---

Personal Care at Home Bill

I wonder whether the Secretary of State could explain to the House how he sees the Bill forming a bridge to a longer-term reform in the terms in which the options were presented in the Green Paper. The underlying proposition of the Bill is that free personal care should be provided to people at home. The Green Paper had an option of taxpayer-funded free personal care within it and the Government expressly ruled it out as being unfair in placing too great a burden on people of working age.