The shadow social care minister has called on Conservative MPs to renounce the so-called “dementia tax”, proposed in the party’s election manifesto, before a debate in parliament on the social care crisis.

The Labour party will hold an opposition day debate on Wednesday which will include a vote on ditching the Conservative manifesto proposal, which would leave people with a maximum of £100,000 of assets after care costs.

Tory MPs described the plans as deeply unpopular on the doorsteps and the proposals were widely considered to have been dropped after the election result. However, the junior health minister Jackie Doyle-Price recently resurrected the idea of asking people to contribute more to the cost of care, saying people’s homes should not be seen “as an asset to give to their offspring”.

The shadow social care minister, Barbara Keeley, said the party would call on the government in the debate on Wednesday to confirm it did not plan to proceed with the dementia tax when it publishes a green paper on social care next year.

“There has been a deafening silence since the general election but we cannot have that,” she said. “People are unhappy, unsettled and extremely worried that this is coming round the corner. They don’t know what they can afford, they don’t know what they can save and they need certainty as they look forward, and that goes for older people and working people.”

Labour’s motion calls on the government “to confirm its intention not to proceed with this” as well as committing to the extra funding needed to close the social care funding gap for the remainder of parliament.

Conservative MPs may be whipped to abstain on the vote on the Labour motion, a controversial tactic which surfaced last week at a Labour debate on the rollout of universal credit.

Their abstention meant Labour’s motion to pause the Conservatives’ flagship welfare policy passed through the Commons without any vote against, though the motion is not binding on the government.

Several Conservative MPs have since voiced their dissatisfaction at having to abstain, with the veteran MP Sir Edward Leigh calling it “the road to tyranny” for governments to ignore parliamentary motions.

Keeley said it was clear public opinion was behind reform of social care, even if it meant paying more into the system. “There have been an awful lot of surveys over the past number of months to say that. But it’s not just a question of people saying they’d pay more – what people want is for it to be fair.



“At the moment, the system is anything but fair. The bulk of providing care now comes from people paying what can be catastrophic care costs and, of course, millions of people providing care for free for their families. As the crisis advances, the burden on family carers becomes even heavier.”

The motion also calls on the government to “remove the threat to withdraw social care funding for, and stop fines on, local authorities for delayed transfers of care”.