IF ever there was an elephant in the room, it’s the growing burden of social care.
I would be the first to admit that I do not have a solution ready to hand.
Worryingly, as we enjoy longer, healthier lives, the cost and problem will only get bigger.
As the Conservatives discovered to their cost at the last general election, the issue is political dynamite.
And, if not thought through properly with all the agencies involved, a metaphorical explosion follows – and it did.
So toxic is the subject that an attempt to reform social care provision by the last Labour government, saw the minister instructed to ‘think the unthinkable’ resign.
So, what to do?
This week, Health Secretary Matt Hancock proposed a new system which would see employees contributing for their own care in a way similar to how pensions are deducted.
The minister believes people will take more personal responsibility for their old age, while protecting savings and homes from potentially runaway costs.
His proposals will be submitted in a Government Green Paper for consultation, along with a new, NHS 10-year plan.
This does seem to make sense as the two are inextricably linked.
And to that end, I would suggest that responsibility for funding social care should be removed from local authorities and handed to the NHS.
Surely, highly qualified administrators there are better placed to oversee the whole picture.
A deteriorating situation at the moment is seeing more and more patients trapped in hospital beds because there’s nowhere to send them.
What is needed is root and branch reform of the whole system, before we throw billions more pounds at the problem.
And that must not be done by politicians.