Boris Johnson’s so called Social Care Plan is a 10% hike in taxes for the working poor which doesn’t fix social care or the NHS but does protect the wealthiest at the expense of our region’s poorest. That’s what he means by levelling up and I won’t be voting for it.
The government voted through their so called Social Care Plan. The reality is a 10% hike in taxes for the working poor which doesn’t fix social care or the NHS but does protect the wealthiest at the expense of our region’s poorest.
- The Health and Social Care Levy is a Tory manifesto-breaking, economically damaging, unfair tax on jobs. This is the biggest rise in taxes on families for over 50 years, with no thought to the impact on working people.
- Even the Conservative attempt to make their tax rise fairer has fallen at the first hurdle – with just £600m of the £12bn annual total being levied on profits from dividends.
- Hardworking families and businesses are left to shoulder the vast majority of the burden, paying 20 times this amount.
- Under the Prime Minister’s plan many people will still have to sell their homes to afford the cost of care. For example, someone with £186k in assets including their home facing large costs because they have to go into care, would have to pay £86k. And that’s before living costs.
- The government can’t even say when and if they can clear the NHS backlog – which means we won’t know when this money will even be spent on social care.
- Not only that, but this is the third tax rise on working families from the Conservatives in recent months, and we are soon to be faced with a hat trick of broken manifesto promises from them.
- The Conservatives proposals will also do nothing to fix the social care crisis, missing the long-term plan of reform and investment our NHS and social care system needs.
- This is a government that underfunded and weakened the NHS and social care for a decade before the pandemic. NHS waiting lists spiralled, up by two million, and crucial targets on cancer, A&E and mental health were already being missed.
- The same is true of social care – £8 billion cut despite growing demand, with carers on poverty wages, without secure contracts, and over 100,000 vacancies. More than 32,000 care home residents died from Covid.
- When it comes to social care, Labour is far more ambitious.
- Our priority will be to give older and disabled people the chance to live the life they choose, shifting the focus of support towards prevention and early help.
- Our guiding principle will be ‘home first’ – because that’s what the overwhelming majority of people want.
- And we’ll also build a strong and skilled social care workforce, with a new deal for care workers to create a well-motivated, skilled and properly rewarded workforce, with more support for unpaid carers.
- This is problem that needs fixing now, with a solution that’s fit for the future. That’s why we’re offering to work with the Conservatives to develop a comprehensive, long-term plan to fix social care.
- We’re honest that this additional investment would need to be paid for through additional tax rises, but increasing National Insurance contributions isn’t right way to do it, hitting working people – especially low earners and young people – and businesses hard.
- We’ll set out our detailed plans for tax reform in due course, but we’re clear that the wealthiest should be asked to contribute more, that taxes to pay for social care should be fair across the generations, and that all forms of income are considered – including shares, dividends and property.