Minister for Older People

Margot James Excerpts

Thursday 28th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Margot James (Stourbridge) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth North (Penny Mordaunt) on leading the charge to secure this debate and all the other work she does on behalf of older people. It is also a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bolton West (Julie Hilling), whose mother I have had the privilege of meeting—she is indeed very fortunate to have such a daughter.

Before entering Parliament I was a local councillor in Kensington and Chelsea and served as older people’s champion for the borough. What I learned in that role has reinforced my support for the campaign, led by Anchor housing and supported by so many charities and housing organisations, for a clear voice at ministerial level for older people.

We already have Ministers with specific responsibility for women, children and people with disabilities. The Minister for Women is also the Minister for Equalities but, although that includes older people with regard to discrimination in the workplace, the Equalities brief is focused primarily on ethnic minorities and gay and transgendered people. If those five demographic groups are represented at ministerial level, why are older people not? Surely such different treatment implies some discrimination.

The arguments for having a Minister for older people go further than the fact that other demographic groups are represented at ministerial level. There are a specific set of interests and challenges associated with our ageing population that require the voice and insights of older people to be heard and taken into account across Government.

What would the role of an older people’s Minister involve? I have learned, from my own experience of a similar role locally, that older people’s interests are commonly perceived to lie in health, benefits and pensions, but that is a misperception, because older people have interests across a far wider spectrum of policy, and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth North said, in areas such as transport their experiences are totally different, on account of their age, from those of younger people.

One policy area that is of prime importance today is the voluntary sector, and research by HSBC has found that the economic value of volunteering among people over 60 years old is £4 billion. My constituency has a remarkable voluntary and charitable sector, which relies hugely on the energy and dedication of large numbers of people who have already retired from paid employment, so an older person’s Minister should champion that aspect of their lives. They are not a cost to, and a burden on, society; they are contributors to society.

The requirements of a Minister go well beyond the role of champion, however. A Minister should do battle for the cause, and that involves questioning and challenging the effects of policy on older constituents. I have a few examples from the past and present.

The social care budget for the five years to 2010 was almost static, meaning that the same budget had to stretch to cover more and more older people, and that local authorities were no longer able to fund care for people in moderate need. They started to restrict care to people in critical need, and that is going to have implications for the future which an older people’s Minister would have been able to spot and to anticipate.

There is still plenty to challenge on behalf of older people, and, as the Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, the hon. Member for Thornbury and Yate (Steve Webb) is here to answer our debate, I congratulate him on securing the best ever deal, as announced this year, for pensioners, but he will know that existing pensioners are concerned about proposals for a flat-rate individual pension for new pensioners from 2015.

If the new pension were set at £140 a week, it would provide a couple who both drew their pension with an income of more than £14,000 a year. Currently, a couple in receipt of the basic state pension and the additional state pension receive an income of more than £11,000, however, so the difference between what I understand to be the new flat rate, £140, payable to both members of the couple and the amount paid to existing pensioners in a couple will be almost £3,000 a year. I welcome the desirability of a new system in terms of simplicity and the restoration of incentives to save, but I ask the Minister to address the sense of unfairness building up among the currently retired population.

There is also a need to challenge the “never had it so good” mentality that has built up among think tanks and interest groups, one example of which the Institute for Fiscal Studies published recently. There are affluent pensioners, and some are asset-rich and income-poor, but there is also considerable pensioner poverty. The scandalous deaths of older people each winter, owing to fuel poverty and numbering more than 20,000 in the most recent year for which figures are available, shame our society.

I have covered the importance of a Minister for older people as champion, advocate and challenger of policy, but the final critical aspect of the role would be to act as a critical friend to the older population; the job could not simply be to promote older people’s economic interests in a silo, as if the wider economy were not an issue. That is why I spoke up for the measure, announced in the Budget, to reduce the special tax threshold that is allowed for pensioners.

One of the toughest jobs of the Minister for older people would be to manage the expectations of our older population now and of the general population as they approach old age. The Government have taken difficult decisions to raise the retirement age and to put public sector pensions on a more sustainable footing, but we will in time have to go further. It is a year since the Dilnot commission reported on the funding of long-term care. I understand that there is no new money to fund Dilnot’s recommendations, and a new Minister will have to level with families and older people about what is affordable and what will have to be financed by individuals, families and private insurance schemes in future. I personally subscribe to much of what is in the commission’s proposals as regards standardising eligibility criteria, making care packages more portable around the country, and setting out standards that individuals and carers can expect.

