Ditching of social care plan is a tragedy

Chancellor Rachel Reeves’s decision to scrap planned changes to the care system in England has been described as a “tragedy” by Sir Andrew Dilnot, the man who authored the proposals in 2011.

Speaking to the BBC’s Today programme, Sir Andrew said: “We’ve failed another generation of families.”

He said it was another example of social care “being given too little attention, being ignored, being tossed aside”.

Ms Reeves said: “There are a lot of things this new Labour government would like to do but unless you can say where the money is going to come from you can’t do them.”

On Monday, the chancellor set out a series of spending cuts, which she argued were a result of a £21.9bn government overspend hidden by the previous Conservative government.

Shadow chancellor Jeremy Hunt accused her of a “shameless attempt to lay the ground for tax rises” in the October Budget.

The social care plan would have introduced an £86,000 cap on the amount an older or disabled person would have to pay towards their support at home or in care homes from next October.

After spending £86,000 on their care, people with a high level of need would have had their care costs paid for by local authorities.

The threshold for getting some council support to pay for costs, before exceeding the cap, would also be made more generous, with people with assets up to £100,000 able to qualify, rather than £23,250 currently.

The care system is facing increasing demand from an ageing population and because people are living longer with more complex conditions.

It has been widely viewed as being in crisis for years – underfunded and struggling to recruit enough staff.

Caroline Abrahams, Director of the charity Age UK, says the care system has “gone from merely creaking to a state of near collapse in some places”.

She describes the scrapping of the care cap as “really bad news for all those older people who were hoping against hope for some relief from their sky high care bills,” leaving them “on their own” in the short term at least.

The Conservative government had already delayed the plans by two years and got rid of the National Insurance rise which was meant to fund them.

Ms Reeves estimated that scrapping the reform would save £1bn by the end of next year.

Asked if the cap would be reintroduced at a later date, Ms Reeves said her colleague Health Secretary Wes Streeting would be working with the sector to improve social care.

The public spending think tank, the Institute for Fiscal Studies, warned that ditching the cap could see people paying “extremely high social care costs” running into hundreds of thousands of pounds.

David Sturrock, senior research economist at the think tank, said there was still “unhappiness” in the NHS and social care sector about the existing funding model.

“The government may still see itself having to find substantial funds for social care services further down the line.”

Labour’s manifesto did not commit to a date for introducing the cap, but during the election campaign Mr Streeting said his party would introduced the spending cap if it won the election.

Sir Andrew Dilnot said that dropping the cap was “unbelievably disappointing for hundreds of thousands of families who need care, for the people who are providing it, for those who are trying to make decisions about it”.

“I really, really hope that after this blip we get back to a serious plan.”

There is a 25-year history of plans to reform social care being ditched by different governments. Sir Andrew’s plans have come the closest to being implemented.

He proposed a cap on social care costs in 2011 and the government passed legislation to introduce it in 2014 but its implementation was later delayed.

New proposals to put in place a cap were announced in 2021 and due to start in October 2023.

That was then delayed until October 2025, but councils were allowed to keep money intended to prepare for the changes.

However, that money has since been spent by councils to ease financial pressures, leading to what the IFS called a £4bn “hole”.

Addressing MPs on Monday, Ms Reeves said she understood why people were angry adding: “I am angry too.”

She accused the previous government of making “commitment after commitment without knowing where the money was going to come from”.

Shadow Chancellor Jeremy Hunt told the BBC that Ms Reeves “knew about” spending pressures adding: “If there is any black hole, it’s of Rachel Reeves’s own making.”

A spokesperson for the Department for Health and Social Care said the government was committed to tackling the challenges, but pointed out the difficulties with next year’s deadlines.

“Preparations have not been made, the reforms have not been funded, and social care providers say it will be impossible to deliver them by October 2025,” he said.

The government has talked about introducing a Royal Commission to draw up a plan for social care with cross-party agreement.

But in 1997 the new Labour government also set-up a Royal Commission to recommend reform – those ideas, which included free personal care for people, were introduced in Scotland, but in England were deemed too expensive.

Many who work in or use care services will view another commission or inquiry as a way of kicking plans for reform even further down the road.

And delay has a financial and human cost – both in terms of increased pressures on the NHS and on families struggling to cope with a broken system.