2017 Election manifesto — Conservatives

Posted on June 6, 2017 by john graham

In the final days of the 2017 General Election canvassing, I will sum up each party’s proposals on the specific issues that relate to older people.    Here is a start with the Conservative Party proposals.

PENSIONS — triple lock changed to double lock. The automatic 2.5% annual increase is dropped.   This won’t matter if inflation rises anyway.    Our basic state pension remains one of the lowest in Europe.

WINTER FUEL ALLOWANCE  — will be means tested in future so will no longer be given to wealthier pensioners.   They will have to trust in global warming.    Or they could move to Scotland where it will still apply because kilts are quite chilly.

FREE BUS PASSES —- will also be means tested (I think ?).  But of course there are less and less buses anyway.

INHERITANCE TAX —- unchanged, but tax free allowance still due to rise to £1 million if you have any money left when you pop your clogs.

SOCIAL CARE COSTS —- this is the biggest and most controversial change, which may have cost them a lot of votes.   It has been labled the ” dementia tax ” by all the other parties.   Crass presentation of a complex issue may cost them a lot of seats and maybe even the election itself.    Lack of honesty in the past on this issue is now coming back to haunt them.

You have always had to pay for your own social care unless you have less than £23,400.   Your house is only taken into account when you die.      The  Conservatives are proposing to increase the asset test threshold to allow you to keep £100,000.      This should be good news but only if you understood the rules in the first place.    It enables people with relatively low value houses to pass on an inheritance instead of having it all gobbled up in paying for care, if they need it.

Belatedly, they said their would also be a cap to care costs but no figure was put on it.   That is how the  “dementia tax”  tag came about.

Posted in ELDERLY UK POLICY | 1 Comment

Election Overload.

Posted on June 4, 2017 by john graham

At the moment in the run up to the snap General Election we are being assailed from all sides by politicians in the newspapers and on tele with sound bite slogans.   Then sometimes on soap boxes at carefully selected venues with a wallpaper background audience of nodding supporters.

Following their every move, we have a feeding frenzy of journalists latching on to every word and attempting to translate what the politicians said, into what they think they really mean.

Next come the pollsters, unable to wait for the election itself.     Ever eager to analyse what people think, before they think.      Illuminating us with  endless insights, which will probably be wrong according to the next poll.

Lastly we have the junk mail.    Pictures of politicians shaking hands and smiling.   Promising anything you want.   All at no cost to you !    In fact you will probably get money back !    And a free pen and a sticker for your window.   Any thing that might get your vote.

This is definitely the era of ” Twitter Politics “.    140 characters of misinformation.    One minute wisdom.    All to enable us to navigate through the next five years.

The LAST LAUGH LOONEY PARTY looks more attractive every day 😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀

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Social Care – What’s Next ?

Posted on May 30, 2017 by john graham

My last blog looked at the fundamental problems behind the crisis in social care for older people.   Now let’s look at the political parties election promises of how to address it.

All the opposition party’s ignore the big picture and focus on the short term issue of capturing the senior generations vote.       Their common solution is to reaffirm their intention of keeping the triple lock on pensions, which ensures pensions will rise by the increase in either wages, prices or 2.5%;  whichever is the greater.    This does little to help the poorest pensioners and nothing to address the issues of poor quality care.

The Conservative Party did at least try to grasp the nettle.   By proposing that home owners use the value of their house to pay for care, which is some thing I have long advocated.     They also extended care funding to include domicillary care and raised the means test entitlement from  £23,500 to £100,000.     However, the details of the policy were not properly thought through and were greeted with a backlash of negative press headlines.     Belatedly the Prime Minister announced there would be a cap on the total costs, but with no indication of how much that would be.        What a mess !

On average people live in residual care for under three years, so might have to pay upto two years of costs themselves, say around £60,000.    A cap above that would prevent them from paying the catastrophic costs of a long term illness.     Hopefully the insurance industry could be encouraged to cover the intervening £60,000.

