Letter: We would be better off if we hadn't worked hard

Letter: To all those hard working people out there, and there are still quite a few, I say don't work.

Why? Because after working hard all your life and paying taxes and NI and paying into a private pension to help you when you retire, guess what? You have a massive stroke, spend three months in hospital and then you are discharged without a care package set up, so your wife, who has also worked hard all her life and paid taxes and NI, has to retire to look after you.

Eventually you get a care package to enable your wife to be able to go out of the house occasionally, then you are diagnosed with leukaemia and given a prognosis of 12 to 18 months.

Then – here comes the best part – you are told that the rules have changed in respect of Personal Payment Plan and you will have to donate £134 per week to pay for your Care Package.

If I hadn't worked, if my wife hadn't worked, if we lived in a council house the "nanny state" would look after you. No-one said life would be easy, but it would have been a lot easier now if I hadn't worked hard in engineering for 50 years, and my wife hadn't worked hard for 46 years. If I had my time over I would have done things very differently.

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