Professor Alan Barrett:

I still have the scars but we will go into that another time. One of the points that was raised with me at the time was the notion that under the fair deal scheme, all cash but only a certain proportion of the family home is taken. It was pointed out that this creates an incentive for families to leave a house vacant when a person moves into a nursing home. While I do not know if this is a major issue, it struck me that it was an unfortunate side effect of the fair deal scheme and one which would be worth considering at some point.