UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is set to announce a £10 billion-a-year tax (€11.6 billion) hike to allow for increased spending on social care programmes such as the NHS and care for the elderly or disabled despite protests from within his own party.
In the UK, care for the elderly takes up around half of all adult social spending, while looking after disabled or mentally ill patients takes up the rest. Credit: Scottish Government / Flickr (Licence: CC2.0)
Both Johnson and Chancellor Rishi Sunak tried to convince MPs the need to raise money to cover the costs of caring was unavoidable, despite the fact that one of Johnson's key campaign pledges in 2019 was a refusal to raise taxes further.
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Social spending skyrocketed during the Covid-19 pandemic, with the government increasing public spending to cover furlough schemes and bailouts for struggling businesses.
However, Sunak has been attempting to slow down the amount of public spending the government does ahead of the new budget, due to be announced at the end of October.
The government's current furlough scheme - which has been in place since March 2020, at the onset of the pandemic - is set to end at the end of September.
The UK's national debt currently sits at 100% of its gross GDP, while it peaked at 106% at the end of the last fiscal year in March.
Social spending has always been a contentious topic within politics, especially for economically liberal parties such as the Conservatives, and many prime ministers in the past have attempted to implement similar policies, but have backed out over fears of public backlash or in-party rebellion.
However, a number of leaders in the west have been called on to increase spending on social schemes such as welfare, partially owing to rising wealth inequality, despite public spending reaching its highest levels since World War 2.
Johnson's proposed tax rise will generate around £30 billion (€34.8 billion) over three years and will go towards social care reform in the UK. This will be primarily done through a rise in national insurance and will offer increased care for pensioners, including wealthier retirees.
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Social care costs have shot up in recent years. AP reports that many people will have to deplete their savings or sell their homes to pay for the care, which can often exceed £100,000 (€116,119).
The government hopes the reforms could cap these costs at around £80,000 (€92,959) for lifetime care.
It is worth noting that while not raising taxes was a campaign promise, fixing the social care system was also something Johnson promised on the campaign trail, which may have left him in a delicate situation.
"We must act now to ensure the health and care system has the long-term funding it needs to continue fighting COVID and start tackling the backlogs, and end the injustice of catastrophic costs for social care," Johnson said, adding he would not "duck the tough decisions" needed to ensure NHS patients get the treatment they require.
Concerns have also been raised that the bill disproportionally affects more affluent, older people at the expense of younger, poorer ones.
Many Conservative lawmakers have expressed concern this could also hurt their party's electoral ambitions.
William Hague, a former party leader, said these policies could blur the lines between Labour and Conservative and fears this could also lead to the party haemorrhaging votes to further right parties.
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The FT reports that, in an attempt to make the tax increases more palatable to the public, it will be billed as a "health and social care levy".
Ultimately, Johnson will style it as a way of boosting NHS capacity by around 10% as waiting lists continue to pile up.
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