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Personal Care at Home Bill

The right hon. Gentleman is right: we should have an open mind on what the right model is going to be as we move forward in these discussions. Whatever model or models we choose will have certain characteristics in common, however. One will have to be that the local NHS and the local social care services work closely together and that they have access to and flexibility over each other's funds. We must not minimise the difficulty of achieving that, however. I have said many times on the Floor of the House and in other forums that the only significant area of local government funding that is not ring-fenced for spending in a particular way is the money that the Government give to local authorities for adult social care. If we were to ring-fence that funding, we would take away a great deal of the localism, as we like to call it. We are going to have to address that issue as well, if we want to tackle this problem. That is beyond the scope of the Bill, and of the amendment, however, and I believe that you would leap up and bring me to a halt if I went down that road, Mrs. Heal. I shall simply say that I am tempted by some elements of the amendments in this group. They deal with matters that we are going to have to face up to in the near future. I do not think that they are appropriate for this Bill, but if we reject them today, we must not reject them for ever.