Ministers will look at how much can be saved from NHS budgets by improving adult social care before increasing taxes to fund the reforms, Andy Burnham has said.
The prime minister gave a speech in north London today to make several social care announcements.
This included launching a “big conversation” public engagement, led by Baroness Louise Casey, which will consider setting out different options for a National Care Service and how to pay for them.
The PM also revealed that Baroness Casey’s social care review, which began under Sir Keir Starmer, will now report within the next year, rather than in 2028 as had been planned.
However, asked after the speech whether government can realistically transform care without raising taxes, Mr Burnham argued: “It is possible from existing budgets to do much more.
“I mentioned… people [are] coming into hospital unnecessarily from social care settings, then having a long length of stay in hospital as a result of that unnecessary admission, and then a long period where they’re medically fit to leave but can’t, because the care is not available.”
He quoted the annual cost of delayed discharges linked to social care at £2.5bn, and said: “If you add all of it up you are talking [about] several billion pounds a year [that] is lost from the lack of a preventive front-end social care service that’s well supported.”
The PM added: “Before we talk about tax rises [we] first have to look the public in the eye and say, ‘are we doing everything we can do from within what we’ve got?’”
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Source: HSJ, 29 July 2026
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