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Dementia Services

Although I applaud the fact that the Government have made money available, the serious point is that there is a shortfall nevertheless. A feature of the Labour Government is that they have tended to offload central Government costs to local authorities, which has caused problems for those authorities. Other Members mentioned the lack of memory clinics—a broken pledge. I am glad to hear that action will be taken on memory clinics. My hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Mr. Leigh), the Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, referred to some of the issues raised by officials his Committee had interrogated. He might have added that the National Audit Office has said that""vast amounts of money have been wasted and there were doubts over whether funding would be found to improve services."" Conservative-controlled Leicestershire county council has invested local tax payer's money to provide services to improve social care, which has not all been matched by central Government, which is regrettable. The Leicestershire budget, raised through council tax, contributes 82 per cent. of the total cost of adult social care, even before implementation of the measures in the Personal Care at Home Bill.