In the UK, we benefit from one of the finest healthcare services in the world: the NHS. We don’t have to pay for hospital treatment (unless we choose to go private) and the bill is picked up by everyone who pays into the UK tax system.

Despite the commitments in 1948 of cradle to grave care being free at the point of delivery, NHS spending is subject to budgetary constraints. With an ever increasing aging population such constraints are inevitable. The result is that many thousands of elderly people are discharged from hospital into a care home setting, and are forced to pay for the full cost of the care they receive. However, there are some people who, because of their health needs, shouldn’t be paying at all. The NHS should be meeting their costs through its obligation to provide ‘Continuing Healthcare’.