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An extra £41 million funding for learning difficulties services was announced by the government last week, but an investigation by Community Care has found that many local authorities are still failing to meet key Valuing People targets, writes Maria Ahmed.

Three quarters of the 20 long-stay hospitals for people with learning difficulties that missed the original April 2004 deadline for closure are still open almost a year on.

Five of these - the Orchard Hill hospital in Sutton, the Gloucester centre in Peterborough, Prudhoe and Northgate hospitals in Northumberland and the Princess Marina hospital in Northampton are also situated within areas showing poor performance on direct payments.

Northumberland and Northamptonshire Councils were identified by the Commission for Social Care Inspection as requiring "urgent investigation” into their provision of direct payments in the social services performance assessment framework indicators for 2003-4. Sutton and Peterborough Councils were said to need to be questioned about their performance.

The Valuing People support team is expected to report on the progress towards the closure of long-stay hospitals and the provision of direct payments to community care minister Stephen Ladyman in its annual report due out next month.

The majority of institutions still open told Community Care they were "in the process" of moving residents out and were "confident" of meeting the new April 2006 deadline for closure.