Sadly, none of this addresses the quality issues in social care nor the forthcoming dramatic rise in the population of older elderly.    Once again the issue has been ducked, because politicians don’t want to lose votes by giving people bad news and older people don’t want to face up to the fact that they may not have saved nearly enough for care if they need it.

 

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Social care confusion

Posted on May 28, 2017 by john graham

I have argued in this blog for years that the only way to release significantnt resources to pay for good quality social for older people is to unlock the equity many older people have in their houses and then expect all those who can, to pay for there own care.

The problem is that there are many barriers that stop this from happening and it will probably take a crisis to clear them away.

the problem is :-

  • When the NHS was established nobody expected longevity to increase as much as it has, nor did they anticipate the epidemic of dementia in these extended years.
  • Older people and their relatives have been led to believe that all health care should be free, even though this has never actually been the case.
  • Dementia, in particular, has always been an area of deliberate obfuscation, because firstly of the difficulty of diagnosing it; secondly, the relatively high cost of lengthy stays in residential care; and thirdly, the perhaps the understandable reluctance of the NHS to accept it as a health problem, which has passed the responsibility for caring for people with dementia to either their relatives, often an elderly spouse, or handed it over to Social Services.

The fact that the older elderly population will double in the next 10 years means that ” the crisis” is upon us now, as the pressures of these issues escalate.      These changing demographics demand an answer, even if compassion does does not.

The Government was already slowly edging toward the issues with a promised report in the autumn.    Now this has been overtaken by the forthcoming snap general election and a hastily cobbled together manifesto.     In an opportunistic, bold and maybe foolhardy move, Theresa May included a proposal to address the social care funding shortfall by shifting more of the burden on to older people, by including the value of their house in the means test evaluation, but allowing them to defer the payment in their lifetime.

I believe this is the right thing to do, but the hasty announcement has mas made its implementation doubly difficult.      Opposition parties have cynically seized on the idea and deemed it a death tax.    The media have not helped with shallow analysis and simplistic headlines. Leaving the population as a whole ill-informed and ill disposed to the proposal.

 Not a great start to reforming social care !

Posted in ELDERLY UK POLICY, Residential Care | 1 Comment

G.P.’s Charging Fees.

Posted on May 23, 2017 by john graham

GP’s are once again raising the issue of charging for an appointment to see your GP.     (You can see all my earlier posts on this subject by clicking on GP’s in the Tag Cloud )

You can tell an election is coming !   The issue has been talked up by the doctors union at the last three elections.   Each time all the political parties have run away shouting  the sacrosanct mantra “the NHS should be free at the point of delivery”.     I am far from convinced that charging is a good idea, BUT, something has to change.

  • More and more GP’s are retiring early.
  • Many practices are unable to recruit new doctors.
  • Some practices are closing altogether.
  • New patients can’t easily get registered.
  • Appointments can be difficult to get quickly.
  • Being not able to see your GP often means more people turn up at A&E.
  • If they are elderly and are admitted, they often don’t come out quickly.
  • Gradually the whole system clogs up.

Underlying this situation is the dramatic growth in the older population and the high levels of chronic illness in the older age group. Nobody wants to face up to this situation, but the G P’s can’t avoid it — unless they retire !

There is a good evaluation of GP’s charging fees commissioned by the Kings Fund not too long ago.    A £10 appointment applied to everyone would raise between £3.5  to £4.5 billion for the NHS.     It concluded it probably would not work well and could have unintended consequences. ( You can see it by clicking on the following link  https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/reports/thenhsif/what-if-people-were-to-pay-10-to-see-a-gp/)

So what is to be done :-

  1.  It has been suggested that they try a few limited pilots of charging, with exemptions for those people on welfare benefits or recurrent illness.    You can see this would be controversial straight away.    
  2. I would open some high street shops as walk-in centres manned by GP’s and nurses.  Open nine till five seven days a week, they would charge a standard £25 for a consultation and more if treatment was subsequently provided.  If you didn’t want to pay for treatment, you would be referred to the NHS and join the waiting list.  This should reduce the pressure on GP services.

 

Could be the start of a new era in health care with a focus on well-being and healthy living.

