Paying for the care of elderly

What the Prime Minister does not say, however, is that this rise is being rendered redundant by the inability of the Bank of England, and others, to neutralise the rate of inflation, a failure highlighted today by the respected Centre for Policy Studies.

Mr Cameron is even less forthcoming on how cuts in council spending – dictated by the coalition’s approach to deficit reduction – is leading to an unprecedented financial crisis in social care.

The consequence, unless the PM gets to grips with this issue, will be even more frail senior citizens having to stay in hospital, despite the financial pressures afflicting the NHS, because of acute cash shortages in local authority care and support.

As such, the figures published by Age UK’s Care in Crisis report make alarming reading. By 2014, and in spite of an ageing population, spending will be £250m less in real terms than a decade previously.

This is a financial disparity that the Government needs to address rather than continuing to use the misleading NHS figure for party political purposes.

Given that there will, inevitably, be more senior citizens requiring care and other support in the years to come, it may be helpful if care of the elderly became fully integrated into the NHS budget rather than being left at the mercy of town hall budgets.

In many respects, it does not make sense for community care to be budgeted separately when the provision of dignified services for the elderly should be a priority for any government.

This change may also alert Mr Cameron to the fact that his government needs to be doing far more to provide the frail and the vulnerable with the standards of care that their lifetime of taxes should merit and deserve.

Simply blaming town halls for these difficulties is not acceptable when so many care failures are caused by the lack of co-ordination between NHS hospitals, local authorities and those meritorious charitable organisations who do so much to help the elderly, and who do not get adequate recognition.