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@mary Perhaps my point was buried in my overly long post.
When I wrote “old age care” I meant specifically the kind that requires some kind of medical supervision and equipment, a care home, or whatever the term is at the moment.
When I wrote “not everybody requires care in old age” I also meant that some people are able to live in their own homes with a lesser degree of support, or live with other members of their family.
I don’t believe that it is fair that somebody easily able to pay for his own old age care in a home should be lodged at the someone else’s expense. But I am certain that this is what will happen in a system where a person’s house will be seized and sold off to finance such care: the property will be transferred to another person or to an entity from which is cannot be seized and the State will left to foot the bill.
And this is why I think that such care, where it is necessary, should be funded through a fund into which the person who finally benefits from the care will have contributed, either through NI contributions or through some sort of tax.
When I pay contributions to the health service, I don’t get a refund for not using the service. But it’s there if I need it. Two of my cousins and several of my friends have no children; their taxes are not reduced to take into account that they don’t have children making demands on the education system. My opinion is that old age care should be the same: we all pay in, and benefit from it if we need it.