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Oral Answers to Questions
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James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)
1. What progress he has made on establishing the big society bank.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
I am delighted to be able to tell my hon. Friend that we are making excellent progress in establishing the big society bank. I am equally delighted to be able to tell him that it will be called the Big Society Capital group.
Big Society Capital announced appointments to the management and board in July. It is now securing Financial Services Authority and state-aid approval, and we expect it to be open for business in the spring.
James Morris
Does the Minister agree that the most important thing about the initiative is that it gets funding to organisations in some of the most deprived communities in my constituency?
Mr Letwin
My hon. Friend is a noted, effective and passionate advocate of his constituency. It is of course for Big Society Capital itself to decide exactly where it places its investment funds, but I have absolutely no doubt that it will want to prioritise social intermediaries who focus on those families who are most vulnerable, and on those individuals and families who are most in need of help.
Albert Owen (Ynys Môn) (Lab)
Community groups, including not-for-profit organisations, have difficulty establishing community projects because of the complexity of the system to secure funding. Will the big society bank have a dedicated officer to help and assist them, so that small projects in deprived communities have a level playing field?
Mr Letwin
The hon. Gentleman raises a very real problem, which Big Society Capital has recognised. Right from the beginning of the scheme’s design, Sir Ronald Cohen has insisted, and Ministers have agreed, that it should not directly invest in social enterprises but act as a provider of finance to social intermediaries—whether they are lending banks such as Triodos or other more exotic and interesting new social intermediaries—that already have a retail function and can deal, and know how to deal, with the small groups that need to deal with them.
Brandon Lewis (Great Yarmouth) (Con)
2. What steps his Department is taking to ensure that small and medium-sized enterprises are aware of opportunities to gain Government contracts.
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
5. What steps his Department is taking to ensure that small and medium-sized enterprises are aware of opportunities to gain Government contracts.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
We have established Contracts Finder as a one-stop shop, which enables suppliers to find procurement opportunities, tender documents and contracts online and free of charge. We are also piloting a simple method, which I think is called a dynamic market, for suppliers to register online for public sector contracts below £100,000. That will enable small and medium-sized enterprises to compete at minimal cost alongside large suppliers.
Brandon Lewis
Does the Minister agree that, although large companies often find it easy to tender competitively for those contracts, there is a real benefit economically from spending time and effort on encouraging small and medium-sized businesses to bid for such tenders?
Mr Letwin
I agree strongly with my hon. Friend. There is a temptation to think that it does not matter who provides a public service contract, big or small, but we all have an enormous interest in encouraging small and medium-sized enterprises to engage in the process, because we all have a huge incentive and reason for believing that innovation in public service can lead to more productivity. It is very often the small, innovative companies that engage in innovation, and therefore we need to ensure that we encourage their participation right the way through the process.
Andrew Bridgen
SME information technology companies are reporting back from the Government tendering process that project aims and budgets remain unspecified and that forms are still the size of telephone directories. Can my right hon. Friend assure the House that those concerns will be taken on board, so that this Government can deliver real value from IT projects—something that the previous Government failed to do?
Mr Letwin
My hon. Friend has actively and aggressively pursued several Government Departments about these issues and I hope that he will continue to do so. He is absolutely right that too much of this still goes on. My right hon. Friend the Minister for the Cabinet Office, who has taken the lead on the issue and deserves great credit for that, has not tried to keep the issue secret—on the contrary, he has tried to open it up.
We have introduced a “mystery shopper” scheme, which allows suppliers to challenge Government procurers when they see overly bureaucratic processes. I am delighted to be able to tell the House that during the first three months of the scheme, 23 cases of things such as huge telephone-book-sized contracts were investigated and 11 have led to immediate reductions in tedious bureaucracy. All the information about the scheme has been published on the Cabinet Office website.
Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)
Has my right hon. Friend had a chance to read the Public Administration Committee report “Government and IT—‘A Recipe For Rip-Offs’ ”? It points out that we cannot rely on the large systems integrators to involve small and medium-sized enterprises. The Government themselves have to employ people from that sector so that the Government can engage with it directly. That is the only way in which we will get SMEs involved in Government procurement.
Mr Letwin
As with every product of the Select Committee in which my hon. Friend is so notably involved, we do indeed pay enormous attention to that report. My right hon. Friend the Minister for the Cabinet Office has already taken that set of steps and is already intending to ensure that we have the expertise to do exactly as my hon. Friend recommends. It is absolutely crucial that we get to grips with every large project, and some of them are central to the Government’s policy agenda—in welfare, for example.
Mark Lancaster (Milton Keynes North) (Con)
3. What steps he plans to take to put in place a system of regular review of remaining public bodies following the implementation of the provisions of the Public Bodies Bill.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Mr Nick Hurd)
The Government are committed to reviewing non-departmental public bodies every three years. The reviews will provide a much needed, robust challenge for the continuing need of individual bodies and ensure that the body is complying with recognised principles of good corporate governance.
Mark Lancaster
Will the Minister remind the House how much money he anticipates will be saved as a result of the Bill? Given the spending on so many quangos, much of which is so wasteful, are we not being slightly modest in our ambitions? Is there not even greater scope in future years to save yet more money?
Mr Hurd
My hon. Friend is entirely right—he should be nudging us to be more ambitious. We have placed on record what we think is a conservative estimate of cumulative administrative savings from reforms already identified of at least £2.6 billion over the spending review period, but we expect that to be a start rather than a finish.
Mrs Jenny Chapman (Darlington) (Lab)
Is the Minister concerned that some of the public bodies may be being abolished with a little too much haste, particularly given the riots in the summer? The Youth Justice Board was very successful in reducing youth offending by around 34%. Does the Minister not worry that we will get rid of some of the bodies in too much of a hurry?
Mr Hurd
The Youth Justice Board still exists. What we have set up with the Public Bodies Bill is a framework and mechanism for enabling reform. Each Department has to come to the House with a case for reform, which needs to be debated and processed through secondary legislation. That is what we have set up, so Parliament will have plenty of opportunity to scrutinise and debate.
