MPs yesterday called for a system of paid compassionate leave for relatives to care for terminally ill patients dying at home.

They urged ministers to study the system in Canada under which employees have a statutory right to take up to six weeks away from their jobs. Patients also have access online to experts in palliative care.

The Commons health select committee also demanded an end to the division between personal social care for patients, which is means-tested, and healthcare, which is not.

Social care includes such basic needs as washing and dressing, but important domestic support such as cleaning is now a low priority for council social services.

The Department of Health has said it is not currently considering the Canadian scheme, but the MPs said it should think again. It was flexible: the six weeks, for example, could be split between relatives or friends; and at least some of the extra money it might cost would be offset by savings from hospital care.

In addition, the government should study estimates from the charity Marie Curie Cancer Care that an investment of just under £100m a year to meet the needs of those dying at home could free £200m for acute services in hospitals.

The committee's report said: "We do not believe it is acceptable for people who choose to die at home to find they are doing so in increasingly squalid conditions.

"Indeed, it is likely that it is poor domestic conditions that often precipitate admission to hospital for people who should be supported so as to remain in their own homes."

Places in hospices were also extremely limited, and nearly all of them were taken by cancer patients, meaning that other fatally ill people, with motor neurone disease or heart disease, for instance, could not find beds.

· Women pay a price for their longer life expectancy by having to experience nearly three more years of ill health before they die, according to a report yesterday from the Office for National Statistics, adds John Carvel.

In 2001 the average life expectancy of women was 80.4 years, but they had 11.6 years of poor health. Men's life expectancy was 75.7 years, but their average period of poor health was 8.7 years.