@YBarddCwsc Yes, last night a lot of those themes were discussed re the unpopularity of any social care policy. I think the trouble is, as noted by another PBer that the solution May had chosen isn't great - I've already said what I think would be a better path to go down so I won't go into that again. I also think that it's not just that she's tackling social care now, but all the other things she's pursuing related to the Baby Boomers. On top of that, as a young person I don't see what she is doing to help my generation/the working population, which is apparently what the shift away from the baby boomers in terms of state benefits is supposed to be about.
I quoted some rough figures to show the cost of what you suggested (National Care Service).
The money required is daunting.
I like the idea of a National Care Service, but it is clear that it will require something like a minimum of 3p on income tax.
I am not a tribal voter, I am interested in policy that is properly costed. I think it is up to May’s critics to provide a better & costed policy.
In the red corner: YouGov and a few other pollsters
In the blue corner: common sense and virtually all of the other evidence - including Labour's own canvassing returns...
New poll analysis: Watson, Skinner and Flint facing defeat. Cooper, Miliband, Reeves and Rayner on the edge
Labour is facing a parliamentary wipeout on June 8th. The defeat will be greater than 1983 with the leading figures such as Tom Watson, Dennis Skinner and Caroline Flint facing defeat while many others, including Yvette Cooper, Ed Miliband and Angela Rayner, are teetering on the brink.
Currently Labour is set to lose just over 90 seats but a relatively small deterioration of the party’s position on the ground could see dozens more fall.
These are the findings of new analysis by Labour Uncut based on the views of dozens of Labour candidates, party officials and activists following the past three weeks of intensive canvassing.
............
The results are not pretty.
While the national polls suggest Labour’s vote is holding up, potentially even advancing on 2015, in the constituencies that matter, something very different seems to be happening.
Again, the point is: both sources of evidence might be, but one must be, wrong. Possibly very badly wrong. So, do we trust the accuracy of these opinion polls that put Labour 4, 5 or 6% up on 2015? Over to you...
Both could be right. There is a significant UKIP to Con swing in Labour-held constituencies in England and Wales north of the Wash-Severn line. This is likely to lead to massive Labour seat losses without necessarily any loss in GB % vote share, or even a net gain in vote share if there is a swing to Labour in safe Labour seats in cosmopolitan metropolitan areas or safe Tory seats.
I haven't looked at the entire thread. But I was beyond astonished at this comment from @kyf_100 (I paraphrase):
'You bought
The issue is the 1/6. Rather than a Dementia Tax, It would be more apposite to call it a Russian Roulette Tax. One chamber is loaded. Now, the cost of health care for those with dementia needs to be met. So...we have to ask the richest: do you want a) to have a 1/6 chance of having to bear the cost of many many years of care yourself - with just £100,000 guaranteed to be left? Or do you want b) to lose 1/6 of your wealth above £100,000, with a new element of Inheritance Tax (or compulsory insurance) that you can't avoid? Or is it that you want c) someone else has to contribute to the cost of your care for many many years?
Seems to me at the moment that we are hearing exclusively from those in c) who want to keep everything and have the Care Cost Fairy settle up their bills....
The reason for c) is that people have the expectation that the NHS should cover mental health issues like dementia and that they have already been paying for it all their lives.
For chronic illnesses of frailty (whether mental or physical) there has been a shift to care outside the hospital, but no recognition that this really means paying for it yourself.
That's right.
If we accept the principle of the NHS that the cost of ill health (which is mainly a lottery) is shared (with the option going private for higher quality), then we should also accept the principle that that the cost of frailty including dementia should be shared in the same way.
It is a form of insurance. The most effective insurer is the government (the US system is twice as expensive) with the premiums paid out of general taxation.
Since 1979, there has been a race to the bottom in rates of personal taxation. First it was funded out of North Sea oil, then privatisations. These were oneoffs - the family silver. We are rapidly running out of family silver.
The options are a) an increase in personal taxation b) an influx of hundreds of thousands of well educated young healthy immigrants who pay tax and consume less services, or c) a growing number of very unhappy pensioners and their families.
@YBarddCwsc Well it's what Labour are suggesting, not just me. Given that anyone could get dementia it seems unfair that the principles of the NHS apply to every other illness except for degenerative ones. The only other alternative is a combination of the two: an increase in general taxation to fund part of social care, and taking less money from people after death in order to pay for care than is being proposed.
If you really think 5 people not affected are going to willingly give up anything to help that 6th (unknown) person then you don't understand people...
They do it happily for the NHS. I'd guess the ratio there is even more skewed.
The NHS with free healthcare has been around for 70 years now and it is something that defines the UK. The question there is would you be able to implement it today if it wasn't already there - and I suspect you couldn't...
No one is talking about completely cutting people off from state support for social care. That would be unacceptable I think.
Therefore we are already in a world where some people paying for others is accepted by all.
