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Spending on research and development and public health promotions will be cut in order to pay for free social care, the health secretary has revealed.
Andy Burnham told the Times today that money would be “reprioritised” to pay the costs of the Social Care Bill, published today.
The £670 million-a-year free social care provision of the Bill guarantees free personal care at home for up to 280,000 elderly and disabled people.
Another 130,000 will receive other help, including adaptations to their homes to allow them to continue to live there.
The Bill forms a core part of the government's legislative programme announced in last weeks Queen's Speech.
And the prime minister will hope it will prove popular amongst voters in the run in to the general election, expected in May.
Burnham told the Times that he would be "squeezing" funds out of "backroom spend" towards direct public benefit.
"I've got to be ruthless about that and I will be ruthless about that," he added.
Burnham expects to pay for the programme by taking £60m from his department's R&D budget and £50m from public health promotions.
Cutting management consultants would provide £60m and a further £20bn is hoped to be secured by making efficiency savings across the NHS over the next four years.
A department of health spokesman said: "We can categorically state that cancer and dementia funding will not be affected.
"We are now providing more funding than ever for health research. This £1bn budget is ring-fenced for research.
"We are committed to fighting cancer and have recently announced our plans for patients to be given a legal right to see a cancer specialist within two weeks."
The Bill has run into stinging criticism from the government's own benches, with several Labour peers lining up to attack it.
Former health minister Lord Warner of Brockley dismissed the Bill as "totally misjudged".
And Lord Lipsey, a former member of the Royal Commission on Long-Term Care, called the Bill a "demolition job on the national budget" and said it was akin to "an admiral firing an Exocet into his own warship."
"I'm not looking forward to the night of the next general election but, if the result goes as I expect, one of the consolations will be that one of the most irresponsible acts to be put forward by a prime minister in the recent history of this country will be swept away with his government," he added.
Dods Parliamentary Communications Ltd