Widower who'd save £123,000
The Government yesterday gave two fictional examples to demonstrate how the social care plan will benefit pensioners:
Yusuf is in his late 70s and has lived alone since his wife died from cancer ten years ago.
He moved out of their family home in Hastings after her death, and downsized to a smaller home worth £180,000 – leaving him with £70,000 in savings.
Yusuf moves into a residential care home after developing dementia. Although he can no longer cope at home alone, his underlying health is good and he spends eight years at the home. His care home costs £700-a-week.
Under the existing system, Yusuf would spend around £293,000 on his care from his assets and income – leaving him with £72,000 in assets.
But under the new system, he hits the £86,000 cap after two years and four months.
This means he no longer needs to pay for his care from either his assets or income. He only needs to contribute to daily living costs. This leaves him with £173,000 – 70 per cent of his original assets.
Over his entire time in care, Yusuf spends £123,000 less than under the current system.
£48k boost for retired couple
Mary and Bob are pensioners living in a £90,000 home in Cheshire with joint savings of £10,000.
They planned carefully for their retirement and have a joint weekly pension income of £762.
Mary has dementia and Bob is her main carer at home. But Bob then suffers a stroke and the couple need to move to residential care.
Under the current system, Mary and Bob would have spent around £114,000 towards their care over the course of two years. They would only have qualified for state support at the end, when each reached the upper capital limit of £23,250, which would be based on half of their shared assets. This would have left them with around £44,000 in assets.
But under the new plan, the couple immediately become eligible for state support due to the wealth of each of them being below the new £100,000 upper capital limit.
Compared to the old system, the couple would save £48,000 from their income and assets over the course of their care.
Cost cap would've comforted us all
Jimmy Quinn's family was forced to sell his home and cash in his life savings to fund his care after he developed Alzheimer's disease.
The Falklands veteran needed specialist dementia care after his condition deteriorated during lockdown, leaving his family facing a £1,400-a-week care bill.
Jimmy Quinn's family was forced to sell his home and cash in his life savings to fund his care after he developed Alzheimer's disease
His daughter Natalie said they had to sell his home in Yeovil and his ISA savings to fund the costs, and said the Government's reform would have been a comfort to her family.
She said: 'My parents worked so hard for everything and had been careful with their money all their lives, so it was really sad to have to sell dad's ISAs and the house they loved, but it was the only way to pay the care home bill.'
Mr Quinn served in the Navy as an aircraft mechanic and was stationed on the aircraft carrier HMS Invincible during the Falklands Conflict in 1982.
He was diagnosed with Alzheimer's last year and died in February, aged 75.
His daughter said: 'He had been living at home with mild dementia but then all