All we are doing is debating how much support the unlucky few should get from the rest of us.
As someone noted earlier, all this does is underline how bad the next five years are going to be. May's vision isn't going to enthuse the public that much - she's winning simply because she's not Corbyn. And this whole saga brings into question her competence, and her ability to deliver a successful Brexit.
What does a succesful Brexit even look like? Everyone wants and expects something different.
Lower immigration. Back to the '50s. Putting the 'Great' back into GB. EU begging to buy our stuff. EU begging us to buy their stuff. Ever stronger 'preshus' Union. Juncker caught with dead rentboy.
@YBarddCwsc Yes, last night a lot of those themes were discussed re the unpopularity of any social care policy. I think the trouble is, as noted by another PBer that the solution May had chosen isn't great - I've already said what I think would be a better path to go down so I won't go into that again. I also think that it's not just that she's tackling social care now, but all the other things she's pursuing related to the Baby Boomers. On top of that, as a young person I don't see what she is doing to help my generation/the working population, which is apparently what the shift away from the baby boomers in terms of state benefits is supposed to be about.
I quoted some rough figures to show the cost of what you suggested (National Care Service).
The money required is daunting.
I like the idea of a National Care Service, but it is clear that it will require something like a minimum of 3p on income tax.
I am not a tribal voter, I am interested in policy that is properly costed. I think it is up to May’s critics to provide a better & costed policy.
There is also the question of how providing the care is best organised and managed. Whatever your view of local authorities, there is no doubt that carrying the burden of spiralling care costs whilst their funding is being cut has had a very serious impact on local councils, which has knocked on to cuts in many other completely unrelated service areas. Local authorities don't have any meaningful way of raising money to meet these rising costs and, without significant change to local government funding arrangements, there are arguments for at least exploring alternative structures.
FWIW. Friday I was canvassing for the Cons in Morley (Cons marginal) and yesterday in Halifax (Lab marginal) Nobody mentioned the pension/care proposals and returns were excellent as usual. What's excercising older voters in these parts is why the f**** are we still in the EU and Why should we pay those b******* any money to get out? Both these seats are nailed on for us and we're expecting to add a few thousand in my Pudsey (Leeds Con) constituency.
Chimes with the Labour focus groups and canvassing evidence I've been highlighting yesterday and this morning. The Government has decided to put limits on the Great OAP Giveaway at long last, it deserves success, and should be applauded.
This is not about cruelty, it's about correction: the rest of the population can't afford to keep on wrapping the well-to-do elderly in cotton wool forever. Some voters may sit on their hands because of this and a few may even change sides, but firstly this is likely to happen disproportionately in Tory safe seats in Southern England where it will make no difference, and secondly the rebellion will, necessarily, be limited. Where else are rich voters up in arms about this meant to turn? To socialism, and the diet of confiscatory taxes which they must suspect is almost certain to trail in its wake?
Beyond that, average house prices in the Midlands and North are much lower than further South. Most voters who do own their own homes in your neck of the woods will now see most of their value protected. Those who don't will wonder what all the fuss is about, and rightly diagnose it as a case of the cosseted rich throwing a strop.
The money for looking after wealthy old people has to come from somewhere, and May has correctly guessed that her target voters in the poorer parts of the country would rather it came from the wealthy themselves than out of everyone else's taxes.
And note, by the way, that virtually all the media uproar has been about the social care reform and NOT the removal of the Triple Lock. The former is what most affects the well-off, and their voice is always the loudest in any discussion of public policy. But when it comes to the big day at the ballot box, the wishes of the poor and those of modest means carry exactly the same weight as those of the prosperous.
The discrepancy between two bookies' Over/Under Labour Total Seats currently provides an attractive betting opportunity:
Stake 6 units with Hills on Labour winning > 162.5 seats Stake 6 units with Betfair Sportsbook on Labour winning < 176.5 seats
Maximum loss is therefore 1 unit (i.e 6 units lost - 5 units won). BUT should Labour win between 163 seats and 176 seats, a highly promising prospect covering a range of 13 seats, then both bets pay out, providing a combined profit of 10 units against a maximum combined loss, as above, of 1 unit i.e. effective odds of 10/1 ..... hurry though this can't last! DYOR.
If you really think 5 people not affected are going to willingly give up anything to help that 6th (unknown) person then you don't understand people...
They do it happily for the NHS. I'd guess the ratio there is even more skewed.
I said this yesterday - it may not be the natural state of human affairs, it may not even be the most efficient one, and there are plenty of other systems of paying for healthcare even across Europe, but "NHSism" has inculcated very deeply into British culture and also into our social and ethical norms. The idea that some people should pay for their own catastrophic health care, depending on what assets they have, has become a British heresy. (It's quite reasonable to argue against it, but it would be electoral suicide for a politician to do so.)
