The distinction between health and social care in England could become less precise under UK government plans to move the two closer together, MPs have been told.

Department of Health officials, who were giving evidence to the parliamentary health select committee on 29 October, said that the current plan to reform social care would mean a much closer relationship between it and the health service.

The government published its green paper Shaping the Future of Care Together in July, with the intention of reforming social care funding and delivery by creating a new national care service, which would be on an almost equal footing with the NHS.

That paper proposes several funding options. A …