Paying for care - how it might work

Here's Andrew Dilnot's example of how his new system would work:


"Alice lived alone in her own home worth £175,000. She had dementia and needed to go into a residential care home when she was 83 for the last five years of her life.

• Under the current system, she would have to pay for all her care and living costs in full until she died. To cover this she would have to sell her home and would end up spending over £90,000.
• Under our reformed system, Alice would contribute in full to her care and general living costs for two years. At this point she would have reached the £35,000 cap and from then on the state would pay her care costs of £18,500 per year and Alice would just pay for her general living costs out of her pension income. She would keep 80 per cent of her wealth (£140,000)."

What this appears to mean:

*free or partly free care in England for those with savings and property worth less than £100,000 (up from £23,250)

*A cap on what you pay (once you're above that threshold) of £35,000 for care (washing,dressing, moving etc), while you pick up the hotel costs (food and accommodation)

*once you reach the £35,000 cap the care comes free, but you continue pay what you can for the hotel costs out of your income. The contribution would be up to £10,000 a year, or £190 a week, which means that people relying just on the state pension would have to dip into savings.