DESPERATE to avoid another winter crisis, the government has injected nearly £300million extra into the NHS for more hospital beds.

But the real problem is not a need for extra beds.

Rather it is that of getting rid of the elderly "bed blockers" who are preventing sick people on the waiting lists from occupying them.

For an Audit Commission report today claims almost 50 per cent of hospital beds are filled by old people who could be looked after in their own homes.

Why aren't they?

Health Minister Frank Dobson points to the "Berlin Wall" dividing the NHS hospitals from the social services which provide community care and supervise residential homes. But it is not just a matter of creating better liaison, it is also one of right resourcing.

For one of the reasons why so many hospital are blocked by old people is that budget-capped Social services departments cannot afford to look after them in their own homes or fund residential care.

Mr Dobson promises to knock the wall down, with more efficient use of existing resources and greater co-ordination between health and social services.

He should get on with the task.

But the government may soon have to break free from the tax-pegging health spending limits it voluntarily inherited from the Tories.

For it is surely the case that extra resources will be needed for community care to keep as many elderly people as possible out of hospital - not least because an on-going "oldie" population explosion will demand it.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.