Acrimony after collapse of secret talks on extra £6bn social care funding

Efforts to reach a secret cross-party agreement on the funding of social care ­collapsed yesterday amid acrimony after the Conservatives claimed Labour was planning to impose a £20,000 “death tax” to fund a national care service.

At prime minister’s questions, under pressure from David Cameron, Gordon Brown refused to rule out the levy to fund social care for the elderly in a white paper due next month. But Labour revealed that the Conservative frontbench held two rounds of talks in December and January to see if an all-party consensus could be reached.

The Conservatives put up posters on Tuesday claiming that Brown planned to impose the levy. The posters followed a report in the Guardian that suggested Brown and his health secretary, Andy Burnham, were looking at proceeding with the proposal.

Burnham, at a Labour press conference this week, carefully denied he was imposing a universal flat-rate levy, but would not rule out a means-tested tax rising to £20,000 and levied at death.

A social care green paper in the summer suggested £17,000 to £20,000 could be collected in different ways. Average care cost in retirement is put at £30,000, and at present many people have to sell their homes to cover the costs.

The government has said an extra £6bn is needed to fund proper social care.

Some advocates of the death levy have suggested a two-tier scheme with a social insurance model for younger people who have time to build up savings, and another scheme for older people.

In the private talks Labour claimed Andrew Lansley, the shadow health secretary, had agreed to look at an all-party consensus on future funding of social care, and had been asked to stop suggesting Labour was planning to withdraw the disability benefit.

Norman Lamb, the Liberal Democrat health spokesman, had also been involved in the discussions on the basis that each party could retain their policy positions in the election so long as they worked towards a consensus and did not exploit the issue.

Lamb described the Tory decision to put up posters as a breach of faith, saying: “Any progress that had been made has now been undermined by this descent to a puerile level of political point scoring.”

The Conservatives said they could not reach agreement in the talks since Labour was intent on a compulsory levy, something that they did not accept. With the cabinet still discussing whether it is politically too risky to suggest a new levy that could be misrepresented in the heat of an election, Brown was unable to defend the proposal or rule it out.

Cameron repeatedly pressed Brown to “rule out all forms of a compulsory levy, means-tested or not, that elderly people would have to pay”. He pointed out the green paper suggested “people might need to pay around £17,000 to £20,000 to be protected under a scheme of this sort”.

Brown replied amid shouting in the Commons : “The wall of noise will not disguise the fact that the Conservative party have absolutely no policy on an issue that is vital to the needs of the elderly. This is a big challenge that this country faces because of the demographic changes that are taking place and the needs and ambitions of old people.” Jane Ashcroft, of the social charity Anchor, said: “It is right that older ­people’s care is getting the attention it finally deserves. But it needs to be addressed seriously and not just be used as a ­political football.”