Fund NHS with ‘higher baby boomer tax’

BABY boomers should pay more tax to fund spiralling health and welfare costs caused by the ageing population, a Tory former minister claims.

Lord Willetts insists higher taxes on wealth are needed to prevent young people, who are already struggling to match their parents’ living standards, bankrolling the crisis by themselves.

Research by the Resolution Foundation think-tank suggests that by 2030 spending on health, education and social security will rise by £20billion in today’s money, and £60billion by 2040.

The extra spending, almost entirely driven by health costs, would need a massive 15p increase in the basic rate of income tax to cover the funding gap until 2040 unless reforms are made elsewhere.

In a speech today, Resolution Foundation chairman Lord Willetts is expected to say: ‘The time has come when boomers are going to have reach into our own pockets. For 30 years Britain has enjoyed a time when baby boomers were at peak earning power. Politicians talked as if tax cuts were the normal state of British politics.

‘But we are at a tipping point. Unless we act, we will face a choice between changing our approach to taxation or cutting access to the NHS and letting social care get into an even deeper crisis. We can’t delay that debate any longer.’