Andy Burnham has been warned that a so-called “death tax” would be unlikely to raise enough money to fund an £18.5bn National Care Service.
The Prime Minister gave the strongest hint yet on Wednesday that he would have to put up taxes to fund a new National Care Service when he said the public should be prepared for “difficult decisions”.
While no decisions on funding will be made until Baroness Casey completes her review on social care next year, one option Burnham backed before he entered Downing Street was a new “national care levy” of 10 per cent imposed on people’s homes when they died, which critics have branded a “death tax”.
Shorts
Under this proposal, the 10 per cent levy would replace the existing inheritance tax rate of 40 per cent on estates above a threshold, with certain allowances and exemptions in place.