Tessa Jowell (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)
In 2009, it was agreed that the office of the chief coroner would be established to improve support for bereaved families. The decision was taken with support from both sides of the House. In the passage of the Public Bodies Bill, the Government have signalled that they intend to abolish the office of the chief coroner before it has even been established. Which organisations are in favour of its abolition?
Mr Hurd
The right hon. Lady knows from our Second Reading debates that there are strong opinions on this subject. I refer her to what I said before; the mechanism that we have set out is for a genuine debate on the proposed reforms. That is what the Bill enables, and she and I, or appropriate colleagues, will have that debate in Committee in forthcoming weeks and months.
Mike Freer (Finchley and Golders Green) (Con)
4. What estimate he has made of the savings to the public purse arising from the work of the Efficiency and Reform Group in 2010-11.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
The Government saved £3.75 billion in their first 10 months after taking office by stopping unnecessary and wasteful spending. We saved £800 million by renegotiating with the biggest suppliers to Government. We cut spending on consultants by 70% and on advertising by 80%. This is just the beginning; there is much more to be done.
Mike Freer
I thank the Minister and welcome the initial savings of the Efficiency and Reform Group. He will be aware, however, of the £1 billion of additional savings that my own research has identified. Will he agree that I could meet the chair of the Efficiency and Reform Group to discuss these savings further?
Mr Maude
The chair of the Efficiency and Reform Group is me, so I will be delighted to meet my hon. Friend, who, when he was leader of Barnet council, showed how much can be done. We do, absolutely, have a huge amount to learn from what is being done best in local government, particularly the sort of savings that can be made by much better use of office accommodation. It is such a pity that when the current Leader of the Opposition was Minister for the Cabinet Office he did not do this stuff himself. The country would be in less of a mess and the public finances would be in better shape if he had done his job properly.
Jon Trickett (Hemsworth) (Lab)
Of course everybody welcomes cuts to wasteful expenditure. However, will the Minister explain why the Cabinet Office website indicates that in January a contractor charged the taxpayer £5,867.66 for flying flags? Will he explain why the Government paid a single taxi fare of £324.14, which would almost get me from here to Yorkshire and back again? Finally, will he explain why the taxpayer paid £181 for a single individual’s eye test? What a waste of money.
Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)
Proxima, a small software company in my constituency, has the potential to offer real efficiency savings in the use of Government software. Its initial discussions with the Department have been positive, but they have now stalled. Will my right hon. Friend agree to meet me and my constituents to see how we can save the Government millions by better use of their resources?
Mr Maude
My hon. Friend has raised an important point, and I will be very glad to meet him to discuss it. There is a huge amount we can do to use IT resources much, much better. Far too often in the past, the Government were reinventing the wheel by buying new systems and not reusing what they had already spent money on. That will now cease.
Mr Michael McCann (East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow) (Lab)
6. What estimate he has made of the number of civil servants who will leave the civil service on voluntary severance terms in 2010-11.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
We aim to minimise compulsory redundancy. We reformed the civil service compensation scheme so that, for the first time, voluntary redundancy was more attractive than compulsory redundancy, which was impossibly expensive under the scheme left in place by the previous Government. We estimate that in early 2010-11 11,200 civil servants left the civil service on the new terms.[Official Report, 8 September 2011, Vol. 532, c. 3MC.]
Mr McCann
I thank the Minister for that answer. Let me place on record the fact that he will share the objective that all severance packages are voluntary. Nevertheless, I am receiving from civil servants who work in my constituency evidence that they have been dissuaded from volunteering for a redundancy package because parts of their accrued service do not count for the final compensation package. Will the Minister ensure that maximum flexibility is deployed in order to allow us to reach the goal of all departures being voluntary?
Mr Maude
I can confirm that staff in the Crown Agents have always been outside the civil service compensation scheme. In April, I used the powers available to me under the scheme rules to allow service in the Crown Agents to count for compensation purposes for the voluntary schemes currently being run by the Department for International Development. I am aware that there are a few cases in which questions have arisen around service before joining the Crown Agents. My officials are actively engaged in clarifying what commitments were made at that time to these staff.
Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab)
7. What estimate he has made of the financial cost to the voluntary and community sector organisations of recent public disorder in England.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Mr Nick Hurd)
Since the riots, we have remained in close contact with our strategic partners, who are feeding in information about the impact of the riots on community groups. I have a meeting next week with community groups and sector representatives to discuss that impact and the way forward.
Jonathan Ashworth
I am grateful to the Minister for that answer. At the height of the disturbances that hit Leicester, the Age Concern ambulance bus was torched. Despite what the Prime Minister indicated to me in his statement of 11 August, Age Concern is not eligible for the compensation schemes. Will the Minister look urgently at setting up a compensation scheme for charities so that Age Concern in my constituency can replace its ambulance bus as quickly as possible?
Mr Hurd
I was as shocked as anyone by the torching of the Age Concern ambulance. My understanding is that under these circumstances, damages are recoverable from the high street support scheme. I have been informed that officials have sent that information through. I would be very happy to meet the hon. Gentleman and representatives of Age Concern if there are continued problems with this issue.
Mr David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend agree that voluntary organisations are the backbone of our local communities and that any damage to their property or organisation diminishes their opportunity to assist the individuals and groups that are most in need?
Mr Hurd
I could not agree more with my hon. Friend, which is why I am meeting many sector representatives and community groups next week to discuss the impact and the way forward. He knows as well as I do that we are doing a huge amount to support community organisations through deregulation and by making it easier for them to access finance.
Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)
How much money does the Minister think he will have to put into the national citizen service to prevent future riots? How will he ensure that that is not done at the cost of general voluntary and community services that support young people, especially given that they are incurring additional costs in helping communities to rebuild after the riots and are subject to Government cuts?
