TIME TO END THE DEMENTIA CARE BILLS BETRAYAL
Two homes which these proud owners worked all their lives for... sold to pay for their crippling dementia care costs. Today the Mail demands our new PM stops this scandalous injustice affecting millions
THE Daily Mail today calls on ministers to end the disgraceful neglect of families living with the burden of dementia.
We have been inundated with letters from readers after revealing that families spent £15billion over the past two years supporting relatives who have the illness. Many sufferers have had to sell their homes to pay for care.
In a further insult, they then effectively subsidise council-funded places in the same residential homes.
A plan to fix the broken care system was promised in March 2017 – but the resulting green paper has been delayed six times, with no sign of when it will be published.
With a new prime minister taking over next week, the Mail demands:
The urgent establishment of a crossparty group to tackle the crisis;
It must examine all funding options, including extra pension contributions, tax breaks for social care spending and the creation of innovative insurance schemes;
The creation of an NHS ‘dementia fund’ to help families pay the extra costs of looking after sufferers;
An end to the ‘double subsidy’ in which care homes charge a higher
rate for private residents than those funded by councils;
A minister to attend Cabinet with sole responsibility for providing a definitive plan of action;
That no one should be forced to sell their home to pay for their dementia care costs.
Charities, think-tanks, academics and politicians of all parties last night backed the Mail’s stand.
‘People with dementia have struggled enough – draining their savings on care while people with other diseases get support free on the NHS,’ said Sally Copley of the Alzheimer’s Society. ‘How many more billions do they have to spend before the Government takes action?
‘The next prime minister needs to take charge and announce a plan to end the tax on dementia.
‘This will change the lives of so many families with dementia up and down the country, who have been neglected and abandoned for too long.’
The delayed green paper is just the latest in 22 years of government commissions, reviews and proposals, all of which have been shelved or dropped.
Experts say politicians have reached a stalemate and the only way to make progress is with a cross-party solution.
The middle classes have borne the brunt of the crisis, with many families denied the chance of handing their house to their children.
Anyone with more than £23,250 in assets – including the value of their home – has to pay the full cost of their care, which can reach £100,000 a year.
And when they sell up and go into a home they end up subsidising those whose support is state-funded. A selffunded room costs an average of £43,993 a year, 36 per cent more than an identical room paid for by a local council.
Around 180,000 dementia patients live in care homes in England and 74,000 of them pay all the fees themselves. Many of the remaining 106,000 only get part of their costs paid.
The Government says the social care green paper will be published at the ‘earliest opportunity’. But the Mail insists a fresh, cross-party approach is needed.
Caroline Abrahams, charity director of Age UK, said: ‘For far too long successive governments have rejected our pleas for social care refinancing and far-reaching reform, but surely now the game is up.
‘MPs on all sides know of too many older people and families in their own back yards who are struggling without the care they need, or watching with horror as their lifetime savings disappear to fund sky high care bills.
‘The Government should listen to them and shame any party which dares to play politics with the issue.’
Ian Hudspeth of the Local Government Association said: ‘We support the Mail’s call for a cross-party consensus to resolve the social care crisis. What we need is answers and certainty.’
And Richard Murray, of the King’s Fund think-tank, said: ‘Reforming social care is now one of the most urgent and important social policy issues facing the country and should be at the top of the agenda for the new prime minister.
‘The social care system is no longer fit for purpose. It is failing the people who use it, their families and carers, and is widely regarded by those who understand the system as inadequate, confusing and unfair.’ A YouGov poll of 101 MPs, commissioned by the Alzheimer’s Society, reveals that 77 per cent believe social care is underfunded, including a majority from all parties.
Tory MP Andrea Jenkyns said: ‘The next Government will have to think out of the box and find support over measures to improve social care funding mechanisms.’
A spokesman for the Department of Health and Social Care said: ‘We have given local authorities access to up to £3.9billion more dedicated funding for adult social care this year, and a further £410million is available for adults and children’s services.
‘We will set out our plans to reform the system at the earliest opportunity to protect people from high and unpredictable costs.’
‘We need answers and certainty’