Capping care costs

SIR – Last week, the Government announced plans to delay the implementation of a cap on care costs in England until 2020.

This was the right thing to do; continuing with the care cap would have been a costly diversion of energy and resources at a critical time.

The top priority must be to prevent the social care system – which millions of people depend on – from collapsing. These people need reassurance that, in acknowledging the need to delay the care cap, the Government grasps the scale of the current crisis in social care. It must use the Comprehensive Spending Review this November to announce significant investment to fill the funding gap that is at the heart of the system’s difficulties.

Only then can we again consider a policy to protect people from the very real and catastrophic costs of care, as the care cap was designed to do.

Victoria McDermott

Chairman, Care & Support Alliance

London WC1

Letter in the Telegraph online: http://goo.gl/Dw9kTS