Kemi Badenoch isn’t alone in dodging the issue of social care

Elections aren’t just fights between the parties over policy. They also include conspiracies of silence where neither side will benefit from talking that much about an issue. Social care is one of those toxic problems: it is a key driver of inefficiency in the NHS, and should have been reformed three decades ago. It is also expensive, complicated and little-understood by voters, who resent any iteration of reform because all involve someone shelling out money when many people think it is free currently (it is not), or that it somehow should be.

This morning, Business and Equalities Minister Kemi Badenoch was quizzed on her party’s plans to reform social care. She didn’t take kindly to being asked about this during her appearance on Times Radio. Initially, she explained that ‘it is one of those issues where there is no perfect outcome’, reminding listeners that when Theresa May tried to tackle the subject in the 2017 election, ‘people responded very negatively to it’.