London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Thursday, Oct 09, 2025

‘Chaos’ in No 10 as Johnson finalises social care funding plan, billions resales from Afghanistan will not be used for social needs

‘Chaos’ in No 10 as Johnson finalises social care funding plan, billions resales from Afghanistan will not be used for social needs

Growing backlash from cabinet ministers and MPs after leaks about plan for national insurance rise

Boris Johnson is expected to make a final decision over the weekend about whether to press ahead with his controversial social care funding plan, in the face of a growing backlash from cabinet ministers and backbench MPs.

One government source described “chaos” in a jittery Downing Street on Friday, after leaks about plans for an increase in national insurance contributions (NICs), including the contested claim that the health secretary, Sajid Javid, has been demanding a rise of two percentage points.

It is understood Johnson still hopes to announce the package next week, but several cabinet ministers are privately fuming about the idea of a manifesto-busting tax rise that will hit young adults on low incomes, but leave pensioners unscathed.

Backbench Conservative MPs including Jeremy Hunt and John Redwood went public with their concerns about an NICs rise on Friday.

Hunt told BBC Radio 4: “Since older people are the biggest beneficiaries, it’s fair they should make a contribution.”

Another Conservative backbencher said Johnson could even struggle to get the measure through a restive House of Commons. “People have been through enough, and we should focus on getting the economy going again. Yes, social care is a ticking timebomb, but does it have to be right now?”

They added: “It just doesn’t feel very Conservative, especially given the manifesto pledge.”

Johnson’s former chief aide Dominic Cummings waded into the row, calling an NICs increase “bad policy and bad politics”.

“Why should young people on average and below-average incomes lose disposable income to pay for another subsidy for the older middle classes?” Cummings asked, in the latest posting on his £10-a-month Substack site. He predicted Johnson could yet succumb to political pressure and “trolley” away from the plan.

Another Conservative MP said he believed colleagues would reluctantly support the proposal, however. “This is a tax rise, specifically on people who work, so MPs are massively torn, but most people will think, given the pressures on the NHS, let’s just bloody do it,” they said.

Depending on the outcome of discussions about how much funding is needed, the proposal is expected to include an increase of 1 or 1.25 percentage points in NICs – badged as a “health and social care levy”.

For someone on average earnings of £29,536 a year, an increase of one percentage point would cost them £199.68 annually.

The proceeds would be devoted to relieving Covid pressures on the NHS in the early years of the plan, with more resources flowing to social care as time goes on.

The proposal is expected to include a lifetime cap on the costs an individual will have to pay towards their care, as originally recommended more than a decade ago by the Dilnot review, commissioned by David Cameron’s government.

Officials in Downing Street are said to be fretting that while the political costs of a tax increase will be high, even a 1.25-percentage-point rise will fail to fix the crisis in social care, or tackle the Covid backlog in the health service.

One source suggested the prime minister had been angered by the suggestion that even after the tax rise, it could take a decade for the NHS to return to pre-pandemic performance.


The chancellor, Rishi Sunak, is also expected to announce that he will not honour the “triple lock” for pensions this year, with wage increases, which pensions track, artificially boosted by the end of furlough. Sticking to the rule could mean an increase in the state pension of as much as 9% next April.

Politically, hitting pensioners by ditching the triple lock for this year could act as a counterweight to the fact that they will be left unscathed by the NICs rise.

With more than two years having elapsed since Johnson promised he had a plan ready to fix the social care system, the government is keen to have it announced and agreed by MPs in the brief, three-week sitting of the House of Commons before the annual party conferences.

The justice secretary, Robert Buckland, said on Friday that any future social care plan must be “adequately funded”, but that no final decision had been taken by the government on how this was to be achieved.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
France: Less Than a Month After His Appointment, the New French Prime Minister Resigns
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Sarah Mullally Becomes First Woman Appointed Archbishop of Canterbury
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
US Prosecutors Gained Legal Approval to Hack Telegram Servers
Macron Faces Intensifying Pressure to Resign or Trigger New Elections Amid France’s Political Turmoil
Standard Chartered Names Roberto Hoornweg as Sole Head of Corporate & Investment Banking
UK Asylum Housing Firm Faces Backlash Over £187 Million Profits and Poor Living Conditions
UK Police Crack Major Gang in Smuggling of up to 40,000 Stolen Phones to China
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Trump Proposes Farm Bailout from Tariff Revenues Amid Backlash from Other Industries
FIFA Accuses Malaysia of Forging Citizenship Documents, Suspends Seven Footballers
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
A Dollar Coin Featuring Trump’s Portrait Expected to Be Issued Next Year
Australia Orders X to Block Murder Videos, Citing Online Safety and Public Exposure
Three Scientists Awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine for Discovery of Immune Self-Tolerance Mechanism
OpenAI and AMD Forge Landmark AI-Chip Alliance with Equity Option
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
France Names New Government Amid Political Crisis
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
Speed Takes Over: How Drive-Through Coffee Chains Are Rewriting U.S. Coffee Culture
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Ringo Starr Champions Enduring Beatles Legacy While Debuting Las Vegas Art Show
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
×