“With the election less than a week away, social care has become a real political issue,” says MRBA Chairman Ian Brace. “Unfortunately MRBA cannot take on provision of long term care because it could eat up all our resources quickly. But the issue of whether someone’s home is an asset comes up regularly in our discussions. Our remit is to help people who are or have been in market research and who are now ‘in need’. But can the owner of an asset that is worth hundreds of thousands of pounds be said to be ‘in need’? Of course every case is different.
We may feel that for someone with a short term need, realising that asset by selling their home is not a realistic solution and would greatly damage their quality of life. On other occasions, selling the home and down-sizing may be the only sensible long term solution where there is a chronic issue.
There is no ‘one size fits all’ solution, and, much as I may hate to say it, I sympathise with politicians as they try to find an answer to the provision of long term care that is both practical and morally just.
