Andy Burnham has said proposed social care reforms would be funded by new taxes after a General Election, claiming he wanted to create a new system where “everyone contributes”. 

The Prime Minister said a plan for a national care service would be presented at the next election, which may only come in 2029. Baroness Louise Casey is undergoing a review on national care and is expected to publish recommendations next year, which could include a new system for tax rises. 

Burnham confirmed his proposed new service would be free at the point of use and funded by taxpayers, adding that the current Labour manifesto did not allow him to follow through on reforms. 

“It will be a system of that kind, so everyone contributes, everyone’s covered, but not precisely, necessarily in the same way that we currently pay for the NHS,” Burnham told the BBC. 

“Parliament [is] just ignoring this issue because they consider it too difficult.”

“It can’t carry on. Somebody needs to grasp the nettle. I will be the one to do that and I realise it might require me to spend some political capital. That it might make me unpopular with some, but that isn’t going to stop me.”

Earlier this week, Burnham ruled out the prospect of calling a snap election before 2029, saying he would “knock dead” speculation that one could come within the next year. 

The Prime Minister also hit back at suggestions that reforms would cost £18bn more a year, saying costs were “not that high”. 

‘Political capital’ spent on new tax system?

He said social care in England was “as unfair as American healthcare” and hit out at politicians in Westminster for failing to “fix something as basic as the care that we give to each other”. 

During the 2017 General Election, Tory leader Theresa May came under fire for a so-called “dementia tax” policy that would have seen long-term social care at home paid by factoring in the value of people’s assets. Costs would be recouped after death. 

Another proposal reported in the Telegraph stated that government officials were considering adding a levy on top of income tax to pay for a national social care service. 

Burnham is expected to speak more about social care at Labour’s conference in Liverpool over the next three days. The Prime Minister previously said he was willing to spend his “political capital” on reforms. 

The funding for a new system could put Burnham in a tussle with top economists, who have warned that a rising tax burden is hurting activity and hiring levels in the UK economy. 

The Prime Minister said he was aware of the “febrile state of the global economy” but said he would announce potential cuts on Tuesday in order to show that he was “prepared to take those type of decisions because I won’t do what the previous Conservative government did and take risks with the economy that actually are still hurting us right now”.