If you are caring for someone for at least 35 hours a week, you may be able to claim carer's allowance (£48.65 a week in 2007-08).

Over one-third of people aged 60-74 and half the over-75s need help looking after themselves. The vast majority of help is provided by husbands, wives or grown-up children. Around half a million elderly people are cared for in residential and nursing homes.

State help is available (Table 1), but often means tested, only kicking in once the bulk of your assets have been depleted. Attendance allowance is widely available and state help is free if you can succeed in the difficult task of convincing the authorities that your problems amount to health care needs - the responsibility of the NHS - rather than social care. "Working out how best to fund care is a minefield in which a wrong decision can have disastrous repercussions," warns Marion Shoard, author of a comprehensive new book on choosing, arranging and paying for care.

Table 1. Summary of the main State help for older people needing care.

Cash from the State

Care services from the State

Providing social care is the responsibility of local councils. If you or a family member needs care, contact the social services department to arrange a needs assessment. You are entitled to this assessment, even if you will pay for your own care. The council will draw up a care plan and must advise about any charges for services recommended in the plan.

There is a wide range of possible services, for example: 

• Equipment, such as grab rails, hoists, ramps;
• Telephone care line;
• Help with daily activities such as getting up, bathing, feeding, going to bed;
• Help with domestic tasks;
• Daycentre place and associated travel; meals on wheels;
• Placement in a residential or nursing home.

Who pays for care in your own home?

You do not have to go through an assessment - you can simply arrange and pay for your own help. But, if you want any state funding, the needs assessment is a compulsory first step.

A few council services may be free, for example, minor adaptations to your home (which might cover, say, grab rails and ramps). But councils can charge for most of their care services and outsource many to commercial firms. Whether or not you pay depends on a means test. Councils set their own rules, but within a framework of national guidelines.

As a minimum, if you have capital of no more than £13,000 (England and Northern Ireland), £17,250 (Wales) or £12,500 (Scotland), your income is £149 a week (£139 in Scotland) or less in 2007-08, you should qualify for free services, but local councils have discretion to set more generous limits. Generally, the council should take into account only the income and capital of the person needing care, not that of a partner or anyone else.

In Scotland, eligible personal care is free if provided in your own home and you are 65 or over. In Northern Ireland, such care is free if you are 75 or over. Throughout the UK, any services provided at home that count as healthcare rather than social care are free.