I think the distinction between health care and social care, and particularly residential care for dementia patients with on-site nurses etc, is a very narrow one, and the long run direction of political travel is likely to be for NHSism to swallow up the social care issue. People have come to expect the provision of high-quality "free" health services without means-testing (where "free" means "paid out of taxes, preferably not my own").
It's interesting that, after an abortive start, in the end NHSism hasn't absorbed opticians and dentistry to the extent of "free care for all". But for catastrophic care, I think this principle is more deeply rooted in the public consciousness - and as dementia becomes an ever-greater bogeyman (I think it may even be up there beyond cancer as the end-of-life illness that people are most petrified of) and people will ultimately stomach higher taxes to pay for it. Quite possibly irrationally, quite possibly inequitably, but the mindset of the British public is very hard-set the issue of who "should" pay in the grand health lottery.
Comments
The money required is daunting.
I like the idea of a National Care Service, but it is clear that it will require something like a minimum of 3p on income tax.
I am not a tribal voter, I am interested in policy that is properly costed. I think it is up to May’s critics to provide a better & costed policy.
Con lead (diff 18/19 vs 16/17 May)
Lon: -10 (-13)
Sou: +22 (+1)
Mid: +11 (+1)
Nth: -14 (-11)
Sc: +6 (-)
Colour me sceptical - but there are some huge internal swings, while other regions haven't budged.....
If we accept the principle of the NHS that the cost of ill health (which is mainly a lottery) is shared (with the option going private for higher quality), then we should also accept the principle that that the cost of frailty including dementia should be shared in the same way.
It is a form of insurance. The most effective insurer is the government (the US system is twice as expensive) with the premiums paid out of general taxation.
Since 1979, there has been a race to the bottom in rates of personal taxation. First it was funded out of North Sea oil, then privatisations. These were oneoffs - the family silver. We are rapidly running out of family silver.
The options are a) an increase in personal taxation b) an influx of hundreds of thousands of well educated young healthy immigrants who pay tax and consume less services, or c) a growing number of very unhappy pensioners and their families.
That would be unacceptable I think.
Therefore we are already in a world where some people paying for others is accepted by all.
All we are doing is debating how much support the unlucky few should get from the rest of us.
Back to the '50s.
Putting the 'Great' back into GB.
EU begging to buy our stuff.
EU begging us to buy their stuff.
Ever stronger 'preshus' Union.
Juncker caught with dead rentboy.
Just for starters.
This is not about cruelty, it's about correction: the rest of the population can't afford to keep on wrapping the well-to-do elderly in cotton wool forever. Some voters may sit on their hands because of this and a few may even change sides, but firstly this is likely to happen disproportionately in Tory safe seats in Southern England where it will make no difference, and secondly the rebellion will, necessarily, be limited. Where else are rich voters up in arms about this meant to turn? To socialism, and the diet of confiscatory taxes which they must suspect is almost certain to trail in its wake?
Beyond that, average house prices in the Midlands and North are much lower than further South. Most voters who do own their own homes in your neck of the woods will now see most of their value protected. Those who don't will wonder what all the fuss is about, and rightly diagnose it as a case of the cosseted rich throwing a strop.
The money for looking after wealthy old people has to come from somewhere, and May has correctly guessed that her target voters in the poorer parts of the country would rather it came from the wealthy themselves than out of everyone else's taxes.
And note, by the way, that virtually all the media uproar has been about the social care reform and NOT the removal of the Triple Lock. The former is what most affects the well-off, and their voice is always the loudest in any discussion of public policy. But when it comes to the big day at the ballot box, the wishes of the poor and those of modest means carry exactly the same weight as those of the prosperous.
Stake 6 units with Hills on Labour winning > 162.5 seats
Stake 6 units with Betfair Sportsbook on Labour winning < 176.5 seats
Maximum loss is therefore 1 unit (i.e 6 units lost - 5 units won). BUT should Labour win between 163 seats and 176 seats, a highly promising prospect covering a range of 13 seats, then both bets pay out, providing a combined profit of 10 units against a maximum combined loss, as above, of 1 unit i.e. effective odds of 10/1 ..... hurry though this can't last!
DYOR.
I think the distinction between health care and social care, and particularly residential care for dementia patients with on-site nurses etc, is a very narrow one, and the long run direction of political travel is likely to be for NHSism to swallow up the social care issue. People have come to expect the provision of high-quality "free" health services without means-testing (where "free" means "paid out of taxes, preferably not my own").
It's interesting that, after an abortive start, in the end NHSism hasn't absorbed opticians and dentistry to the extent of "free care for all". But for catastrophic care, I think this principle is more deeply rooted in the public consciousness - and as dementia becomes an ever-greater bogeyman (I think it may even be up there beyond cancer as the end-of-life illness that people are most petrified of) and people will ultimately stomach higher taxes to pay for it. Quite possibly irrationally, quite possibly inequitably, but the mindset of the British public is very hard-set the issue of who "should" pay in the grand health lottery.