Care reforms – to fix a system that is fragmented

The Care and Support White Paper, together with the draft Care and Support Bill also published today, sets out how the social care system will be transformed “from a service that reacts to crises to one that focuses on prevention and is built around the needs and goals of people.”

The reforms aim to ensure people will get the care and support they need, so they don’t reach crisis point, and the draft Care and Support Bill “consolidates a mess of different laws to, for the first time, create a single modern statute for adult care and support.”

The government says it would consider a voluntary scheme that would allow people to choose to take up a government social insurance scheme, making paid contributions to ensure their care and accommodation costs would be capped. 

The report also commits to introducing a Universal Deferred Payments scheme to ensure no one will be forced to sell their home to pay for care in their lifetime. 

The health secretary Andrew Lansley said: “Too often people who need care don’t know who or where to go to, don’t know what care they will get and don’t know how it will be paid for. 

“Our plans will bring the most comprehensive overhaul of social care since 1948 and will mean that people get the care and support that they need to be safe and to live well so they don’t reach a crisis point.

“We agree that the principles of the Dilnot recommendations – financial protection through capped costs and an extended means-test – would be the right basis for any new funding model. 

“However, any proposal which includes extra public spending needs to be considered alongside other spending priorities, which of course include the demographic pressures on the social care service itself. The right place to do this is at the next Spending Review.”