§ Mr. Allan Stewartasked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will list the grants given by his Department to organisations concerned with alcohol abuse in each year since 1979–80.
372Wrecords of how many wheelcharis are on issue to different age groups. In total there are over 480,000 powered and non-powered wheelchairs on issue. It is estimated that a considerable number of these users could benefit in varying degrees form a dual purpose powered chair which could be used indoors and outdoors, but there are no reliable figures of how many, nor the likely cost of such provision. In its report the McColl working party suggested that the cost of providing dual purpose powered chairs for 24,000 of those with the greatest need would be over £30 million. This is more than the total annual expenditure on the entire wheelchair service.
§ Mr. Ashleyasked the Secretary of State for Social Services when he intends to announce his decisions regarding the recommendations of the McColl committee on dual purpose powered wheelchairs.
§ Mr. MajorWe are still considering this major issue in the context of decisions on other important aspects of the artificial limb appliance centre services raised by the McColl report. We will announce our conclusions as soon as possible.