Mr Hurd
We are hugely enthusiastic about the national citizen service; much more, apparently, than the Opposition Front Bench. The experience from this summer is that it has been a fantastic experience for young people, connecting them with a chance to do something really positive in their communities. We are piloting it, but have to proceed cautiously because a lot of taxpayers’ money is involved. As the Prime Minister has made quite clear, we are keen to expand it as fast as we can.
Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)
8. What recent progress he has made on the national citizen service pilots.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Mr Nick Hurd)
We are absolutely delighted with the progress of the national citizen service. About 8,500 young people enjoyed an extremely positive experience this summer. The feedback has been fantastically positive and we will publish an evaluation report shortly on this year’s pilots.
Caroline Nokes
I thank the Minister for that response. Will he confirm that he will look to involve organisations such as the YMCA, which has a fantastically strong track record of providing constructive activities for young people, in the delivery of the scheme?
Mr Hurd
I share my hon. Friend’s high regard for the YMCA and lots of other youth organisations across the country. As I said, we are ambitious to expand the national citizen service and are looking to commission up to 30,000 places next year. We are actively reviewing a list of applications and bids from a great diversity of suppliers. We will announce the results of that shortly.
Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)
I know that the Minister is still working out the fine details of the scheme, but may I urge him not to reinvent the wheel, but to make the best use of the Prince’s Trust and the Duke of Edinburgh’s award scheme, of which I am a gold member? As well as not reinventing the wheel, I urge him not to break the spokes in the wheel by shattering youth service provision throughout the country as very good schemes go to the wall under this Administration.
Mr Hurd
I should make it clear that we are deliberately offering 16-year-olds in this country something new and distinctive. If the hon. Gentleman listens to the kids on the programme this year, he will hear that they see it as being very different from the Duke of Edinburgh’s award and the Prince’s Trust. It is set up to be different, and that is why we are piloting it. As I said, we are extremely enthusiastic about the feedback.
Mr Speaker
Order. There are far too many private conversations taking place in the Chamber. The House must come to order and hear Mr Mel Stride.
Mel Stride (Central Devon) (Con)
T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
As Minister for the Cabinet Office, I am responsible for the public sector Efficiency and Reform Group, civil service issues, industrial relations, strategy in the public sector, Government transparency, civil contingencies, the civil society and cyber-security.
Mel Stride
Okehampton, in my constituency, has recently seen unemployment treble virtually overnight, although the figure has now decreased dramatically due to local action. It is holding a very important event this week, “Okehampton Works”, bringing together public, private and voluntary organisations to focus on employment, which is an important step towards the big society locally. Will my right hon. Friend join me in visiting Okehampton to meet, and learn from, those who have pioneered that important initiative?
Mr Maude
I should be delighted for either myself or the Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (Mr Hurd), to join my hon. Friend in Okehampton to discuss those very issues. There is a huge amount that can be done.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
One quango that has done a really good job since it was brought in by the Labour Government is the Security Industry Authority, which licenses bouncers outside pubs. One role that it has not yet been given is the licensing of private investigators. We have seen over the past year that some private investigators are very good people, but some of them are the scum of the earth. Should we not be licensing them and giving that power to the authority?
Karl MᶜCartney (Lincoln) (Con)
T2. In the light of the excellent work in Lincoln this summer of the pilot national citizen service managed by the Lincolnshire and Rutland Education Business Partnership, can my hon. Friend assure me that careful consideration has been given to the EBP’s bid for next year, which I wholeheartedly support, so that it can be the deliverer of the NCS for the whole of Lincolnshire in 2012?
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Mr Nick Hurd)
I am grateful to Lincolnshire and Rutland Education Business Partnership for the excellent work that it has done this summer, which is a really good example of communities working together to support the NCS. As I have said before, we are giving careful consideration to all bids received to run the 2012 pilots and will be making an announcement very shortly. [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. There really is far too much noise in the Chamber. It is very discourteous to the Member asking the question and the Minister whose answer we want to hear. I hope the House will show some respect for Mr Sammy Wilson.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
What arrangements does the Minister intend to put in place to ensure that places such as Northern Ireland benefit from the opportunities presented by the big society bank?
Mr Hurd
I was in Belfast just a few weeks ago, at Hillsborough castle, talking about just that to a section of community organisations and social enterprises that were fascinated by the big society bank. We made it very clear that it was open for business in Northern Ireland.
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
T4. I enjoyed a very rewarding week of volunteering in my constituency during the summer with Mencap, the National Trust, Kirkwood hospice, the Forget Me Not Trust and many more. Does the Minister agree that volunteering should be a key component of the national citizen service?
Mr Hurd
I congratulate my hon. Friend on the sterling example that he has set others. Of course, one of the purposes of the national citizen service is to connect young people with their power to make a positive difference in their communities. If he had visited some of the pilots that I did, he would have been absolutely inspired by the enthusiasm with which they undertook that task.
Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)
In opening access to public data on the performance of our publicly subsidised railways, does the Minister recognise that real-time running information would be even more powerful in driving innovation that would aid the travelling public? Will he get train operators to be more open with such public data?
Mr Maude
My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. These are services that rely on public subsidy, and that information is incredibly valuable and capable of providing enormous benefit to the users of public transport. It can drive more passengers on to public transport, which we all want, so it is in not only the public interest but the operators’ interest to make such data available.
Gavin Barwell (Croydon Central) (Con)
T5. Further to our meeting in May, may I ask my right hon. Friend what progress has been made with the relocation of part of the central Government estate from central London?
Mr Maude
At this stage we are concentrating on simply reducing the footprint of the Government’s property estate, which was allowed to grow massively out of control under the last Government because there were no controls whatever. Rather than looking to relocate, at this stage we are simply looking to reduce what the Government occupy. I know that Croydon, which my hon. Friend represents vigorously, is a very good location out of central London for Government services to operate from.
Sajid Javid (Bromsgrove) (Con)
T7. Small and medium-sized enterprises in my constituency warmly welcome the steps that the Government are taking to make it easier for them to win Government contracts, but they also need better access to finance to win such contracts. What steps is my right hon. Friend taking to help with that?
