the Brown government’s health insurance and ‘age-tax’ plans announced on Monday were condemned as privatisation and ‘a punishment for growing old’ yesterday.
‘Health insurance means back to private medicine. It’s unacceptable,’ said Dave Wiltshire, Secretary of the All Trades Unions Alliance (ATUA).
He added: ‘If it takes a general strike to stop it, so be it!
‘Age taxes are revolting, just a punishment for growing old, after the bosses have finished using you to make profits.’
On Monday, Brown and Health Secretary Alan Johnson launched a ‘consultation paper’ in preparation for a green paper in six months time for new legislation on the funding of elderly care.
Health Secretary Johnson said a new form of ‘social care insurance’, on top of the National Insurance Contributions (NIC), would be required.
‘If we are running out of so-called free personal care – which even the Liberal Democrats have dropped as a commitment – then you are looking at some kind of insurance that can be provided by the state or the individual,’ said Johnson.
He said ‘a £6 billion funding gap for social care’ would emerge within 20 years, warning: ‘Radical change is needed so that people are clear about what they are entitled to and where they can get it.’
Introducing the ‘age tax’ plan the consultation paper warned: ‘If every adult makes a contribution, the risks of high costs hitting each household are reduced.’
The document said government could do a number of things, including making private insurance for care and support compulsory.
Wiltshire continued: ‘It’s time to bring this government down.
‘The whole concept of the Welfare State was that you paid National Insurance tax in order that when you retired you had a pension you could live on and if you became too infirm to look after yourself you would find a care home.
‘This is a big step towards destroying the Welfare State and is being carried out by a Labour government.
‘It should not be welcomed by the trade union leaders, it should be rejected out of hand.’
Paul Cann, Director of Policy at Help the Aged claimed: ‘The Green Paper presents a golden opportunity to fix what many experience as a broken system – unfit for the future and unable to deliver the quality of care and support they wish for.’
Press officers for the TUC, UNISON and the British Medical Association all declined to comment.