I am pleased that the Government are going to bring forth a Bill in this Parliament to address these matters, and more, but I hope that if they accept the need for an older people’s Minister, that person would start to lay out what it is reasonable to expect and not to expect from the taxpayer towards implementing Dilnot’s fundamental recommendations on the funding of long- term care.

--- Later in debate ---

[Liz Kendall]

I think we made big improvements for older people, but far more needs to be done. One of the biggest challenges—transforming the care system for older people—requires action across Government. It is not something that a Minister for older people could do on their own. They would need the Treasury, No. 10, the Department for Work and Pensions and other Departments to be closely involved. It is a matter of having someone who can help to co-ordinate action across Government and provide a stronger voice at Cabinet level. That is the role a Minister for older people would perform.

Let us consider some of the other areas in which we need to make sure that older people’s needs and concerns are heard. Take education policy, which some might not think would be relevant. We need to understand that as people live longer and need to work for longer, lifelong learning is essential to help them to develop new and different skills. In family-friendly working, we need to understand that a quarter of all grandparents— 3.5 million in total—are still working as well as helping to look after their grandchildren.

Several hon. Members have mentioned housing policy. We must ensure that there is a range of good-quality options for people as they get older, so that they are not given a choice between living in their own home or a care home; there should be various stages in between. Transport policy is also very important. I am sure that many hon. Members find that bus services are a big issue in their constituency. Making sure that services are linked up is a big challenge. Our energy policy must also take into account the needs of older people, many of whom have very high energy and heating bills, particularly if they have long-term health conditions.

Having a Minister for older people in Cabinet would help to ensure that all Departments were more aware of the issues and concerns I have raised, but the final and most important reason why we need the role is that, as a society and a country, we need to face up to the major economic and social challenges of demographic change. That is a key issue behind Grey Pride’s campaign and is highlighted in the motion. Many hon. Members have spoken about pensions, and I am sure the Minister will speak about them too, but I will focus on care and support.

That must be one of top priorities for the Minister for older people because it is one of the biggest challenges facing Britain today. That is why one of the options would be to have the Minister for older people in the Department of Health, because the key to transforming the care system is in transforming the NHS. Social care budgets have been under increasing pressure for many years, but the care system has now reached breaking point. Adult social care makes up around 40% of local council budgets—up to 60% in some areas—and it is their biggest discretionary spend. When the Government are cutting local council budgets by a third, it is inevitable that services for older people will suffer. Figures from the Department for Communities and Local Government show that more than £1 billion has been cut from local council budgets for older people’s social care since the coalition Government came to power. The result is that councils are raising their eligibility criteria: 80% now provide care only for those with substantial or critical needs, up from 50% only four years ago.

[Margot James]

Does the hon. Lady not accept that the phenomenon of councils changing their eligibility criteria to restrict care to critical level started way before the cuts to local government budgets?

[Liz Kendall]

I did say that social care budgets had been under increasing pressure for many years, but local councils are now facing cuts of a third in their overall budget. Adult social care is their biggest discretionary spend, so they face real challenges and are moving their criteria from modest to only substantial and critical need.

Preventive services have all but disappeared in many areas. Fewer older people get free care; more end up having to go into hospital, or are unnecessarily stuck in hospital or more expensive residential care. Charges are increasing across the country and vary hugely depending on where people live. It is not just older people who are suffering, but their families. Carers suffer ill health and some have to give up work because the right services are not available. There are costs to the taxpayer if they are not in work and contributing financially. There are also increased benefit bills.

The fundamental problem, and another reason why a Minister for older people is important, is that our welfare state was established in a very different age. In 1948, average life expectancy was 66 for men and 71 for women; now, it is more than 78 for men and 82 for women. Some health conditions that are now common amongst older people, such as dementia, were almost unknown back then, and many disabled children died at a young age. Social expectations were very different. Disabled adults had fewer rights, and people automatically assumed that women would stay at home to care for their families.