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that without the finance, SMEs cannot take part. I am delighted to be able to tell him that in the first half of the year, SME lending has almost lived up to the target set in the Merlin agreement for SMEs—it is within £1 billion—which is a major achievement.
Nicky Morgan (Loughborough) (Con)
T8. Does my hon. Friend agree that the promotion of youth organisations such as the Passion youth centre in Shepshed, which are often set up by churches, should be a cornerstone of the Government’s response to the riots over the summer?
Mr Hurd
I should certainly like to join my hon. Friend in congratulating the Passion youth centre and the local churches that support it. That seems to be an excellent example of the community pulling together to make better use of an old facility, which is exactly the type of thing that we are trying to encourage through the Localism Bill, Big Society Capital and the Community First grant programme.
Ian Austin (Dudley North) (Lab)
Q1. If he will list his official engagements for Wednesday 7 September.
The Prime Minister (Mr David Cameron)
I am sure that the whole House will wish to join me in paying tribute to those who have fallen in Afghanistan since we last met for Prime Minister’s questions: Lance Corporal Paul Watkins, from 9th/12th Royal Lancers; Corporal Mark Palin, from 1st Battalion The Rifles; Marine James Wright, from Juliet Company, 42 Commando, Royal Marines; Lieutenant Daniel Clack, from 1st Battalion The Rifles; and Sergeant Barry Weston, from Kilo Company, 42 Commando, Royal Marines. We should also remember Senior Aircraftman James Smart, from No. 2 (Mechanical Transport) Squadron, RAF Wittering, who died in a road traffic accident in Italy on 20 July while supporting operations in Libya. I pay tribute to their outstanding courage and selflessness. They have each given their lives serving our country and making our world more safe and secure. Our thoughts and deepest sympathies should be with their families, their friends and their colleagues.
This week, we also reach the 10th anniversary of the terrible atrocities of 11 September 2001, so we should remember all those who lost their lives that day, and all those who have died in pursuit of a safer future throughout the last decade.
This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others, and in addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.
Ian Austin
The whole House will agree with the tributes that the Prime Minister has just made to members of the armed forces who have made the ultimate sacrifice defending our country.
Earlier this week, the Government pushed through legislation that says that terror suspects must be given access to mobile phones and the internet and that ends relocation orders, so that such suspects cannot be kept out of London in the run-up to the Olympics or the Queen’s jubilee without emergency legislation. Will not decent, law-abiding people out there be shocked to discover that the Prime Minister is weakening protection for them while pushing through what many people will think is a charter of rights for would-be terrorists?
The Prime Minister
I do not agree with that. We consulted very carefully with the police and the security services in order to try to get to a better position, because frankly, control orders did not have the confidence of the public and did not work in far too many cases. The arrangements that we have put in place will keep this country safe and have greater public confidence.
Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)
May I thank the House and all my Hexham constituents for their messages of support while I was temporarily in hospital? I am now fully recovered, thanks to the outstanding care of the NHS and its hard-working doctors and nurses. Does the Prime Minister agree with me, as many doctors and nurses did, that it must be our mission to improve and reform the NHS, so that the service that we so cherish will improve with the challenges ahead?
The Prime Minister
May I say how good it is to see my hon. Friend back in his place and fully recovered? He is right: the point of our health reforms is to put doctors in charge, give patients greater choice, and heal the divide between health and social care. I believe that they will lead to a stronger NHS and better outcomes for patients.
Edward Miliband (Doncaster North) (Lab)
May I begin by joining the Prime Minister in paying tribute to our brave servicemen who have given their lives over the summer: Lance Corporal Paul Watkins, from 9th/12th Royal Lancers (Prince of Wales’s); Corporal Mark Palin, from 1st Battalion The Rifles; Marine James Wright, from Juliet Company, 42 Commando, Royal Marines; Lieutenant Daniel Clack, from 1st Battalion The Rifles; Sergeant Barry Weston, from Kilo Company, 42 Commando, Royal Marines; and Senior Aircraftman James Smart, from No. 2 (Mechanical Transport) Squadron, RAF Wittering. All of them demonstrated tremendous bravery and courage in the line of duty, and we send our deepest condolences to their families and friends.
Let me also join the Prime Minister in remembering all those who died in the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001. We all said at the time that we would never forget, and it is right that we pay particular attention on this the 10th anniversary of 11 September, so that for the victims and their families we show that we are true to the words that we spoke in the aftermath of those terrible attacks.
As the House returns from the recess, I also thank all our policemen and policewomen who did such a tremendous job in the riots over the summer, and it is on the subject of policing that I want to start my questions to the Prime Minister. We learned last night that the Prime Minister now wants to hold his elections for police commissioners not alongside local elections, as originally intended, but in November next year. How much extra money does he expect that to cost?
The Prime Minister
It will cost an extra £25 million. The money will not be taken from the police budget.
Edward Miliband
So the Prime Minister is making a bad policy worse by wasting money. If he wanted to postpone the elections, he could easily have decided to hold them in May 2013; and, indeed, subsequent elections will be held in May 2016. Will he tell us why he has decided to waste his money in this way?
The Prime Minister
It is important to get the policy right, and to make sure that it works. Let us be clear. First of all, why are the Opposition so frightened of an election? What have they to fear?
The right hon. Gentleman called this bad policy. Let me tell him what was said by his own shadow Policing Minister. The hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) said that
“only direct election, based on geographic constituencies, will deliver the strong connection to the public which is critical”.
Why is the right hon. Gentleman so frightened of an election and proper police accountability?
Edward Miliband
We know what the public up and down this country know: this is the wrong priority for the country. What did we see during the riots? We saw visible, effective policing. Now the Prime Minister tells us that the country cannot afford the current police budgets, and that we must cut the number of police officers by 16,000. However, he tells the country that it can afford £100 million and more as a result of his decision to waste money on 42 elected politicians earning more than £120,000 a year. That could pay for 2,000 extra police officers. Is not the truth that this is the wrong priority at the wrong time for the country?
