Andy Burnham tells BBC NHS 'will collapse' without social care reform

Andy Burnham has told the BBC "the NHS will collapse" if social care is not reformed but said he could not put a timeline on changes. In his first major interview since becoming prime minister, Burnham said he would not want to leave office without bringing in "substantial change" to the social care system. The prime minister also suggested making it harder to claim benefits, saying the country had to get serious about getting the welfare bill down. Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has meanwhile written to the prime minister, saying he should rule out tax rises or increased borrowing to fund social care reform. Burnham told the BBC that if the government did not reform social care, the NHS would "collapse under the weight of trying to care for people who've really not needed to end up in the NHS system". But pressed on whether he would create a new system before the next election, he said he "couldn't put a timeline on it right here, right now", though he would put "whatever political capital I have into fixing broken social care". Burnham first proposed a universal system of social care in England in 2009 when he was health secretary under Gordon Brown and pursued the idea of a c