Abstract
The Government has acknowledged a new approach to the issue of eligibility and assessment is required to deliver its vision for a transformed care and support system. The paper identifies the lessons that need to be learned from the failures of the current system if a new system is really to deliver the new vision for social care. It goes on to propose how such a system might be constructed. The paper also sets out why the Government's current proposals (Autumn 2013) will fall a long way short. They amount to virtually no change to a system that has not only failed to deliver equity or transparency, but also in the process has had an oppressive and damaging effect on the process of assessment and support planning, acknowledged as the cornerstone of the care and support system. The paper also suggests that an approach to eligibility that delivers all that is expected of it will unavoidably challenge some key elements of current strategies to personalize care and support, leading to a need for them to be re-envisioned.