The Prime Minister
As ever, the right hon. Gentleman has got his figures completely wrong. The police authorities of whom only 6% of the country have actually heard will be abolished, and that will save money.
Let me put it to the right hon. Gentleman again. Why is he frightened of direct elections that will make the police accountable? He was responsible for the last Labour manifesto, and this is what the last Labour Prime Minister said:
“the Home Secretary will bring forward proposals for directly elected representatives to give local people more control over policing”.—[Official Report, 14 May 2008; Vol. 475, c. 1388.]
Why the U-turn?
Edward Miliband
We know that the Prime Minister has got the wrong priorities on the police and that he is refusing to back down. However, he has got the wrong priorities not just on the police, but on the health service as well. Can he tell us why the number of people who have had to wait longer than six months for an operation has gone up by more than 60% since he came to office?
The Prime Minister
I am not surprised that the right hon. Gentleman wants to change the subject, because on policing he was having his collar felt as he has done a complete U-turn on the policy he used to be committed to.
As I said some moments ago, in our health service we are seeing more cancer patients get treatment, more doctors in our NHS, fewer bureaucrats, a reduction in mixed-sex—[Interruption.] I know Labour Members do not like hearing—[Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. There is far too much noise in what is beginning to sound like orchestrated heckling. [Interruption.] Order. It is profoundly discourteous and it should stop.
The Prime Minister
The trouble is that the Opposition do not like hearing good news about what is happening in the national health service. The fact is that waiting times for outpatients have actually fallen since the last election.
Edward Miliband
That was a complete non-answer; the Prime Minister cannot even answer the questions. We are talking about people up and down this country who have been waiting longer for their operations. [Interruption.] The Government Chief Whip shouts from a sedentary position; he should care about these people who have been waiting longer for their operations. Let me tell the Government Chief Whip and the whole Government Front Bench what we are talking about. Between June 2010 and June 2011, the number of people waiting more than six months for an operation was up by 42% for those waiting for a heart operation, up by 62% for those waiting for orthopaedic operations, and up by 72% for those waiting for eye surgery. The country and I are just asking for a simple explanation from the Prime Minister: why has it happened?
The Prime Minister
The explanation is that the amount of time that people are waiting for an outpatient operation has actually gone down; that is what has happened. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, we have targets for 90% of people to get their treatment within 18 weeks, and those targets are being met. He may not like the truth, but that is the truth, and I have to say to him that that is why we now see the Royal College of General Practitioners, the Royal College of Physicians and the Royal College of Nursing all supporting our health reforms. We even see Lord Darzi, the former Health Minister, supporting our health reforms. Labour has got itself into a position of opposing all reform to the NHS and opposing the extra money into the NHS; that is its position.
Edward Miliband
I think the Prime Minister has convinced the country that he is on another planet from them. He had his holidays interrupted—fair play to him—but he took time off from his holiday to tell the Western Morning News what he has just repeated: that the
“whole health profession is on board for what is now being done.”
I have to ask: does he read the newspapers, because only on Tuesday of this week the British Medical Association, the Royal College of GPs and the Royal College of Midwives all rejected his Bill? And that was only this week. The truth is that under this Government we are seeing two reckless and needless reorganisations of our public services: police numbers down and waiting lists up. Under Labour, we saw police officers up and waiting lists down. Why does he not do the right thing for the future of our public services, and scrap both of these disruptive and dangerous plans?
The Prime Minister
Is it not interesting that he does not dare in six questions to mention the economy? On our health reforms, let me quote what the man his Government plucked from the NHS to run the Department of Health, Lord Darzi, says:
“The proposals from the NHS Future Forum, and supported by the Government, have recast the reforms in”
the right
“direction and are to be welcomed.”
So now we have the Royal College of GPs, the physicians, the nurses and people working in the health service supporting the changes we are making, and Labour wanting to cut the money and also cut the reform. Isn’t it no surprise that the shadow Health Secretary—it is traditional to quote the shadow Health Secretary on these occasions—said this:
“It’s a tough fact of life…that what Labour says matters less than what almost anyone else says”?
I couldn’t have put it better myself.
Mrs Helen Grant (Maidstone and The Weald) (Con)
Does the Prime Minister agree that building stronger families and communities is absolutely essential and key to dealing with antisocial and delinquent behaviour?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. This is important and I am sure that there will be all-party agreement on it. As well as having a tough response from the criminal justice system to the riots—we have seen that tough response, with some exemplary sentences handed out very rapidly by the courts system; I praise all those who have been involved in speeding up the justice system—at the same time we need to do more to strengthen communities, to strengthen families, to increase discipline in schools and to make sure that our welfare system supports responsible behaviour rather than irresponsible behaviour. We will be bringing forward proposals along those lines and I hope that they will have support from everyone in this House.
Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab)
Q2. Before the summer, the Prime Minister took part in a TV documentary that highlighted fears of crime and antisocial behaviour on the Saffron Lane estate in my constituency. Does he expect crime and antisocial behaviour on that estate, and across Leicester, to increase or decrease when he cuts 200 police officers from the Leicestershire force?
The Prime Minister
I want to see crime and antisocial behaviour go down. Let me just remind the hon. Gentleman that today only 12% of police officers——only one in 10—are on the beat at any one time. There are 25,000 police officers in back-office jobs, not on the front line. We all have a responsibility to try to get our budget deficit under control. His party is committed to a £1 billion cut in the police. What we have to do is recognise that this is about getting officers on to the front line—that is the debate we should be engaged in.
Mr David Burrowes (Enfield, Southgate) (Con)
Q3. In the wake of the riots, may I commend the Government’s and Mayor of London’s support for high streets, such as those in Enfield, which were badly hit? Is this not a good time to support the forthcoming global day of prayer, which in London will be taking place at Wembley?
The Prime Minister
I certainly pay tribute to what the Mayor has done and what the Department for Communities and Local Government has done to make sure that there is money available for rebuilding our communities. The good thing about the £20 million high street support scheme, which my hon. Friend mentions, is that 29 local authorities have already registered for it. I hope that we will see the money being spent quickly to help rebuild our high streets.
