PENSIONERS FORCED TO SELL HOMES TO PAY FOR CARE

An estimated 20,000 pensioners per year in the UK must sell their homes in order to pay for rising care costs.

Current legislation states that individuals must pay for their own care requirements until they have £23,250 left, a figure which includes any property the individual owns. Saga’s Ros Altmann said that many elderly are “struggling in massive houses they don’t need, only to find they don’t have the money to pay for care when they need it” and must therefore downsize their property.

The Commission on Funding of Care and Support, however, has suggested raising the cap to £100,000 as well as providing means-tested support and universal disability benefits. Once the individual’s care costs have gathered to the level of the cap, they are eligible for a care package funded by the state. People in residential care would be responsible for making some contribution to their general living costs, just as they would be expected to cover these costs if they were living at home, but a limit would be set on this contribution. This would allow individuals to retain about 70% of their wealth and use some of their assets to improve their general wellbeing as they see fit.

Raising the threshold from £23,250 to £100,000 is estimated to cost £0.1 billion more each year and implementing the proposals would result in increased spending of around £0.2 billion on assessment and care management costs. Economist Andrew Dilnot, who led the commission, stated that the proposals would require 0.25% of total public spending, and that this was a “price well worth paying” for fairer social care.