Independent living is priority for care cash, says Dilnot

25 May 11
Attendance allowance should be 'renamed and rebranded' under a new social care system based on both individual and state contributions, the head of the independent commission examining care funding has told Public Finance.
By Helen Mooney | 25 May 2011

Attendance allowance should be 'renamed and rebranded' under a new social care system based on both individual and state contributions, the head of the independent commission examining care funding has told Public Finance.DilnotGUARDIAN

Andrew Dilnot, chair of the Commission on the Funding of Care and Support, said he could see the rationale for the non-means-tested benefit, which is given to people over 65 to help them remain in their own homes.

Retaining the allowance and other disability benefits that keep people out of expensive residential or hospital care is likely to form a major recommendation in his report to government, due to be published in July.

Pensioners are currently eligible for the attendance allowance if they need help with personal care because of a physical or mental disability. But Dilnot said older people should be able to use the allowance to modify their homes to remain independent for longer by, for example, installing stair lifts, rails and downstairs bathrooms. He added that as well as being beefed up, the benefit would need to be ‘renamed and rebranded’ to make its purpose clearer.

The former director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies also confirmed to PF that the commission would recommend a model of funding that was reliant on both taxpayer and individual contributions, likely to be through insurance payments.

He said: ‘The suggestions we come up with need to be resilient and I don’t think an entirely tax-funded [system] would last or be sustainable in the future.

‘We have also ruled out the other extreme of just leaving it all to the private sector because the private sector does not want to play. The space we are at is looking at the best way of sharing between the state and the individual.’

Splitting the costs of care would mean one of two options – ‘people pay in all the way through their lives or the costs of social care are capped,’ he added. PF understands the report will include a figure for the recommended maximum state contribution per individual.  
Dilnot warned that the government would need to commit more than the £8bn it currently spends on social care for elderly people each year. But the commission has not decided whether individuals should be forced to save for their future care needs. In the run-up 
to last year’s general election, the Conservatives refused to back Labour’s plans for a compulsory social care levy to fund a universal system, calling instead for a voluntary insurance scheme.

Emma Stone, director of policy and research at the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, warned that if insurance were to be ‘a central part of the solution’ then it would probably need to be made compulsory. ‘At the very least there would need to be an auto-enrolment, nudge approach but I would have concerns that even that would be too soft,’ she said.

Nick Kirwan, assistant director of health and protection at the Association of British Insurers, said the social care insurance market could not be revived until insurers knew how much the government was prepared to pay.

A government white paper is expected later this year and legislation in 2012.

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