The House of Commons reaction to Andrew Lansley's Dilnot Commission statement

Health Secretary Andrew Lansley unveiled the details of the Dilnot Commission’s review into elderly care funding to the House of Commons yesterday, with the care community anxiously poised to see that MPs live up to their promise of achieving non-partisan talks while also ensuring the legislation is implemented effectively and achieves affordable and sustainable funding.

Lansley began on some familiar territory, stating that ‘age is the principle determinate of need for health and for care services’ and that ‘change is essential’. The minister also touched upon the difficulty that society faces in encouraging and educating the population to prepare for the likelihood of care, confirming that the Commission’s research concluded many people assume social care to be free, that there are no means to predict what costs care requirements will incur and that few financial products are available to assist.

Of the Dilnot Commission’s more specific suggestions, Lansley confirmed that a cap of £35,000 had indeed been recommended on personal social care costs, though stressed that this amount was flexible for debate. The aim of Government legislation should be to achieve a ‘responsive and personalised care and support system’ and to ensure that all service users have access to ‘personal budgets’ by 2013. Further measures that have already been warmly welcomed by many leading care associations include universal access to means-testing and greater protection for housing assets, which are currently too often lost on sourcing care that those without assets receive free from the state, while a range of additional considerations have been put forward by the Commission in order to give the new legislation as much chance of success as possible, including the creation of a more diverse insurance market, early intervention proposals and the safeguarding against abuse and poor standards.

With the care community largely behind Dilnot’s conclusions, it would seem the focus will now fall upon relations between the political parties themselves and whether cross-party talks can hold off growing divisions in other policy areas. While pledging to work closely with the care market on the legislation throughout the Autumn, Lansley also indicated that the Coalition would seek to work with the opposition in order to achieve a consensus on legislation which, after all, will be tested over the course of many decades due to the ageing demographic and potentially be a concern of many Parliaments, whether they be Conservative, Labour, Liberal, or some other form of beautiful coalition.

The Labour response, therefore, might prove as crucial as those upon the Government benches. So far the Commons response echoed the call for consensus that Labour leader Ed Miliband has championed over recent days. Although Shadow Health Secretary John Healey expressed disappointment that the Coalition has not scheduled completion of the White Paper until the Spring, warning that the issue shouldn’t be ‘kick[ed]… into the long grass’, though on the matter of cross-party talks he stated that ‘if the Government is serious, we are serious’.

Such a note of solidarity seemed to be the tone of the Commons session, though there are potential sources of divisive opinion that might prove more vocal as the debate progresses throughout the Autumn. MP David Blunkett spoke of his concern for creating ‘perverse incentives’ for residential care rather than putting ‘the glue back into supporting families and neighbourliness’, while MP Oliver Colvile called for Lansley to confirm that the Treasury is fully behind the issue, as has been speculated is not the case – a question on which the Health Secretary’s answer was notably vague. MP Dennis Skinner further spoke out against a trust in big business, criticising the ‘millionaires owning Southern Cross’ and calling on local authorities to play the key role in developments, with fellow Labour MP Emma Reynolds bringing up the discontent surrounding the Tories pulling out of previous cross-party talks on the issue before the 2010 General Election, though Lansley responded that it was the former PM who was responsible for ending those efforts.

If there was one notable absence from the discussion it would seem to be that of regulator the Care Quality Commission, whose performance has been increasingly questioned over the last 12 months, but whose role in ensuring service quality will be essential to the Dilnot Commission’s success.