To think older people need to sit up and take notice of this

[OwlOfBrown]

So the Tory manifesto includes a plan to make (elderly) people pay for their own social care costs until they are down to the last £100K of their wealth. Andrew Dilnot, who chaired a commission on social care costs during the coalition government which suggested a cap of £35,000 on care costs borne by individuals, has condemned this plan.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/may/18/tory-social-care-plan-example-market-failure-andrew-dilnot

www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-politics-19286845/andrew-dilnot-on-social-care-cap-and-inheritances

I know a lot of MN'ers will say that this is fair, and I do have some sympathy with that opinion. Why should someone be able to sit on hundreds of thousands of pounds of wealth when the state pays for their care? But is it really fair? What about when others have the same amount of wealth but enjoy the good fortune of not needing social care so get to keep their wealth? After all, we don't make people with long-term illnesses pay for their medical treatment (yet...) so what is different about social care?

Debate away - I'm interested to hear other people's opinions on this.

Sorry akaWisey I wasn't trying to be offensive. But realistically, elderly people who require care are a financial burden in the sense that someone has to pay for that care.

Maybe not solve them... but it will certainly help.

So what will happen to someone that has already released equity, will they be able to release more? When DF died DM did an equity release to allow her to stay in her home (no lectures about how she should have downsized please).

Not BOTHERED to save for a house ? Like everyone has the same opportunities in life ! Try being on a low wage and married .. Oh we had a house then of our own . Then get divorced and end up in private rental as no social housing . Save up for a house was the LEAST of my concerns .

Jesus Christ some of the superiority on here .

I'm from the US, so it's a different perspective here as there is no 'social care' as it's thought of in the UK.

Here, it's what people save for, it's why they take out long term care insurance. It's expected that you will pay for your own long term elder care. Why should the state pay for it? So you can horde your money to leave it to your kids? Nope. Why should I pay out the wazoo in taxes so your children can inherit your money or your house? Only when one runs out of money does the govt step in and pay for your care. I think that's as it should be. Of course, allowances are made for spouses who are still able to live in the home.

My mother is currently in long term care. She is paying for it out of the money she and my late Dad invested through the years. My brother and I BOTH feel that that's what her money is for and neither of us expects to inherit anything. She's now 94 and we expect that she has enough money to last until/if she reached 100-101. Both of her parents lived into their late 90s.

And what is the damn well OBSESSION with home OWNERSHIP in this country ?!

I'm not sure I understand the outrage about this (and I'm another one who might stand to inherit a large estate).
At all other stages of one's life, you buy property to suit your needs at that time. So, you might look to upgrade from a flat to a small house once you start a family and so forth if the flat no longer meets your needs.
What's different about this? If you're in a house that no longer is suitable for you to live in, surely you sell it and use the funds to live somewhere that does suit?

We live in a house which we rent privately. The owner is a lady who bought this (as she had the cash) from a couple desperate to move. It sat empty for a year as the owner then had a massive stroke and was unable to do anything with the house. She also owns another house in this street which she inherited from her dad. So three properties.

She lives in one, we live in one and her son and his family live in the third. They are all still in her name but all owned outright. Currently the son and his wife pay for her care using her savings (around £50k a year) and the money from the rent from this house. Once the savings run out then should have been able to get social funded care. But now they will have to put the houses up as collateral (so to speak) for this care.

Meaning out of three houses which would all have gone to her son she will likely just leave them £100k and no home as all three would need to be sold to cover the care costs. The son only works very part time as he needs to be on hand for his mum, carers only come in three times a day but quite simply the vast majority of the care falls on his shoulders, they can't ever go on holiday or go to see his wifes parents for longer than an overnight and they have wiped out their own savings adapting part of her house and ensuring she has what she needs.

So they provide all the care, save the government thousands and what? End up homeless with at most, £100k and no chance of buying another home despite living in that house for years. With hindsight mum should have transferred it over to him but it didn't happen and now their situation is so precarious. As is ours if the state demand that one of the houses be sold - it will be ours meaning we will be homeless again.

What a fucking mess.

Social care crisis? Ok lets give mainly women a whole years unpaid leave to do the caring and if that's not enough we can then strip every asset from them anyway.

I'm foreign and continually amazed at the British attitude that their family's wealth belongs to them via inheritance and it's the state's job to pay for everything to preserve private inheritances. My parents' home has climbed hugely in value, they fully expect to sell it to pay for quality care and consider themselves lucky they'll be able to afford better quality care, not that they should be entitled to hang onto it in order to pass it to their children or family.

'Because I think he'd rather take matters into his own hands than be in a situation where the government make him pay for care he already paid for, for over 40 years. '

That's the problem, he didn't pay for it. He paid for it based on statistics he'd die about 5 years after becoming economically inactive, or even before. It wasn't meant to sustain people for 20-30+ years of being economically inactive and developing more and more expensive healthcare problems. It's a harsh truth, but that's mostly the way of things.

Ah - I didn't listen to the R4 thing, and I don't know the ins and outs of the new bits of care people will be entitled to - I am sure they explained it much better than me. I only know about the 23k because we had to look into this for my FIL. I know currently they do a rigorous assessment of needs, and some people will still get funded care regardless of assets but it is a high level of need.

