Wes Streeting said Labour has “got to set out the plan for the funding of social care” but declined to give a cast iron commitment that it will be in the party’s general election manifesto.
The shadow health secretary was asked repeatedly if Labour will set out in its manifesto a detailed plan for how social care should be paid for.
He told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme: “We will certainly have more to say about that in the not too distant future…”
Asked again if it will be in the manifesto, he said: “We will have social care in our manifesto.”
Asked again on the specific funding issue, Mr Streeting said: “You are tempting me into announcing Labour’s manifesto on the Today programme this morning. I am going to resist that temptation.
“In direct answer to your question, I think you just set out plainly there why we failed over more than a decade now, yes, we have got to set out the plan for the funding of social care.
“We have also got to set out a different kind of politics around social care for the long term as well.”
He added: “I would hope that the next Labour government won’t just provide an answer to the immediate crisis in social care but will set out a long-term direction for investment and reform that can command consensus across the divide and can last for generations, as we did on the NHS in 1948.”
