Town hall and third sector groups have raised fresh concerns over government plans to reform social care which this week were debated in the House of Lords.

London Councils warned that the capital's boroughs face extra costs of £877m by 2019/20 and local authorities across England £6bn because of the proposed £72,000 cap on care costs. A report published this week by Age UK also warned that care home fees paid by councils would be too low and families would be forced to pay additional ‘top up' charges.

London Councils says the £335m announced in last month's Spending Review to help councils deliver the proposed changes in 2015/16 will be ‘too late' and local authorities need transitional funding to prepare as soon as possible.

It says that the percentage of people paying for residential care in London who reach the £72,000 cap at which point councils pick up the costs could be 27% compared to just 3% in areas where residential care costs are lower.

The warnings follow the LGA's own call for single care and health budgets in its report Rewiring Public Services unveiled at its conference last week in Manchester
Shadow health secretary Andy Burnham also called for ‘a national health and care service' with local government commissioning through health and wellbeing boards and the NHS ‘leading on provision.'

Health secretary Jeremy Hunt told the conference he wanted ‘a seamless provision of services so people don't know whether they are served by the local authority or the NHS.'

He added: ‘Everyone is protecting their budgets and preventing people from coming into their eco-systems.' He said he wanted the extra £2bn earmarked in the Spending Review from the NHS for adult care ‘to transform out of hospital services.'