It's disgusting but typical of a conservative government.
But good for labour as the cons will lose the older person's vote they usually rely on.

Triedandtrusted, you are right, under the current system you pay all your care home fees until you are down to your last £23K. Then you pay part of them until you are down to something a little over £14K. Only that amount is fully exempt so being able to retain £100K is an improvement. From experience however, having had to find a care home for my father last year, I can say that if you or your parents have enough assets to pay for your own care then you should thank your lucky stars. You can then choose the care home you want for your loved one, rather than being forced into one that the council provides for you. Yes, it's hideously expensive but it would have broken my heart to leave dad in some of the places we viewed. At least he had the fund to finance a safe, pleasant home with kind and caring staff for his last days. Without that money we would have had no control over where he went. Everyone seems to think that if you're feckless enough to spend your money on booze, holidays and Sky TV you get it for free what others have to pay for. You don't. You get what you're given and I was grateful beyond words that dad had the money to pay for a decent place. Nearly broke my heart seeing how some had to live.

It will be interesting to see what happens to care home fees. after this. Already, people who self-fund in care homes are often charged more than people who are funded by the local authority as local authority payments don't cover the costs. So they are topped up by the homes by charging self funders higher fees.

In some societies people care for the elderly in their families - just saying. fucking selfish babyboomers

Magpiemagpie Currently the value of your home is taken into account. It's part of your capital. All capital is taken into account over £23K. The value of your home isn't counted for the first twelve weeks. After that it is and you can either sell it or, with the agreement of the authorities, defer payment and pay after death. As I said before, having seen the care homes those with no choice sometimes have to live in I am immensely grateful that my dad had a house to sell.

What about when others have the same amount of wealth but enjoy the good fortune of not needing social care so get to keep their wealth

You can say that about anything though.

What about those that pay into a state pension but die before retirement. Etc etc etc

I think, for those of you whose experience is of a different country, it is worth explaining that in this country, the care that is paid for by the government is no different to the care that someone might pay for themselves. So you could have a person on one end of a street who has worked full-time, 5 days a week, from the age of 18 to the age of 67 (so 49 years) and gone without things like Sky TV, and not gone out to the pub much in order to save for a deposit and buy a house, sends their children to the local school because they can't afford private school fees, and on the other end of the street is someone who never saved a penny, worked the minimum hours possible, and due to low wages, got help with the rent, and a full bursary for private school fees, but has Sky TV and a few nice nights out down the pub each month, and they both end up in the same care home, with the same care - the first person pays for it themselves, while the second person gets it paid for by the government. Except that the first person hasn't had quite as much of an easy life. Flame me if you will, and it's a clumsy way of mapping it out, but I'm just trying to explain where some of the resentment you are infering is coming from.

In some societies people care for the elderly in their families - just saying. fucking selfish babyboomers

Such societies tend to a) not have so many who live so long, something carries them off before they tend to develop extremely complex needs b) be heavily patriarchal where women are forced into providing 'care' (you're deluding yourself if you believe all these elderly are treated well) c) don't have average house prices in the £200ks and costs of living that means most have to work outside the home all the hours God sends just to keep the wolf from the door.

Just saying

I will vote for the party that looks seriously at how other countries fund their health and care needs. The fact is we don't pay enough to cover the cost of everything that is expected. In Germany they pay an extra amount that covers the full cost of care in old age or infirmity, in France I believe they top up their health care by taking out additional insurances.

We have to bite the bullet and accept that our system is and has been for many years chronically underfunded and that all of us ( and I include myself because surprise surprise I pay tax on my pension which will surprise those who think all pensions come tax free) need to recognise this however unpalatable it is.

I agree to an extent tried.

Booksmusicclothes
Not if the other spouse is living in it . it's disregarded
But if you live in it on your own then yes it's taken into account

I guess I'm thinking of it as it is for my parents as they are both alive
But if one of them had to go into a nursing home at present they can't touch the house as long as one of them still lives in the house

FWIW the info about the US isn't right. Medicare takes your pension if you have one and then they pay the rest. If you have any sense at all you put your house into a trust and then Medicare can't touch it. I imagine the same thing will happen here. Once the house is in trust it's no longer your asset.

I'd vote for any government that pulls its finger out and allows adults of sound mind to end their lives and extends that to adults who, when of sound mind, sign an order that they want to have their lives ended in the event of their developing dementia or whatever debilitating illness they see fit, should they become unable to do it themselves.

Trouble is with keeping the house it can be difficult if the spouse in care is the main pension holder as often the woman cannot afford to run the house as she lost out in the 70s as sahms stamps were not paid.

triedandtrusted. The care the person who's never saved a penny gets may be the same as the care you hard workers pay for but that is not guaranteed. The care my father got was paid for, our of his pocket, and was vastly superior to the care home he may well have been allocated by the state. If I had had a choice between paying for his continued care in the home he was in or keeping the money and taking my chances with a state allocated home I would have continued paying without hesitation. I visited enough care homes that left me in tears at the thought of my dad ending up there to know that we were lucky that he had the money to pay for a decent place.