CLAIMS that Mersey councils are forcing too many elderly people to sell their homes when they move into residential care triggered a furious denial last night.
Liverpool City Council hit back after the Conservatives released research suggesting government guidelines urging town halls to use “discretion” in means testing free care were being ignored.
The rules mean anyone with assets worth more than £22,500 should meet the full cost of care, but councils can choose whether or not to include the value of a person's home in that calculation.
A second discretion can allow people to defer payments until after their death – with the house only then being sold if needed to pay for their care bill.
According to the Tories, who submitted freedom of information requests, 46% of local authorities made no use of the first power in 2007/08, while 20% did not exercise the second option of deferring payment.
St Helens and Wirral authorities were among councils who did not disregard the value of a home on a single occasion last year, while Knowsley – disregarding on 10 occasions – did not defer payment at all.
Cheshire had the best record in the region disregarding the value of a home on 152 occasions and deferring payment 108 times.
Meanwhile, Liverpool insisted it did not hold details on how many of the 495 people taken into residential care in 2007/08 were allowed to use either discretion.
The Tories also attacked separate figures suggesting Liberal Democrat-run Liverpool slashed its long-term care budget by 14.2% last year – the second biggest cut in the country.
Knowsley, Sefton, St Helens and Cheshire also cut their budgets, according to the Conservatives, while Wirral hiked its spending by 8% in 2007/08.
But a Liverpool council spokesman said both Tory claims were misleading, insisting spending on residential care was down because more people were being helped to live in their own homes.
Furthermore, only 62 of the 495 people who went into a residential home in 2007/08 were homeowners, which meant the issue of disregarding or deferring payments did not arise.
The spokesman added: “In cases where they do, it is down to the individual person or family to decide when a property is sold and we leave it entirely up to them.”
Knowsley authority told the Tories it was drawing up a deferred payment plan.
