Funding care but is it Boris the bold or the abandoner?
■ Aidan says that those with a certain amount of private pensions should not have a state pension (MetroTalk, Wed). After 43 years of paying into my state and works pension so that I can retire and feel safe (being unemployed for only one week in that period and having no children), I totally disagree with Aidan.
I can understand the rich being taxed more as they don’t spend most of their life worrying about paying for essential items but stop having a go at those who have spent their life preparing for later years, and are now having contributions taken away by successive governments, including a six-year loss of pension already.
Thank God Boris is sorting the issue of care. The NHS should be for all at any age.
Christine Smith, St Austell
■ Aidan, I’ve paid into both a private pension and also had to pay into a National Insurance stamp that guaranteed me a pension. There’s no way the state pension should be removed from people who have paid into it all their working life, no matter what their private pension is.
Ger, Glasgow
■ The 1.25 percentage point increase to National Insurance (Metro, Wed) is disgusting. Young people are being
abandoned. House prices are higher than ever, there’s a jobs shortage, and then there’s tuition fees and inflation.
And Mr Tom (MetroTalk, Wed) says ‘shame on us’? I say, ‘Selfish you, and selfish government!’ There are a thousand other ways to raise the money. Reward the working class! Tax the rich!
Mark, Birmingham
■ Regarding social care, I’ve heard over and over how a family ‘had’ to sell their house to pay for a place in a care home. My question is, what happens to those who don’t own their home, or are not worth the amount that would cover these excessive care home fees?
I’ve had to rebuild my life three times over the years and it’s not easy to do that as a working-class man, I assure you. So when I reach retirement age, I’ll certainly have to take on part-time work to top up my pension (I have two private pensions).
Geoff Hall, Croydon
■ So Boris’s government is raising tax to cover the backlog of patients waiting for treatment on the NHS due to the Covid crisis, and to sort out the costs for elderly people needing to go into care homes. What did people expect?
We’ve had one of the most successful vaccination campaigns in the world. That cost money, most of which was created by quantitative easing.
This proposed tax hike for the forthcoming October Budget is by no means punitive – 1.25 percentage points on National Insurance is not very much at all for each individual. And if it means that social care costs can be capped at £86,000 – and Mr Johnson promised to sort out social care costs in his manifesto – then it’s a small price to pay indeed.
Also, pensioners will now have to pay more tax. This is only fair if they are earning above tax thresholds.
My main worry is that, as a 65-year-old anticipating collecting my state pension next year, the pension triple lock will be suspended indefinitely and this country’s state pension will fall even further behind as a percentage of the average wage compared to that of other Western countries.
Dr J, Stoke
■ Most polls suggest the public is in favour of this tax hike to pay for social care. The prime minister is being bold – somebody has to be!
Labour duck the question because they can. Sir Keir Starmer criticises but doesn’t offer a constructive alternative solution – another example of Labour treating the electorate as stupid.
Just imagine if the government didn’t have an enormous majority. We would be discussing this proposal for months, if not years, kicking it into the long grass until a general election.
Paul, West Midlands
■ It’s most unfair to be collecting this extra tax for social care from those least able to afford it. Why not make a two per cent rise for the higher-rate payers, who pay 40 per cent and above?
Jenny Day, Rochester
■ I agree with National Insurance affecting younger people more than the elderly – after all, they’ve been in this world for just five minutes and, after living off mum and dad all their lives, they haven’t really contributed to the system that is the country, whereas older folk have been paying in most of their life.
Paul, Northolt