Gloria De Piero (Ashfield) (Lab)
Does the Prime Minister support the closure of local police stations?
The Prime Minister
It is up to chief constables to work out how best to police their areas, but what I am finding from talking to police constables up and down the country is that they want to put their resources into visible policing on the streets. They have got the support of a Government who are cutting the paperwork, reforming the pay and reforming the pensions—taking the difficult decisions that will make sure that we have more police on our streets than we ever would under Labour.
Mr John Baron (Basildon and Billericay) (Con)
Q4. Will the Prime Minister join me in sending a very clear message to the Travellers at the illegal Dale Farm site: we all hope that they move off peacefully in order to avoid a forced eviction but if they do not do so, they should be in no doubt that the Government fully support Basildon council and Essex police in reclaiming this green belt land on behalf of the law-abiding majority?
The Prime Minister
I certainly give my support to Essex police and to all the county and district councils that have been involved, and I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the very hard work he has put in on this issue. What I would say is that it is a basic issue of fairness: everyone in this country has to obey the law, including the law about planning permission and about building on green belt land. Where this has been done without permission it is an illegal development and so those people should move away. I completely agree with the way in which he put his question.
John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Lab/Co-op)
Q5. The Prime Minister opposed Labour’s anti-gang laws, but then the riots occurred and he decided to strengthen them. Now he wants to weaken anti-terror laws by scrapping relocation powers. What will have to happen before he is prepared to admit that the mess he is replacing them with is putting national security at risk?
The Prime Minister
I simply do not accept what the hon. Gentleman says. In our review of control orders, we listened extremely carefully to MI5, the security services, the Metropolitan police and all those involved. There was a full review process to make sure that we could have a system that is legal—that is vital because the courts unpicked so many of the last Government’s changes—that the public can have confidence in and that will keep us safe.
Heather Wheeler (South Derbyshire) (Con)
On the day when 200 people from Bombardier in Derby are here to hear whether we can change the arrangements for the Thameslink contract, can the Prime Minister give us some hope about future contracts and about changing the tender arrangements—the mess that we were left in by the previous Government?
The Prime Minister
I certainly want to do everything I can to help Bombardier, which is an excellent company that employs people in Derbyshire and has done a brilliant job as an engineering business in this country for so many years. Before people from the Labour party start shouting, let me remind them that this procurement process was designed and initiated by the previous Government. It is no good their trying to shuffle off their responsibility—it is their responsibility.
Thomas Docherty (Dunfermline and West Fife) (Lab)
Q6. Why do the Government not agree with the police that children as young as seven should be banned from having shotgun licences?
The Prime Minister
I think we should enforce proper rules on gun licences, including shotgun licences. We always keep these rules under review and if they need toughening, I will happily look at that.
Nadine Dorries (Mid Bedfordshire) (Con)
The Liberal Democrats make up 8.7% of this Parliament and yet they seem to be influencing our free school policy, health and many issues including immigration and abortion. Does the Prime Minister—[Interruption.]
Nadine Dorries
Does the Prime Minister think it is about time he told the Deputy Prime Minister who is the boss? [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. I wanted to hear the question, but I want to hear the Prime Minister’s answer.
The Prime Minister
I know that the hon. Lady is extremely frustrated about the—[Interruption.] Perhaps I should start all over again—[Interruption.] I am going to give up on this one.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
Q7. With the Future Jobs Fund and education maintenance allowance having been scrapped, the number of young people not in education, unemployment and training is at a record high of 18.4% on the Prime Minister’s watch. When will things get better for our young people?
The Prime Minister
Clearly, we face a difficult situation in terms of youth unemployment. Let us be clear that the situation was getting worse during the economic good times, and there was a 40% increase in youth unemployment over the time of the previous Government. What we are seeing today is a disturbing increase in the number of those not in employment, education and training over the age of 18, but under the age of 18 that number is coming down. The steps that we are taking are to improve schooling, to raise the participation age to 18 and massively to increase the level of apprenticeships to 360,000 starts this year. We are also introducing the Work programme, which is the biggest back-to-work programme that has taken place in this country since the 1930s and it will also be made available to young people who are in danger of being left out of employment, education and training.
John Stevenson (Carlisle) (Con)
Q8. I have been working with local businesses, my councils and other organisations to help promote, expand and grow the Carlisle economy. Clearly, given the economic background, it is imperative that we grow both the local and national economy. Will the Prime Minister tell us what new measures the Government will introduce to help promote such growth?
The Prime Minister
I am grateful to my hon. Friend and I enjoyed seeing at first hand what is happening in Cumbria to try get the local economy moving. The action we are taking obviously includes the cuts in corporation tax, and the regional growth fund and the enterprise zones. Specifically for Cumbria, the money we are investing for superfast broadband will really help that county, particularly the most rural and far-flung parts, and will ensure that small businesses can benefit throughout the county.
Mark Tami (Alyn and Deeside) (Lab)
Q15. DNA and CCTV played a vital role in the arrest of many of the looters. Why is the Prime Minister undermining that in the Protection of Freedoms Bill?
Sir Alan Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (LD)
Q9. When my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister comes to consider next week’s Vickers report on the banks, which have been rescued with fantastic amounts of taxpayers’ money, will he have no truck with the banks’ argument that they cannot be reformed to prevent another crisis because they are having such a struggle coping with the crisis they have already created? Surely never again should British taxpayers have to bail out banks that are too big to fail.
The Prime Minister
My right hon. Friend is entirely right that the Government must take action to reform the banks, and that is what we are doing. We have already set out how we are getting rid of the tripartite structure that failed so badly under the previous Government, how we are putting the Bank of England back in charge, and how we are making sure that, as he put it, we cannot have in the future these catastrophic bank failures that cost the taxpayer so dear. We are looking forward to receiving Professor Vickers’ report. It seems to me there are two vital things we have to secure—a safe and secure banking system for the future, but also proper bank lending, including to small businesses, right now in our economy. That is what Government policy will be aiming for.
