OPINION
An Unfair Levy
By Rosie Brocklehurst
Ostensibly, the Government has striven to fulfil a manifesto commitment to sort Social Care by breaking a manifesto commitment on no rises in taxation. Not a blush appears on Boris Johnson’s cheek. Yet none of what has been announced makes sense.
Many people have not yet fully understood how unfair and useless the Government’s move is. There is no Social Care ‘plan’ as such. But the Health and Social Care Tax levy plan will protect the already asset-wealthy – those who have benefited from other tax reductions on capital gains. It will fall heavily on low earners and the young. Ironically it is not even going to work to fix Social Care anyway.
It may raise just about enough to make a start on reducing backlogs in the NHS but not by much.
Residential Social Care is means-tested, and those without assets but with income such as a state pension will have all that pension taken away for their care. Many people with houses in the middle range, may have to sell anyway after means testing. Social Care will continue to be an area plummeting into crisis and neglect, with undervalued staff shrinking in numbers daily. Those of working age who need Social Care for daily support and respite, or those elderly who need home support, delivered in each case by underpaid zero hours contract workers, are unlikely to see any improvement either. How can there be improvement on £36bn over three years which will be devoured by the NHS just to make a small dent in waiting lists? Social Care needs twice that just for itself and to make the sector much more attractive to staff.
To sum up: Social Care in the UK is already a disgrace, morphing into a disaster, with no effective improvement plan and, even now after this deeply unfair levy announcement, faces a gloomy future with nowhere near enough money.
This Government is so horrendously incompetent.
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