Rayner: Pensioners may be willing to back triple lock reform to fund social care

Pensioners could be willing to give up the triple lock if they know their money is going towards social care rather than to fill a “black hole” in government spending, Angela Rayner suggested.

The senior Cabinet minister praised Prime Minister Andy Burnham for being willing to stake his political reputation on fixing a social care system in England which leaves people facing a “lottery” at the end of their lives.

There is widespread speculation Mr Burnham is eyeing changes to the triple-lock, which guarantees the state pension rises in line with inflation, earnings or 2.5%, whichever is highest, as a way of funding an NHS-style social care service in England.

Housing Secretary Ms Rayner said Mr Burnham was prepared to be “brave” in order to fix a system which left people with conditions such as dementia at risk of losing their home while people with cancer or other diseases get free NHS care.

She said families faced a lottery over “which way to die is the better way” and Mr Burnham was right to stake his political future on addressing it.

“He’s saying that this lottery at the moment of ‘which way would you like to die’ is not OK.

“He’s making it really clear that people are paying at the moment, and it is a system that we’ve got to ask ourselves: Is this what we want for our loved ones? And is this value for money, is this fair on individuals? Is it fair on the taxpayers?”

She told a live recording of Sky’s Electoral Dysfunction podcast that Mr Burnham was aware of the criticism he would face – his previous attempt to reform the system during Gordon Brown’s premiership led to claims he was planning a “death tax”.

Housing Secretary Angela Rayner with Labour MP Jess Phillips during the recording of the Electoral Dysfunction podcast (Peter Byrne/PA)

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Ms Rayner said: “We’ve got a prime minister who said ‘I am okay with burning through all my political capital to the point where it might finish me off on the basis that my legacy will be something better and different’.”

Changing the triple lock has long been seen as off-limits for politicians because of the risk of losing the votes of pensioners, despite warnings from economists that it is unsustainable with an ageing population.

But Ms Rayner suggested pensioners could be sympathetic if they knew where the money was going instead.

“The high principle on this is that people have paid in all their lives. They are willing, I think, to look at that.

“But what they don’t want is what they consider to be, quite frankly, incompetent politicians that are going to take something from us to fill a black hole.

“If they can see that this is going to improve and and move it into a way that delivers, so you’ve got a retail offer of ‘that’s no longer fit for purpose, but we can either do something for the younger generation because of the intergenerational disparities, or something on social care or whatever’, I think they would they would be willing to have a conversation.”