SAM BRODBECK PERSONAL ACCOUNT

Forget the mansion tax, the new Chancellor must make social care his first priority

When he stands up to deliver the first proper Budget of Boris Johnson’s majority government, Rishi Sunak will have been Chancellor of the Exchequer for a matter of weeks and will not have reached the age of 40.

As is clear from pages 1-3 of today’s Money section, Mr Sunak has a lot to consider – and a historic opportunity to make real, lasting change.

Interminable Brexit negotiations meant that normal Parliamentary business ground to a halt for three-and-a-half years: essential reforms never made it on to the statute books and serious problems that afflict the property market, thousands of pension pots and millions of families’ tax plans remain unsolved.

Mr Sunak and the Tories must seize the moment. The Government has an 80-seat majority, the Conservatives’ biggest for more than 30 years, while Labour is in disarray and more than four years remain until voters return to the polls.

Now is the time for bold plans, not the kind of kneejerk announcements deemed necessary to keep Jeremy Corbyn from No 10. We must hope Sajid Javid’s departure signals the end of plans to slash tax relief on pension contributions or introduce what would be Britain’s first wealth levy since the “window tax” of 1696.

No, what is needed most urgently is a workable fix for our rapidly failing social care system. Families are grappling both with little-understood funding rules – such as the NHS’s “continuing healthcare” provision – and with huge regional variations in the quality and cost of care homes.

Self-funded residents, those with assets of more than £23,350 in England, pay as much as a third more than a council is charged for exactly the same level of care.

Unscrupulous law firms are using the confusion to sell dubious schemes to people desperate to protect family homes and other assets from being swallowed up by the care system.

Even a short stay in a home can be ruinous. The average cost of a room in a nursing home reached £937 a week (£48,700 a year) in England in 2019, according to industry analyst LaingBuisson.

Is a lasting solution possible without tapping into the cash tied up in homes?

Theresa May’s solution – nicknamed the “dementia tax” by her enemies – ensured she lost her majority in the snap election of 2017. Boris Johnson was understandably nervous about making the same mistake ahead of the December 2019 poll.

In his first speech after his election victory, Mr Johnson said he would come up with a fix. In an interview the next day, he added that the “key thing” was that “nobody should sell their home to pay for the cost of care”. Is a lasting solution possible without tapping into the wealth tied up in Britain’s homes? What is certain is that the Prime Minister and his Chancellor have no excuse for more delays.

If now isn’t the time to tackle social care, when is?