Will my life savings be wiped out by care costs?

Age UK’s Caroline Abrahams said in reforming the system, the government should not be afraid to follow the lead of other nations, such as Germany, which has a mandatory long-term care insurance system funded through contributions from workers and employers

“Many other similar countries took action to reform their social care systems at the end of the last century, or in the early 2000s – but ours is substantially the same as it was in the 1950s,” she said.

“This means we have a lot of catching up to do, but more positively there are many lessons to learn from the experiences of other nations.

“No country has completely ‘cracked it’, but there are different things to like, from the approaches to social care taken in Germany, Japan and Australia, among others.

“Many commentators say that even within Great Britain, the social care systems are better in Wales and Scotland than the one we have in England.

“Hopefully we can take the best from other nations and put together a new approach that works for us here.

“Certainly, in all these other countries, the individual and their family is offered more support, and usually earlier too, compared to how social care works here in England.”