Seething resentment of homeowners forced to sell up to pay for care
SIR – Jackie Doyle-price, the social care minister (“Homes aren’t an asset to give to your children, says minister,” report, October 12), just does not get the seething resentment of those who have probably paid high taxes all their lives (which funded others’ welfare and index-linked public-sector pensions) and are now expected to pay for their own care at the end of their lives.
The logical inference from the position adopted by Ms Doyle-price is for us to sell up at the age of 55, rent somewhere, give our cash to the kids and spend the rest as if there were no tomorrow. Then there would be a level playing field between those who contributed the most and those who have contributed the least.
I despair at the lack of Conservatism in this Government. Where is the reward for working hard, doing the right thing and trying to give one’s children and grandchildren a helping hand by passing on some of the assets left at the end of one’s life? James Kent
Crakehall, North Yorkshire
SIR – Scenario: I do not own a home, having rented for many years. However, I have accumulated substantial assets in cash, shares and works of art.
Would anyone suggest that all these assets have to be retained for the benefit of my children, leaving it for the state to pick up the bill for my residential care?
Why, therefore, is a home any different? P H Brady
Radlett, Hertfordshire
SIR – What’s new? When dementia struck in 1989, my mother had to sell her flat to fund her care. She died in 1995 and there was not much left. David Milford
Shaugh Prior, Devon SIR – The Prime Minister promises billions of pounds for more social housing. Wonderful for those lucky enough to qualify, but my concern is for those young couples who are not poor enough for council housing but not wealthy enough to afford the astronomical prices now asked for even modest homes in some parts of the country.
They are trapped in the high rental bracket and, for them, there seems to be no way out or up. These are the “just about managings” about whom the then new PM expressed so much concern, but who now seem to be slipping out of her memory.
No wonder the Conservatives have lost the younger generation. They have virtually told them that nothing can be done to help them. Myra Spalton
Macclesfield, Cheshire SIR – As we watched Far from the Madding Crowd on television recently, it occurred to me that we had better record the series, as its setting, the Blackmore Vale, an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in Dorset, is about to be vandalised by developments of several hundred houses.
These are being foisted upon what Thomas Hardy called the “Vale of Little Dairies” by a company with no local interest and apparently few cares in the world except making money for their investors.
I live in Hardy’s Stapleford, not far from his Casterbridge. I look out on the Vale and wonder that our political masters can even begin to think of allowing, even encouraging, such vandalism. Tim Otter
Stalbridge, Dorset