Posted in N.H.S. | Tagged | 3 Comments

Last Laugh Looney Party on PACKAGING

Posted on May 21, 2017 by john graham

This week the Packaging Association had its annual awards ceremony.  I will bet there were not many older people there !

In this election people are not taking the LLLP seriously enough.     So today we are announcing our new policy on one of the big concerns for older people, which stops them quietly getting on with their lives in a stress free way.

PACKAGING

We have talked about this over and over in this blog.   ( See earlier blogs on this subject by clicking on PACKAGING in the Tag Cloud)

Arthritic fingers don’t make unwrapping easy and shrink wrapping is almost impossible to remove.      So the LLLP  PROPOSES THAT  POLITICIANS SHOULD BE SHRINK WRAPPED FOR A DAY TO SEE HOW THEY WOULD LIKE IT 😀

Child proof bottle tops are no better.     They will also be outlawed in future. if you vote for the LLLP.   Little children should be taught to not be nosey and leave things alone that don’t belong to them !

Then there are all those heavy, bulky, stapled together, glued, tied and taped cardboard boxes, which are usually twice the size of what’s inside.    They have got to go!     How many injuries have happened trying to open these things ?      That is probably why the NHS is clogged up with old people 😀

 

 

The LLLP NO-PACKAGING POLICY has been fully costed and the £1.45 billion saved will be spent on the NHS to employ courteous nurses who actually speak to old people 😀

Posted in SMILES | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Last Laugh Looney Party on Gadgets

Posted on May 18, 2017 by john graham

The world is getting too complicated.    We are being overloaded with too many things.    I learned that from my de-cluttering days.    The Last Laugh Looney Party will lead us forward into a much simpler life.        A life with less possessions, less things to go wrong, less new fangled gadgets which are supposed to make life easier, BUT DONT.

If we are successful in the election, every house-hold will be restricted to a maximum of THREE GADGETS.    You can choose any three, but no more :-

  • COOKER —- number 1 choice for most people, but some may decide to eat out all the time or live on salads 😀
  • TELEVISION —- desired by many, but remember there are a lot less channels to watch and no remote controls, so you will have to get up to change channels.
  • speaking of WATCHES or a CLOCK —– you could have one, but what is the point, when you have all the time in the world in retirement 😀
  • SCOOTER —- no cars remember, alternatively roller skates could be fun .
  • COMPUTER —– desirable to keep a link to the outside world and  could double as a telephone, a clock, a sound system, and probably a lot more that I haven’t discovered yet ?????
  • The TEASMAID,  the BREADMAKER, the COFFEE MACHINE, the  all singing,  all dancing, healthy eating, BLENDER all of which have been used at least once before they were put in the back of the kitchen cupboard three years ago can all go to the local museum 😫
  • Along with the ROWING MACHINE, which never did get me fit enough for the boat race.
  • WASHING MACHINE —– can be replaced with a wash board or just a large flat stone in the garden.    The TUMBLE DRYER can now be a simple line outside.
  • CARS  —-  are gadgets, but you won’t need one if you move to one of the LLLP Island Resorts.   Mobility scooters will be exempt from the gadget rules.

Immediately after the results of the election, there will be a massive de-cluttering.    All surplus gadgets will given  to charity and then passed on to people who don’t have enough gadgets.

This LLLP MASSIVE GIVE-AWAY should secure enough votes to get them elected with a big majority.   This policy is fully costed and should save older people £millions in insureance premiums.

Posted in SMILES | Tagged | 2 Comments

My Garden Age 3

Posted on May 16, 2017 by john graham

It’s been a three years since I last wrote about my garden.  (You can see all the earlier posts on my garden by clicking on “My Garden Age” in the TAG CLOUD).

This year has been a particularly good year for Bluebells and right now in the middle of May my garden is absolutely full of them.  There seem to be more and more of them every year, rather like the numbers of older people in our society.  I think society should learn to appreciate older people for the beauty and colour they bring to each new Spring.

The bluebells capture the whole garden for a few weeks in May.     A woodland retreat wrested from the daffodlil spring.

