28 April 2006
The current system for funding long-term care is 'inequitable, incoherent and financially unstable', a three-year research project by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation has concluded.
The report, Paying for long-term care, also draws on a survey which found that the present means-testing system was causing people to 'asset dump' as they approached old age.
Instead of making savings - which would be drawn on to pay for future care costs - adults were either spending their funds before they got frail, or transferring them to relatives.
To redress this, the report authors recommend that the government double the capital threshold at which people must begin to contribute for their home care costs. At present, this applies to people with assets worth more than £21,000. The authors estimate that increasing it to £42,000 would cost the taxpayer £250m—£300m a year.
Doubling the personal expenses allowance for people in local authority care homes from £19 to £38 per week would cost around £250m a year. But the researchers found there was public support for tax increases to pay for such care.
PFapr2006
