Vultures, turn your gaze towards Britain, and rejoice
https://www.ft.com/content/82ff3a76-...9-b01cc67cfeec
This will be a great opportunity for friends of MPs to avail themselves of the considerable resources that have until now been hoarded and jealously guarded by Britain's elderly. It'll be a new gold rush.
Last edited by Aimless; 05-20-2017 at 06:58 PM.
"One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."
I don't got no subscription
Is this to rent an elderly person?
Copy and paste the headline into Google and click the link. It bypasses the FT's paywall (Google pays the FT for this).
It's actually a reasonable proposal that is an improvement from the current situation but has had appalling media management and it was utterly moronic to include it in the manifesto without roadtesting the idea first.
Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer
Yes, force old people to leave their homes. That works just wonders for their life expectancy.
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
That is not the proposal at all.
Basically the current situation is that if some requires care then they are required to pay for it themselves, unless they have no assets in which case the state pays. If someone requires care in the home (costs an average of £13/hr for home visits) then they are required to pay for that if they have cash above a threshold or other assets but the value of the home is not counted. If someone is required to go into a care home (costs £700-£1000 per week on average) then their house must be sold to pay for it with all but £23,000 from the estate being spent on the care costs. Once someone is down to their last £23,000 then the state will pay for the care. If eg a couple own a home and one needs to go into a care home and the other can stay at home then a charge is put against the estate to pay for the first one until after the one staying at home either dies or goes into a home themselves at which point the house must be sold.
That is the current situation.
The proposal is to change the situation so that nobody is required to sell a home while they are alive. The threshold of what can be kept from an estate will be increased from £23,000 to £100,000. Care in the home and care in a care home would be treated the same so that if some requires home care visits then that comes out of their estate after both of the couple have passed on.
This is kinder on the elderly (they get the care they need and nobody is forced to sell a home while alive anymore), and much fairer on the children (who get the benefits of the estate) on those who end up in a care home as the charges would quickly whittle down the estate to the £23,000 floor in the old system. It is a bit tougher on the children of those who require care in their own home. It is better for the Treasury as there are many more who need care at the home [each paying a bit more from their estate now] than care in a care home [paying much less than now].
So, I probably dreamt of these last paragraphs in the FT's article where they explicitly talked about old people having to sell their homes?
But it's moot anyway, May recognized that the proposal amounted to political suicide.
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
No you failed to understand them. Where in those last paragraphs does it say the proposal was to force people from their homes? The proposed house sales would be after both of the couple have passed on, if they're still in their homes after they've died then maybe they should be forced out- are you concerned about their ghosts or something?
They've made a right pigs ear out of this. Dreadful media management.
It was still a dementia tax. Public healthcare is about socializing health care - i.e. spreading the costs.
This was the complete and utter opposite and a US-Republican's wet dream. Better hope you drop dead on the spot!
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
Social care is not covered by the NHS and never has been, as I said people are already responsible for paying for their own care costs if they can within certain requirements and if the state steps in then that is not the NHS doing so.
Right. Dementia is not in any way health related.
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
Never said it isn't but nursing care is not covered by the NHS. If there was an operation or medical cure that could treat it then that would be but simply living with it is not covered by the healthcare system.
We're seeing a similar dynamic in the US with Trump's budget. My social feed is packed with people listing programs that feel good, and nothing about what they cost. I am selling most of my illiquid assets. Going to consider getting a shack somewhere rural, and the tools I would need to get there when the fiscal reckoning happens.
It is funny though that somehow people find it logical that those who have assets should not use these assets to pay for their own care demands in order to pass on the assets to their children. It's not very different than the 'profits for us, losses for society' attitude bankers have.
Congratulations America
I'm objecting to the fact that dementia is treated differently from other expensive illnesses like cancer.
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
It's the difference between treatment and living costs. Cancer patients may get expensive chemotherapy and then go home, the state pays for their chemo but it doesn't pay for their home or food etc.
Those in a nursing home aren't getting simply medical treatment they are paying for all their living costs.
You obviously never took a look at how much cancer treatment actually costs... Hint: Dementia is not the #1 cost factor in health care.
Not seeing where the double standard comes from.
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
It's not about cost, the NHS pays for treatment regardless of how much it costs, within reason. A home is not treatment, its where you live.
This does not even make a iota of sense. Also: If you think that cancer patients are in the hospital all the time (or even a huge amount) then you've got another thing coming. You get a dose for the chemotherapy treatment and then you go home again. How exactly do you think cancer treatment works? They're in a hospital for several months, non-stop?
And it's not about costs? What kind of half-arsed double-speak is that exactly again? It's all about the costs.
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
It's about treatment costs. Treatment (which is most of the cost for cancer patients, particularly those living at home) gets paid for. Assisted living (in your own home or in a facility) is not treatment and that's what Rand is balking at, paying for that when the patient still has the means to pay for it themselves. Of course, it's not quite that clear-cut because both assistance and the familiar home environment can be palliative for those suffering from dementia.
Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"
And if dementia patients were in hospital they'd be covered by the NHS too.
In an ideal world where we had a magic money tree with an unlimited pot of money maybe we could extend the NHS to include social care too. But it never has included that to date and we frankly can't afford to provide it just so that the wealthy middle class get more of an inheritance. Why that'd be your priority Khen is beyond me. Where should this come from, should we cut the treatment we offer to cancer patients so the NHS can afford to provide nursing homes? Or should we increase taxes? How much do you think it would cost to provide nursing care free at the point of use? Bearing in mind that demand would probably shoot up if care was free at the point of use too, especially with an ageing population.
That doesn't mean its all about the costs, we won't extend the NHS to cover social care which it has never covered to date because its not affordable, but its not covered now for the reasons its never been covered not because its expensive. New and expensive treatments get added to the NHS all the time.
Actually, their house doesn't necessarily need to be sold. It depends on the local authority. The local authority can pay for part of the care, as a debt, that the person isn't immediately able to pay, regardless of the assets, and can offer to allow people to keep their property while it's being rented out and put a charge on the property (after a specific debt threshold has been reached). So elderly people can decide instead to rent their property out to help pay for part (the rent would need to be enormous to pay for all of it) of their care home fees instead, and accrue a debt.
So there's different financing options available but the principle remains that the elderly are responsible for their own care costs at the moment already.
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