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People with learning difficulties simply do not have a high enough priority in government thinking.

And in a system such as social care, which is increasingly driven by targets set by the centre, that means they don’t have a high enough priority for those commissioning and delivering services either.

We have seen many times how quickly and forcefully the government can make change happen when it identifies a problem that is attracting substantial media and political attention. It rapidly devises a solution and writes that solution into the performance assessment system.

Adoption is just one obvious example. Delayed discharge is another. Unfortunately, in both these cases, the government’s preferred solutions are simplistic and blunt in comparison to the well thought-out and people-centred vision of the Valuing People white paper.

The only problem with the white paper is that the mechanisms to make it happen are not in place.

This week’s announcement that the implementation support fund will be extended for an extra two years is welcome. But however worthwhile the support has been, this is just more of the same. And when agencies are burdened with massive uncertainty and looming change, recruitment problems, and a dense web of performance indicators, a culture has been created in which appealing to professionals’ values, judgement and understanding of best practice isn’t enough.