Henry Mcleish

Henry McLeish argues that Andy Burnham’s condemnation of Britain’s social care system should trigger comprehensive reform. He describes a crisis marked by underfunding, fragmented services, local-authority cuts, hospital bed blocking, unaffordable care costs and severe pressures on people with dementia and their families. He calls for a lifetime cap on care costs, stronger council funding, nationwide free personal care, decentralized National Care Services across the UK and a preventative healthcare model. These measures would recognize social care as part of health and wellbeing rather than treating it primarily as a financial burden.

Andy Burnham is urged to make reforming Britain’s centralized political system a long-term priority while also defining a more credible role for the UK in Europe and the wider world. The column advocates greater powers for English local and regional government, renewed devolution for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, electoral reform, and potentially a federal structure. It argues that Britain’s unresolved post-imperial identity and Brexit have left its international position uncertain, and endorses Neil Kinnock’s proposals for closer European cooperation, including a possible future route back to EU membership.