Health and Social Care

Lord Davies of Stamford Excerpts

Thursday 12th October 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords—

[Lord Davies of Stamford (Lab)]

I shall give the Minister another chance. He did not even begin to answer the question from my noble friend Lord Hunt. Why did the Government drop Dilnot?

[The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Evans of Bowes Park) (Con)]

My Lords, we will hear from the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord O'Shaughnessy]

The noble Baroness will know that there has been a small reduction in the total number of residential nursing home beds, although it is a fairly flat picture over a long period of time. We have also seen an increase in the amount of domiciliary care. One of the things we need to get to the bottom of, and this is what the consultation will look at, is the imbalances that exist between the funding regimes for residential and domiciliary care. We have to get to the bottom of it, because it creates an imbalance on the provider side as well, so that we can have proper funding for the kind of care that people need regardless of whether it is in a residential nursing setting or at home.

[Lord Davies of Stamford]

Could I perhaps try again? I would like to give the Minister a chance to answer the very important question from the Lord, Lord Hunt, which he completely ignored. Why did the Government drop Dilnot?

[Lord O'Shaughnessy]

The Government have not dropped Dilnot. We will be consulting on both the cap and the floor in the proposals that come forward on social care funding, which build on the Dilnot proposals.