Social Care Funding

Hazel Blears Excerpts

Monday 11th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

That is the main point of what is being announced today. We are not able, with the public finances as they are, to offer a huge amount of support, but what we can do is give the certainty that means that for the first time people will be able to plan and make provision for their social care costs. We will be one of the first countries in the world that does that, which is why this is a very encouraging and very important day for people who care about the tremendous uncertainties associated with growing old.

[Hazel Blears (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

The Alzheimer’s Society has said today that capping care costs is a step in the right direction, but a £75,000 cap is so high that it will help only the few. The Secretary of State knows that there are 800,000 people in this country living with dementia now, and his announcement today, however welcome it is, does not deal with the community care costs that those people face day to day. This costs a billion pounds in, but there is £1.3 billion out of community costs to local authorities. How will he fill that gap?

[Mr Hunt]

The right hon. Lady knows well the challenge and the crisis that we face because of dementia, and she has spoken movingly on the issue. What I would say about what the Alzheimer’s Society is saying is that to look at the cap in isolation is to misunderstand these proposals. For many people with dementia, the most significant thing will be the increase from £23,000 to £123,000 in the threshold at which they get state support. That is a big step forward.

The cap is not saying that we expect people to pay £75,000 towards their care costs. We are saying that that is the maximum anyone will have to pay, which makes it possible for people to make provision in their pensions and in insurance policies. One in three of us will get dementia, and we do not know whether we will be among those one in three. This proposal will allow people to put some certainty in place—to make plans now, which means that when they are dealing with the nightmare of either themselves or someone in their family having to cope with dementia, they will not have the double whammy of having to worry about losing their house as well.