Dilnot says ditching of social care plans is a ‘tragedy’

Sir Andrew Dilnot, who set out proposals for major changes to social care funding in a 2011 report, has described the government’s decision to abandon those plans as a “tragedy”.

Speaking to the BBC, Sir Andrew said: “We’ve failed another generation of families.”

He said it was another example of social care “being given too little attention, being ignored, being tossed aside”.

The plan, due to be introduced in October, was to set an £86,000 cap on the amount older people have to pay towards their care, either at home or in care homes.

Once someone had reached that £86,000 cap, any remaining costs would be paid for by local authorities.

The threshold for getting some council support to pay for costs, before exceeding the cap, was also to be made more generous. People with assets up to £100,000 would be able to qualify, whereas at present the threshold is £23,250.

Sir Andrew said that dropping the cap was “unbelievably disappointing for hundreds of thousands of families who need care, for the people who are providing it, for those who are trying to make decisions about it. I really, really hope that after this blip we get back to a serious plan.”

Older people face ‘sky high’ care costs

Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, said that a substantial overspend by the last government had forced her to implement spending cuts, which included removing the plans to cap social care costs. She said: “There are a lot of things this new Labour government would like to do but unless you can say where the money is going to come from you can’t do them.” She estimated that the decision not to introduce the cap would save £1bn by the end of next year.

Caroline Abrahams, director of the charity Age UK, told the BBC that the care system had “gone from merely creaking to a state of near collapse in some places”.

She said the decision not to introduce the care cap was “really bad news for all those older people who were hoping against hope for some relief from their sky high care bills.”

Asked if the cap would be reintroduced at a later date, Reeves said that Wes Streeting, the health secretary, would be working with the sector to improve social care. During the election campaign Streeting said his party would introduce the spending cap if it won the election.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), a think tank, warned that ditching the cap could see people paying “extremely high social care costs” running into hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Unhappiness about existing funding model

David Sturrock, senior research economist at the IFS, said there was still unhappiness in the NHS and social care sector about the existing funding model: “The government may still see itself having to find substantial funds for social care services further down the line.”

Addressing MPs, Reeves said she understood why people were angry adding: “I am angry too.”

She accused the previous government of making “commitment after commitment without knowing where the money was going to come from”

Sir Andrew’s plans had already been subjected to long delays. He proposed a cap on social care costs in 2011 and the government passed legislation to introduce it in 2014, but its implementation was later delayed. Eventually proposals to put a cap in place were announced in 2021 and were initially due to start in October 2023.

That was then delayed until October 2025, but councils were allowed to keep the money they needed prepare for the changes. Since then, however, that money has been spent by councils to ease financial pressures.