Are older people being let down by their friends and families?

Norman Lamb MP, Care and Support Minister

Liz Kendall MP, Shadow Care and Support Minister

YES

Minister for Care and Older People Norman Lamb clashed with shadow minister Liz Kendall last week, over comments the Labour MP saw as accusing UK families of neglecting their elderly.

Speaking to The Daily Telegraph, Mr Lamb claimed that “older people were being let down by their friends and neighbours who should help them to live independently at home.”

Calling for local councils to build “neighbourly resilience” amongst communities, Mr Lamb wants to see “a partnership between state and society” on issues such as loneliness and isolation, in order to reduce society’s dependency on residential care.

Mr Lamb continues, “We all have a part to play. In this way, we can make the system sustainable, and it can be a more decent society, a less neglectful society than we sometimes experience where we just expect the state to do everything.

“With the right support and the right community resilience, and a rebuilding of the neighbour support that used to be there, more people could stay in their own homes for longer.

“We have lost the extended family because families have become dispersed. We need to rebuild that neighbourly resilience that helps people stay independent. If someone is living on their own never seeing anyone, that is a dismal existence, and it often ends up with it all collapsing and them going into a care home.

“Give them support, some companionship, and help them maintain activity in mind and body and everyone benefits.

“I want local authorities to be giving people guidance about how they can maintain their own resilience, using their friends, their neighbours, their community and in that way build resilience and reduce the burden on the state.”

NO

Liz Kendall MP, Labour’s Shadow Minister for Care and Older People, was scathing towards Mr Lamb’s comments on family responsibility, attacking the Coalition’s record on the ‘care crisis’ and calling for the Government to take responsibility, rather than seeking to lay the blame at the door of families.

Ms Kendall begins by praising family contribution, saying: “Britain’s 6 million unpaid family carers aren’t being neglectful of their loved ones and they don’t expect the state to do everything – far from it.

“They look after their frail elderly and disabled relatives day in day out, often with precious little help and support.”

She then goes on to highlight cuts to local authorities as a key factor that is piling more pressure on unpaid carers, saying: “This Government is making their lives much harder by cutting local council care budgets. Fewer families are now getting vital services like home help for free, and charges for home care, and residential and respite care are increasing.

“Families and friends want to help their elderly relatives and neighbours, but they need proper support to do so. Instead of blaming families for the care crisis, the Government should be facing up to its responsibilities by putting in place a decent and fair system for funding social care now and in future.”