Let’s see what joys Summer will bring.  Perhaps older people will be celebrating a whole new outlook on later life after the 2017 General Election.  When, who knows, the Last Laugh Loony Party may just get elected, or at least be in a coalition where they hold the balance of power.  That will certainly bring a lot of wisdom, beauty and colour to the Brexit negotiations.

Tagged | 1 Comment

Social Care Class Action on Bingo

Posted on May 14, 2017 by john graham

Amid all the recent concern about the shortage of funding for older people needing care, “Social care ” hit the headlines today from a rather unusual source.   This is The Times front page headline for the 10 May :-

” Stop splitting up elderly couples “

It is a report of a speech given at the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services Annual Conference in Stafford.  The speech was given by Sir James Munby, President of the family division of the High Court.   The judge in full flight rebuked his audience for not keeping elderly couples together, when one has to move into residential care.     Warming to his subject, and no doubt acutely aware of his approaching retirement, here are some of his choice words :-

  • “Separating elderly couples against their wishes must stop”
  • “Officials should give higher priority to happiness and spend less time complying with procedures and safety rules”
  • “Separting couples……… was absolutely shocking and a profound indictment of our society”

Strong stuff from a top High Court Judge.    It is a wonder he didn’t lock up half of his audience there and then !     He is right in much of what he had to say, but of course it has been going on for years.   Residential Care has always separated older couples.  No partner, if they didn’t need care themselves, would move into a care home.  So it’s not at all surprising that couples are split up, but it’s certainly not a compassionate way of looking after couples who would prefer to stay together in the final years of their lives.   Extra care housing was designed to deal with precisely this eventuality, but unfortunately there is far too little of it, so it is not an option for the majority of older people.

It is hard to blame Social Services, because they are driven by the financial constraints of Central Government, which has led them to cut back on domiciliary care, which does allow people to stay together in their own homes.   Compassion has for long been replaced by expediency.

The Judge also had some choice insights into life in residential care :-

  • ” Forcing older people to take part in group social activities, such as line-dancing and bingo nights could leave them miserable “
  • ” you are actually putting someone in a regime which may not allow them to smoke, or a regime where for their own good they may be heavily persuaded to indulge in the kind of collective jollification which they would have loathed at home “

The Judge is motoring now, because these comments apply to all people who move into residential care, not just couples.     He is creating an argument for older residential care residents  bringing thousands of cases to court for “forceable line-dancing” or “compulsive bingo playing” or “wrongful collective jollification”.

Court should be fun when the cases come about and older people will have the support of all those legally-aided no-win-no-fee lawyers 😀.  What a day out that will be, much more interesting than bingo or line-dancing.

Posted in Care Funding, Residential Care | 6 Comments

Last Laugh Looney Party Fourth Half Manifesto.

Posted on May 11, 2017 by john graham

This is the last segment of our 2017 LLLP MANIFESTO.   ( You can see the earlier ideas by clicking on ” LLLP ” in the TagCloud )

If we are elected we expect to transform the lifestyle of older people for the better and make sure they are valued and respected in society.

We will make their lives EASIER :-

  • By relocating them to age-friendly communities in Island Resorts;
  • By providing them with new purpose-built housing for rent;
  • By releasing their financial resources to fund care and support as they need it;

and SAFER :-

  • GP’s will do most consultations by home visits.
  • Hospitals will see you straight away, there will be no waiting lists.
  • Operations other than day surgery, will be done in brand new LLLP Indian facilities and older patients can take three weeks to recuperate in luxury patient hotels before their free flight home;

and FASTER :-

  • By providing them with traffic free green routes reserved for mobility scooters and a free taxi service for more distant travel;
  • By ensuring all newspapers and other printed documents are simple and easy to read;

And FUN :-

  • On the LLLP RESORT Islands every day will be a Bank Holiday;
  • Temperatures will be warmer because they will be in Fahrenheit ;
  • Everything will be tax-free, there will be no VAT.  And instead of Pound shops, we will have Shilling and Penny Shops, so things will be much cheaper ;
  • There will be good news storeys every day.

Posted in SMILES | Tagged | 2 Comments