Grahame M. Morris (Easington) (Lab)
Q10. The Prime Minister will be aware that his Government are consulting on their changes to housing benefit claims under the criteria of under-occupancy. This will adversely affect 450,000 disabled people, including 33,000 in the north-east alone, who stand to lose on average £676 a year. A substantial number will be affected in my constituency. How does this policy meet his Government’s fairness test?
The Prime Minister
We are making a specific exclusion to deal with people who have carers living in the home, but we do have to reform housing benefit. I think the whole House knows, frankly, that housing benefit was one of those budget items that was completely out of control. In some parts of London, we had families claiming £60,000, £70,000 and £80,000 in housing benefit just for one family, so this does need to be reformed. It is no good for the Labour party—
The Prime Minister
Frankly, too many. And it is no good for the Labour party to complain about every single reduction to public spending when it left us with the biggest budget deficit in Europe.
Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)
The Prime Minister has listened to Liberal Democrat colleagues by delaying police elections until November next year. Will he now listen to Conservative colleagues and take the opportunity to hold a referendum on Europe?
The Prime Minister
That is an ingenious way of putting the question. As I explained yesterday, I want us to be influential in Europe about the things that matter to our national interest—promoting the single market, pushing forward for growth and making sure that we get lower energy prices. Those are the things that we will be fighting for, but I do not see the case for an in/out referendum on Europe. We are in Europe and we have got to make it work for us.
Mr Dave Watts (St Helens North) (Lab)
Q11. Does the Prime Minister agree with his Housing Minister that due to the economic policies of the Government, we now have a growth crisis? When he does a U-turn, will he choose to cut VAT, which is Labour’s policy, or to give tax cuts to the rich?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Gentleman obviously has not had time to read this great tome, which points out that increasing VAT was Labour’s policy at the last election. What he should focus on is the fact that the person responsible for Labour’s economic policy at the last election has said it had no credible policy whatever. The problem for Labour is that absolutely nothing has changed.
Michael Ellis (Northampton North) (Con)
Will the Prime Minister join me in congratulating Members from both sides of the House and in both Houses on their generosity in responding to the letter from Mr Speaker and the Lords’ Speaker in supporting a gift for Her Majesty the Queen for her forthcoming diamond jubilee from this Parliament?
The Prime Minister
I am delighted to join my hon. Friend in praising everyone who contributed to this very imaginative and sensible gift for Her Majesty’s diamond jubilee. Perhaps I could pay particular tribute to him because he has worked so hard to make this work. I think it will be a fitting tribute and it is something that the country should focus on. To have a diamond jubilee is an extraordinary thing for us to be able to celebrate in our lifetimes.
Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)
Q12. With electricity and gas bills going up by 20%, and with 6 million families in this country now facing fuel poverty, does the Prime Minister still think it was right to cut the winter fuel payment to pensioners by £100?
The Prime Minister
Let us be clear: we are going ahead with the winter fuel payment set out by the previous Labour Government in their Budget. At the same time, we are increasing the cold weather payments on a permanent basis, so this Government are being more generous than the previous Government.
Simon Wright (Norwich South) (LD)
In seeking to address the economic recovery, is it better to help those who are taxed on incomes as little as £150 a week, or those who, after tax, take home around 10 times that amount?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. Let me just point out two things that we have done that are totally in line with that, one of which is to lift 1 million people out of income tax altogether—that is a coalition commitment that we have been delivering on. The second thing, when it comes to tax credits, is that we have increased, over two years, by £290 the tax credits that go to the poorest families in our country. That is why we have managed to take difficult decisions—everyone knows we have had to take difficult decisions—without an increase in child poverty. In better economic times, under the previous Government, child poverty actually went up.
Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
Q13. Bringing Siemens, manufacturing wind turbines, to the Humber is vital for jobs and a breakthrough on renewables, which will hopefully increase the UK industry in this area. Local councils and businesses are doing everything they can to attract Siemens to the area, but we face very strong foreign competition. Will this Government do what the last Government did and back this bid? Will the Prime Minister do everything he can to secure Siemens coming to Hull?
The Prime Minister
I absolutely agree with the hon. Lady for raising this issue. I think it is vital for the future of our economy and the future of the area that she represents. I met Members of Parliament from Humberside to discuss the issue. I have myself spoken to the head of Siemens about the importance of this investment going ahead. We are continuing the extra money going into ports to help the development of this industry and we back it all the way.
Amber Rudd (Hastings and Rye) (Con)
At a meeting this morning with organisations working in the horn of Africa, representatives expressed their gratitude for the fact that the British public have been so generous and the Department for International Development has provided such leadership. That famine is continuing to become more severe. Will the Prime Minister ensure that the Government continue to provide international leadership to help the people in east Africa?
The Prime Minister
I can certainly give my hon. Friend that assurance. The response of the British public has been remarkable. These are difficult economic times, but they have shown an incredible generosity and led the world in the contributions that they have made. And because this Government, again in difficult economic times, have made the decision to fulfil our pledge of reaching the level of 0.7% of national income going into aid, we are also leading the world in the amount of money that we are putting into the horn of Africa to vaccinate children, to save lives and to recognise that this is an ongoing humanitarian crisis.
Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)
Q14. Does the Prime Minister agree that his Housing Minister is an absolute star? In the face of declining planning permissions for new build homes, in the face of fewer new homes being built in the previous 12 months than in any year of Labour’s programme of administration for house building, his Minister’s great idea is to urge councils to build more moorings for houseboats. Fantastic.
The Prime Minister
I thought the hon. Gentleman was doing so well till he got all political. I think there should be agreement across the House that house building is too low in this country, and it is a shocking statistic that the typical first-time buyer is now in their mid-30s. So we do need change, we do need more houses to be built, and I think my Housing Minister is doing a first-class job.
