Housing Market: Difference between revisions

One of the ways the first time buyers could move up the ladder family assets becoming available as the older generation died. This wealth staying in the family was very important to those who were not wealthy as it provided a large boost to their financial prospects. One of the biggest assets has always been property. This has been particularly important when a generation could move up the housing ladder and accordingly create a valuable asset to pass on to family members.

The government has began to target this asset with:

The Conservative party also intended to make the families of those requiring care to pay from the value of their house. The plan being that the family could retain £100,000 of the value of the property. This would have meant once costs of sale were taken into account, it was likely that families would see the asset stripped. They backed down on this policy due to a negative public reaction. This is a completely unnecessay measure as the pension pot has sufficient funds to set up a decent and caring system. Cynically you could say it was a method of moving houses into the financial investment market to provide properties for their portfolio which would be broken down into smaller units. See the section [[Pensions - Conservative Impact|Pensions]] to see why elderly needs can be fully funded.

* The levy, covering personal care rather than going into a home, would generate £7billion a year, according to a report by think-tank the Social Market Foundation

* It is thought around 233,000 people – or 41% of 65-year-olds –would have to pay it every year

It is also worth noting that once a policy like this is introduced it can easily follow the same route as student marketisesfees, with the yearly amount increasing. This policy would in reality asset strip the elderly in our society.

:'''"British politics is in flux. The ideas of the radical centre need a champion. People – of all parties and none – who reject the strident extremes that too often dominate political debate today need a home. SMF will be that champion and offer that home."'''</div>

So not only are they a think tank, of which we unfortunately already have many who are undemocratically influencing government, they clearly state that they are opposed to the policies of the Labour party of removing private companies out of the provision of public services. They are described as experts in the media, but describe themselves are "radical centre", which sounds strikingly like an oxymoron. Rather like saying you are a radically wedded to being a couch potato. Maybe the term should be radically anti-radical.

The SMF is not a think tank outside the bubble of Westminster. Its [http://www.smf.co.uk/about-us/#people Executive body] has a proportion of serving MPs. The very ones that are making the decision to take these policies to partliament sit on their Executive and influence government decision making. Many members are journalists that have access to the Westminster lobby. Most if not all appear to have been involved in denigrating the policies of the Labour party.

It is fair to say that social care comes at a price. The government has for some time stated that it is a price too high not to require additiona inputs from the public. The problem is that the financial sector has long been stripping the money out of the social care sector.

In December 2017 Four Seasons Health Care, the country’s largest care homes operator, was in financial difficulty. The Care Quality Commission, had to request creditors to agree a standstill on debt repayments to prevent the business falling into administration. This happened only six years after the failure of Southern Cross, which at the time was the biggest company in the industry.

One of the causes is the pressure fees are under due to local authorities social care budgets have been cut. Possibly it has been more difficult to recruit due to Brexit. But in reality the biggest cause of social care failure is due to the part the private sector plays in the provision. The involvement of private equity has created the situation where many care homes cannot balance their books. In the case of Four Seasons the private equity firm "Terra Firma" bought the care homes operator at such a high price that the interest payments consumed the company finances. It was always seen as a high risk and this exacerbated the situation with Terra Firma borrowing at high interest rates to make the purchase. Niels Pratley stated in the Guardian "The UK is awash with long-term pension fund money that would happily build and own care homes for modest real returns. Instead, we have a high-stakes financial game in which players aim for fatter rewards."<ref>A shocking way to fund UK care homes, Nils Pratley in the Guardian 12 December 2017 - https://www.theguardian.com/business/nils-pratley-on-finance/2017/dec/12/a-shocking-way-to-fund-uk-care-homes</ref>