Henry McLeish, the former First Minister, yesterday insisted free personal care for the elderly was affordable in the long term, provided ministers had the political will to see it through.
He also queried whether councils claiming to have run out of cash for free care had actually done so, suggesting some may have raided budgets for the elderly to spend on other services as they felt the elderly were least likely to complain.
His comments come in advance of a Scottish Executive review of free personal care (FPC). Mr McLeish, who introduced FPC in 2002, was speaking at a conference on the elderly organised by Holyrood magazine.
He said there had been a lot of scepticism about FPC, especially as it was a markedly different policy from that of Westminster, but it had addressed the "ridiculous anomaly" between health care and social care - one free at the point of need in hospitals, the other charged for in people's homes.
He said: "When people say about free personal care it can't be sustained why not? It's about resources. It's about priorities."
David Manion, chief executive of Age Concern Scotland, said FPC was "absolutely affordable", but its implementation so far had been woefully lacking.
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