The commission comes alongside immediate government plans to get care workers to do more health checks, and a funding boost for services to help elderly and disabled people remain in their homes.
It will be split into two phases, the first of which will report by mid-2026 and identify critical issues and recommend medium-term improvements.
But phase two, which will look at how to organise care services and fund them for the future, will not report until 2028 – a year before when the next election must be held.
Social care means help for older or disabled people with day-to-day tasks such as washing, dressing, medication and eating.
Only those with the most complex health needs get social care provided free by the NHS, so most care is paid for by councils.
In England, only people with high needs and savings or assets of less than £23,250 are eligible for that help, leaving a growing number of people to fund themselves.
Some face paying hundreds of thousands of pounds for their care and may be forced to sell their own home as a result.
The government’s ultimate aim is “a new National Care Service, able to meet the needs of older and disabled people into the 21st Century”, said Streeting.
He said he had invited opposition parties to take part in the commission “to build a cross-party consensus to ensure the National Care Service survives governments of different shades, just as our NHS has for the past 76 years”.
Baroness Casey – who has led several high-profile reviews, including into homelessness, the Rotherham child exploitation scandal and the Metropolitan Police – said she was pleased “to lead this vital work”. The commission will report to the prime minister.
She is viewed in government as being straight-talking, with good cross-party links, and as someone who gets things done.
Even so, drawing up a plan for a National Care Service that meets the needs of an ageing population and is affordable is perhaps her biggest challenge yet.
