Well, it appears that money is much easier to come by if you're a barely-competent government department than if you're someone needing nursing care, that's for sure. There's evidence that the CFSMS have received:
19/06/2003 - a suggestion that funding from 1999-2003 was a paltry 20m - "...has produced a financial benefit to the NHS of almost 300m, a 15:1 return on its budget".
??/12/2004 - this notional 15:1 return has dropped to 13:1, with a claimed £478m saving on a budget of £36m "since 1999", suggesting they get about £7m a year...but the following years' accounts state that funding for 2003/2004 was £11.6m. Perhaps the government just doubled the budget that year.
2004/2005 - aha! Annual accounts! They open joyously enough with the touchy-feely, inclusive, it's-not-ours-it's-yours feel of "protecting your NHS" above a picture of a smiling woman, some babies, and bizarrely a handful of pills. Something about the opening page makes me sure they're happy pills. These claim the NHS has now saved £671m, and that funding in 2004-2005 was £18.412m and 2005-2006 reduced to £14.897m.
06/12/2006 - an extra £1.5m for "the Holbein case" (your guess is as good as mine).
So it's all a little confusing, with several mentions of top-up funding to the tune of £100m just in the few articles I could turn up being tactically omitted from the aren't-we-great tubthumping...
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