Someone needing 5 years in care in late life could pay £125k out of their assets. That’s the value of a house in ex-red-wall Hartlepool. In contrast, someone with few or no care needs pays nothing. 7/22 pic.twitter.com/x0pjVe4ueW
— Charles Tallack (@CharlesTTHF) December 2, 2022
We can’t do this for social care. Despite wishful thinking of politicians (Cameron the latest), no insurer will offer pre-funded insurance to cover the risks. Dilnot Commission established this after extensive discussions with insurers in 2010/11. 9/22 https://t.co/RJkY0wywbt
— Charles Tallack (@CharlesTTHF) December 2, 2022
The govt. legislated for this in 2014 care act (and said cap would be £72k) but then delayed indefinitely in 2015. Delay was aided by the LGA who said that the money for the cap should instead be put into the social care system (it wasn’t of course). 11/22 pic.twitter.com/3elGgkn2BL
— Charles Tallack (@CharlesTTHF) December 2, 2022
The govt. legislated for this in 2014 care act (and said cap would be £72k) but then delayed indefinitely in 2015. Delay was aided by the LGA who said that the money for the cap should instead be put into the social care system (it wasn’t of course). 11/22 pic.twitter.com/3elGgkn2BL
— Charles Tallack (@CharlesTTHF) December 2, 2022
The cap only happened because the PM championed the reforms. The Treasury couldn’t kill the idea but still managed to force an amendment to the 2014 Act so that the cap was less costly. This gave people with modest wealth far less protection. 15/22https://t.co/7uuup1L0KP
— Charles Tallack (@CharlesTTHF) December 2, 2022
But in the autumn statement the Chancellor announced that “after listening to concerns of local government”, adult social care charging reforms would be delayed. Local govt repeated their 2015 mistaken despite @RichardnotatKF warnings not to. 17/22
https://t.co/qB8qhQUzmr— Charles Tallack (@CharlesTTHF) December 2, 2022
And Andrew Dilnot – the architect of the reforms – calmly raged about the govt’s decision. 19/22https://t.co/YIc9xyn0Z5
— Charles Tallack (@CharlesTTHF) December 2, 2022
Conclusion: protection against social care costs is a missing part of our welfare state. A capped cost model is a cheaper way of offering protection then providing free care to everyone (= cap of ÂŁ0). In the 11 years since Dilnot no-one has come up with anything better. 21/22
— Charles Tallack (@CharlesTTHF) December 2, 2022
As the problem won’t go away, Dilnot’s proposals may one day be back on the table. But if they are, any weakness (<100% PM support, a lukewarm or fragmented social care sector) will once again be exploited by the Treasury. /end
— Charles Tallack (@CharlesTTHF) December 2, 2022
To be clear, the reason why there is little or no private insurance available is that the wider context of social care makes it actuarially a pretty uninsurable risk.
We need a clear and stable implementation of “Dilnot”, then the financial services industry can help people to plan how to meet their meet their costs up to the cap.
It’s also the case that there are real problems with the proposed scheme. Having produced a (as far as I know, the only) scenario based model of the new scheme, it offers much less protection than suggested, because of the way it implements the income rules. it’s not that it needs a postponement, it needs a reworking.