Use aid NOT tax rises to cover cost of care

GIVEN the scale of the funding crisis engulfing elderly care – and the threadbare service so many older people now endure – it hardly seems possible things could get much worse.

Yesterday a bleak report by the Institute for Public Policy Research said that, by 2030, there will be a £13billion black hole in care budgets, even with significant funding increases. Disturbingly, the authors concluded: ‘ On current trends adult social care is unsustainable.’

And today? In a further crippling blow, the British Medical Association warns

another £5billion could be slashed from social care funds over the next four years.

We also have a clear indication as to how these huge gaps in funding are likely to be plugged. Not, as they should be, from the ballooning foreign aid budget – but from the pockets of already hard-pressed families paying council tax.

Tory-run Surrey County Council is planning a staggering 16 per cent increase in a single year. For the average council tax payer, this would mean their annual bill rising more than £200 a year to £1,470.

If a council in Chancellor Philip Hammond’s own true blue back yard is even considering such a drastic move, others will doubtless follow suit. Indeed, bills in most areas are likely to rise by 5 per cent a year for the next two years – the most town halls can get away with without triggering a referendum.

Meanwhile, thanks to David Cameron’s arbitrary target, spending on foreign aid is set to increase from £12billion to nearly £16billion by 2020, with unimaginable sums wasted, funnelled off to unaccountable bodies or falling into the pockets of dictators.

As council tax payers face swingeing rises, and services for the elderly decline, how can there be any possible justification for this mindless foreign aid largesse?