Britain’s biggest pensioner organisation, the National Pensioners Convention (NPC) has entered the debate on social care to call for the creation of a National Care Service, funded through general taxation and based on care needs rather than ability to pay.

NPC General Secretary, Dot Gibson said: “Over the last few years it has become widely accepted that the existing social care system suffers from a number of inherent problems; namely its complexity, the unfairness of means-testing, a postcode lottery of funding and standards, little support for family carers and a distinct lack of personalised services."

“In addition there are concerns surrounding the standards and quality of care services, the training, remuneration and employment conditions of the care workforce and the lack of a robust and effective regulation and monitoring of care providers."

“Successive governments have also argued that changing demographics and an ageing population are putting the services under even greater strain and the King’s Fund research shows that the number of older people who need significant care support but receive no assistance will reach almost 900,000 in 2012, rising to one million by 2015."

“At the heart of the problem facing the care system, is the false separation by successive governments of medical care funded by the NHS through taxation and social care that is provided largely by local authorities in the community and is means-tested. As a result of this conscious decision, thousands of frail elderly people with complex health problems have been removed from receiving free NHS medical care and moved into the community – either in their own home or a residential home – to receive social care. This has led to the perverse situation where those suffering from Alzheimer’s disease are classed as needing social care rather than medical treatment, and left to fund themselves."

“However, given the growing importance of this issue, it is only correct that we begin discussing how much it would cost society as a whole to provide everyone in need with good quality, personalised, social care. The choice we face as a society is to find the additional funding by diverting existing spending from one area to another, accepting the need to pay additional tax (estimated to be around 1.5p in the £1 of income tax) – or a combination of the two. For example, the combined cost of the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts are estimated at £20bn, £46bn of tax payers’ money was used to bail out the Royal Bank of Scotland during the economic crisis and £25bn is lost every year in tax avoidance, with a further £70bn evaded by large companies and wealthy individuals.”