Prime Minister backtracks on social care as Labour close in
Activists say voters confused by policies
We have not changed the principles of the policies. Prime Minister Theresa May.
THERESA MAY’S election campaign suffered its first serious setback after narrowing polls and warnings from Conservative candidates forced her into a major U-turn on her flagship manifesto pledge yesterday.
Mrs May had to defend herself against suggestions that her offer of a cap on social care costs undermined her claim to offer voters “strong and stable leadership”.
The Prime Minister used the launch of the Welsh Conservative manifesto to reinstate an upper limit on the amount that anyone will have to pay for care in old age just four days after the party dumped the idea.
The move came as two polls pointed to Labour enjoying a fivepoint boost following both major parties’ manifesto launches last week and Conservative activists reported Mrs May’s plans for social care and means-testing the winter fuel allowance had confused voters.
One Conservative candidate said: “We have had a lot of people getting in touch about the winter fuel allowance. I think the presentation of both polices has been poor.
“In my constituency it has single-handedly resuscitated the Labour campaign.”
Another said: “People recognise the fairness element of the fuel allowance policy but the social care policy hasn’t been properly sold.
“The overriding view is that it’s not a deal-breaker that will make people vote for Corbyn instead, but they’re not entirely happy about it, even if they understand that it has to be paid for somehow.”
Conservative activists from across Yorkshire confirmed both issues had been raised in weekend canvassing with complaints focused as much on the lack of detail on the policies as on the principles behind them.
The Conservatives last week insisted their plan to guarantee older people would retain £100,000 in assets was fairer than the social care cap suggested by an independent commission led by economist Sir Andrew Dilnot.
But the policy was branded a “dementia tax” because it put no upper limit on the amount people could be charged for their care.
Mrs May yesterday said the already-promised Green Paper on social care would consult on an “absolute limit on the amount people have to pay” but insisted “nothing has changed”.
She said: “We have not changed the principles of the policies we set out in our manifesto. Those policies remain exactly the same.
“What we have done, which other parties have signally failed to do, is to recognise the challenge that we face, to respect the needs and concerns of the British people and to provide a long-term plan for sustainable social care which means that elderly people in this country won’t have to worry about how their social care will be paid for in the future.”
Former Hull MP and deputy prime minister Lord Prescott was yesterday campaigning with Jeremy Corbyn as the Labour leader visited the city and Scarborough.
He said: “All her life is about Uturns. She’s standing as ‘could be relied on’, stable and trustworthy; I think the people have got the real measure of this woman – you can’t trust her. Did the Cabinet discuss it? No. Did the parliament discuss it? No. Did their party discuss it? No. Just ‘me, me, me’ and she’s the only one that does a Uturn on her own thing.”
A poll by Survation published yesterday showed Labour up five percentage points to 34 per cent while ICM had the party also up five points to 33 per cent.
Last night Mrs May insisted her party is “committed” to curbing immigration to the tens of thousands despite claims that she did not have the backing of the Cabinet. The Prime Minister dismissed comments in an editorial in the London Evening Standard, edited by former chancellor George Osborne, which said no top ministers supported the Tory target. She added: “We have brought in new rules. We’ve ruled out a lot of abuse that was taking place in the system.”
THERESA MAY was being disingenuous when she blamed Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn’s “fake claims, fear and scaremongering” for the Tory party’s embarrassing volte-face over social care.
As Prime Minister and party leader, this was Mrs May’s manifesto and she should have thought through the consequences of the proposals before beating a retreat 96 hours after the formal launch in Halifax – one of the quickest u-turns in electoral history.
So much for Mrs May’s much-vaunted “strong and stable” leadership. She sounded shrill and rattled when she told reporters that “nothing has changed, nothing has changed” after being pressed about the terms of the consultation that will follow if the Tories are returned to office.
There also appears to be signs of a breakdown of discipline within the PM’s inner circle – details of her concession were leaked to George Osborne, the former Chancellor, who then mocked Mrs May in a withering editorial in the Evening Standard, the paper he edits, which concluded: “Just as well, really, that this manifesto wasn’t written on a tablet of stone.”
Yet the irony, as Labour continue to break the bank with its electoral promises, is that Mrs May’s instincts are correct. Britain has been spending beyond its means for too long and long-term changes to the funding of social care are required to take account of Britain’s ageing population. The longer the day of reckoning is put off, the harder it will be to reconcile these dilemmas.
And though the Tory manifesto guaranteed that no-one would see their total assets depleted below £100,000 as a result of care costs, the apparent rejection of a cap on contributions, due to be pegged at £72,000 from 2020, led many to conclude that the elderly would pay the price for these reforms as the Tories looked to reconfigure the economy on the back of the hardearned money of pensioners.
Coming in the aftermath of a Budget u-turn on NI contributions for the selfemployed, another selfinflicted own goal, Mrs May needs to reappraise how she forms policy rather than blaming others. After all, this doesn’t bode well for Brexit – the issue that triggered this election.