Care and Support Green Paper calls for fairer care system

Today the Government outlined the long-awaited Care and Support green paper, calling for a much-needed reform to care services in England.

Secretary of State for Health Andy Burnham highlighted the need for revision, calling on “a care system that people can depend upon” and noting the need to address the inconsistencies that lie within the current legislation.

Burnham called for a system that offered “universality, simplicity, prevention and fairness”, drawing to an end the ‘postcode lottery’ that pervades the current care services system.

In his presentation to the House, the Secretary of State outlined three options for the future funding and support of a care system which would provide “a pathway to protecting people’s houses and investment in retirement”.

The Minister detailed the proposals laid out in the green paper, firstly presenting a partnership model, by which a quarter or a third of costs would be covered by the State, with the individual left to top up the remainder of their care.

The second option would be underpinned through a voluntary insurance scheme promising a minimal level of free basic care with the Government helping to establish insurance systems for people to pay into to cover for the extra costs.

Finally, the Minister detailed the third and perhaps most controversial proposal of a comprehensive system whereby people would be required to pay up to £20,000 on retirement to fund their social care package.

Throughout his speech, the Minister paid tribute to carers recognising “the intolerable pressures” that many carers face up and down the country, and acknowledging the huge contribution of carers calling them the “bedrock” of social care.

Alex Fox, Director of Policy and Communications with The Princess Royal Trust for Carers welcomed the proposals. “We are pleased to see that the green paper recognises the unfairness of the current system for carers and acknowledges that, given the commitment of families, they should no longer have to take on an unreasonable caring role”.

Fox emphasises: “The green paper highlights the importance of delivering the National Carers Strategy as part of a fairer system, however,” he warns, “it does less to reassure carers that they will no longer find themselves contributing unsustainable high levels of care, whilst at the same time, finding themselves contributing significant financial resources against the cost of care”.

Fox notes: “We are one of the few countries in Western Europe which gives families less the more that carers provide. We have to find ways of valuing the contributions of carers properly if we are to continue to rely on carers for an increasing amount of our national care services”.

Fox concludes: “The Trust is determined to help the most isolated and overlooked carers take part in the big care debate which the paper calls for”.

In a joint statement The Princess Royal Trust for Carers and Crossroads Caring for Carers are highlighted in the green paper as saying:” Whilst we recognise that in future more will be expected of families as a whole, we are calling for a commitment to protect families from unmanageable and dangerous levels of caring. We believe that a system which incentivised smaller caring roles whilst protecting people from often short-lived ‘heavy end’ caring roles would, through being more sustainable, be better for carers, those for whom they care and the economy.”