Gordon Brown fulfilled his dream to become Prime Minister yesterday after more than a decade of waiting and pledged a decisive break with the Tony Blair era.
     
After spending almost an hour at Buckingham Palace with the Queen – twice as long as the departing prime minister – Mr Brown made a short stirring speech in Downing Street before entering the door of Number 10 for the first time as leader of the country.

Mr Brown, clutching the hand of his wife Sarah, finally stepped out from Mr Blair’s considerable shadow with a promise to heal the divisions within his party and the country over the Iraq war. He also signalled a new, more low key style of government in stark contrast to the flamboyance of his predecessor.

“This will be a new government with new priorities,” Mr Brown said. “I remember words that have stayed with me since my childhood and which matter a great deal today: my school motto, ‘I will try my utmost’.”

There was conspicuously no mention of Iraq, the issue that dogged the final years of Mr Blair’s premiership and he repeatedly emphasised that he could provide the country with the “change” it wanted.

He stressed that his domestic priorities were “change in our NHS, change in our schools, change with affordable housing, change to build trust in government, change to protect and extend the British way of life”.’

Two senior officials at the government agency meant to safeguard patient safety in the NHS have cost the taxpayer more than £640,000 in early retirement payments, ministers have admitted.

Playing chess, reading newspapers and engaging the brain in other tasks can significantly reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s disease in later life, according to a study.

A hospital department head who threw herself to her death from a 100ft motorway bridge was driven to suicide by NHS reforms, an inquest was told yesterday. Morag Wilson, 32, a manager at Wythenshawe hospital, stabbed herself with a kitchen knife before jumping from the M60 into the Manchester ship canal.

Thousands of people in England are likely to receive more help towards their care costs, a minister has said. Ivan Lewis, the Care Services Minister, was unveiling a national framework for funding NHS continuing healthcare.

The aim is to standardise decisions on who is eligible for continuing care, making the process faster, fairer and more simple to understand. However, campaigners said the measures did not go far enough, and many people could still be unfairly treated. They also stressed it would not cover social or personal care, which includes help with washing, feeding and dressing.

Continuing nursing care – a package of nursing and social care – is needed mostly by elderly people to help them cope with illness, or an on-going medical condition. At present, decisions on who is eligible vary around the country, often leading to people with identical needs being treated differently. The new guidance – which will affect thousands of people living in care homes, and in their own homes – is an attempt to end this “postcode lottery” by introducing nationwide rules.

Mr Lewis said: “We understand that families do have to make difficult and emotional decisions when someone has to go into residential care and this can be made worse by having to consider how this will be funded.” He said the new system would not solve all the problems immediately, but would lead to real improvements over time.

He said: “It will lead to fair and consistent access to NHS funding across England, irrespective of location, diagnosis or personal circumstances. This will make the system faster and more convenient for both patients and professionals. In particular, it will be of help to those who previously have been excluded, such as younger adults with long term neurological conditions and older people with dementia or other mental health needs.”

Thousands of children – most of them girls – are ending up in hospital in England every year because of binge drinking, according to new government figures which were released yesterday.

The number of children with special needs in English schools has dropped slightly, according to new government figures. Over half (57.2%) of state school pupils at all levels have special educational needs, down by 1.5 percentage points from 2006.

The English Community Care Association (ECCA), the leading representative body for independent care homes, has welcomed the announcement that there would be a national system for defining access to continuing care.