Health and Social Care Levy — House of Commons, 2021-09-08
Topic: Social Welfare
Dehenna Sheridan Fareham (Conservative, Centre-right): I know there have been partisan words flying across the Chamber today, but one thing that unites everyone across the House is a commitment to try to tackle the issue of social care so that our children are still not having to deal with it in generations to come. I would like to start by thanking all our NHS workers who have been a part of tackling the really difficult challenge over the past 18 months. Their dedication to fighting covid, keeping us safe and keeping the NHS working at this difficult time must be commended by us all. I also want to thank our care workers. I have to mention my cousin Natalie and my great aunt Elaine, who have been fantastic, working throughout the pandemic. I have said it now. They will be watching at home I am really proud that, after years of it being kicked down the road, it is the Conservative party that is finally grasping this issue and saying that we are going to tackle social care. To some extent it has been disappointing to hear Labour criticise with no viable alternative. I want to try to be more constructive. One of my concerns is about the speed at which these proposals have been presented to us. We know that urgency is needed to tackle this issue. In a sense, it is fantastic that the Government want to act swiftly, but having seen these proposals only yesterday, we have had limited time to scrutinise them effectively and to consult our constituents and find out what their concerns are about these proposals, and to feed that into Government. I really hope that Government will engage with us as this passes through to the next legislative stages The speech that really struck me today was from my right hon. Friend the Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Jake Berry). I kind of wish I could copy and paste his speech and turn it into my own, because it really did address many of the points that I wanted to make. The first one I want to touch on is the relativity of house prices and how the maximum floor for care will have an impact. My hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Bim Afolami) made a decent point about needing a simple system, but unfortunately, when looking at that limit and relative house prices in areas such as my Bishop Auckland constituency, where the average house price is about £120,000, seeing constituents potentially lose a huge percentage of their only asset—an asset that they have worked their entire lives for to pass on to their children—is something that I am finding incredibly hard to justify, when people in other areas of the country who have worked equally hard would lose a much smaller percentage of that asset It is good, however, to see the floor lifted from £23,000 to £100,000. That is to be commended, but still, there is an issue about the ultra-wealthy who will also have the cost of their care capped, and who can afford to pay more than the £86,000. I hope that that will be addressed. I also have concerns about national insurance being used as the tool for this, like many other colleagues who have spoken today My main concern is the fact that we have not had a great deal of time to consider these proposals and to consider alternatives, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) said. The article by Peter Lilley proposing a state-backed optional insurance system not only is a free market approach to tackling this, backed up by the state, which is well needed, but goes to the Conservative principle of personal responsibility that I think every Government Member supports A quote by Mike DeWine, the former Governor of Ohio and a US Senator, struck me: "Governing is about making tough decisions, but it’s also about figuring out a better way to do things." I am so proud that the Government are making this tough decision. I hope that by working together, we can find that better way of delivering on our social care pledge, but unfortunately, for the reasons I have highlighted today, I will be abstaining on this today. However, I will work alongside colleagues to try to make it the best it can be for all our constituents, for the country and to ensure that our economy can bounce back in the best possible way.