Mr Matthew Offord (Hendon) (Con)
While much attention is being paid to the military activities occurring in Libya over the summer, will the Prime Minister join me in congratulating Captain Steve Norris and the crew of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary’s Wave Ruler in the work they are doing combating drugs in the Caribbean? Not only did they intercept £50 million of cocaine over the summer, but they have also been helping humanitarian efforts in the Overseas Territories following Hurricane Irene.
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend makes an important point. While we obviously should focus on and praise the incredible work that our services have done in Libya and Afghanistan, there are the ongoing tasks. He talks about drug interdiction in the West Indies. There is also the task of protecting the Falkland Islands. There is the work that we are doing to prevent piracy off the horn of Africa. In all these tasks people are giving a huge amount of time and effort, and we should praise and thank them for what they do.
Petition
(12 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)
I am very grateful to have the opportunity to present a petition on behalf of many of my constituents.
The petition states:
The Petition of residents of Crawley,
Declares that the Petitioners are concerned by the current proposals to close a general practitioner’s surgery in the Crawley Borough Ward of West Green.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to take all possible action to ensure that Leacroft surgery is able to maintain health service provision in the area.
And the Petitioners remain, etc.
[P000953]
Point of Order
(12 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Tessa Jowell (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)
Questions 1 and 3 on the original future day listings for oral questions to the Minister for the Cabinet Office concerned proposals to abolish the Youth Justice Board and the office of the chief coroner—vital bodies scheduled to be removed under the Public Bodies Bill. The Government transferred the questions to other Government Departments. Do you, Mr Speaker, not agree that the Opposition should be able to hold the Minister for the Cabinet Office to account on these specific and unpopular proposals?
Mr Speaker
I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for her point of order. I certainly agree that Ministers should be held to account. The House will know that transfers are matters for the Department concerned, not for the Speaker, although I am concerned that such transfers should be made in good time. The right hon. Lady’s point will have been heard and noted on the Treasury Bench.
Bill Presented
European Union Act 2011 (Amendment) Bill
Presentation and First Reading (Standing Order No. 57)
Mr William Cash, supported by Mr Bernard Jenkin, Mr John Whittingdale, Mr John Redwood, Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, Mr Greg Knight, Mr Graham Stuart, Mr Richard Shepherd, Jacob Rees-Mogg, Chris Heaton-Harris, Zac Goldsmith, Mr Peter Bone, presented a Bill to apply the terms of the European Union Act 2011 such as to require approval by Act of Parliament and by referendum of provisions for creating a fiscal union or economic governance within the Eurozone.
Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 21 October, and to be printed (Bill 228).
Magna Carta Anniversary (Bank Holiday)
(12 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Mrs Eleanor Laing (Epping Forest) (Con)
I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to designate Monday 15 June 2015 as a bank holiday in the United Kingdom to mark the 800th anniversary of the signing of Magna Carta; and for connected purposes.
On 15 June 1215, the foundations of our democracy were laid when King John met his barons at Runnymede and sealed the historic document that has become known as Magna Carta. The effect of the Bill, which I now bring before the House, would be to celebrate appropriately the 800th anniversary of that momentous occasion. The concept of celebrating Magna Carta has widespread support. Indeed, Mr Speaker, we are grateful to you for having hosted in the Speaker’s House in June this year the inaugural meeting of the all-party parliamentary Magna Carta group, many of whose members are present this afternoon.
What better way to celebrate freedom than by having a day’s holiday? I appreciate, of course, how difficult it is for businesses, service providers and schools to deal with the consequences of a day’s holiday, and I am not suggesting that 15 June should be an extra day’s holiday, but, given the current discussions about moving the May bank holiday, the perfect replacement for the first Monday in May would be 15 June: Magna Carta day.
There is something unique and very special about celebrating Magna Carta. Its significance goes far beyond these shores. Upon it are based not only our own constitutional freedoms, but those of the United States of America, most of the Commonwealth and much of the European Union. Even in Scotland, where Magna Carta never had any force, its value as a constitutional document is still appreciated.
The committee set up by the Magna Carta Trust, ably led by the inimitable Sir Robert Worcester, is proposing a Magna Carta day to the American Congress, to the Canadian, Australian, New Zealand, Trinidadian, Indian, South African and all Commonwealth Parliaments and to the legislatures of all countries that hold our values and suggesting that they observe the 800th anniversary and declare their Magna Carta day to share with ours.
The German ambassador, when asked recently about the salience of Magna Carta, responded, “Magna Carta is known to everyone in Germany as the foundation of democracy—it is in the school syllabus.” What a pity it is not in our school syllabus.
Winston Churchill was, of course, absolutely right, as ever, when he said that Magna Carta was
“the foundation of principles and systems of government of which neither King John nor his nobles dreamed.”
Magna Carta established the very idea of the rule of law. It was the first formal document to insist that no one is above the law, however high his or her status. It also established that Executive power must proceed by recognised legal process, never unlawfully, when action is taken against an individual.
In the 800 years since the principle of the rule of law was thus set down, every aspect of our country’s development has been influenced by it. This is not just dry, legal doctrine; it is our dependence on the belief in this fundamental freedom that has shaped our nation’s character, fostering belief and pride in our basic liberty and giving us the confidence to question authority. What began as an agreement to give people freedom from royal interference has developed over eight centuries into a range of fundamental liberties. Now it is not the monarch who tries to interfere in the lives of our people; it is the state.
As we—Parliament—battle daily to keep the people we represent as free as possible from state interference, the principles of Magna Carta are every bit as important as they were 800 years ago. British people know that they have an inalienable right to freedom and to challenge the authority of Government. We have fought for that right through the ages—not only for ourselves, but for others right across the world.
Looking at the events of the so-called Arab spring over the past few months, we see how much still has to be done in trying to win those precious rights for those who still do not have them. As President Obama said when he addressed our Parliament in May:
“Centuries ago, when kings, emperors and warlords reigned over much of the world, it was the English who first spelled out the rights and liberties of man in the Magna Carta… through the struggles of slaves and immigrants, women and ethnic minorities, former colonies and persecuted religions, we have learned better than most that the longing for freedom and human dignity is not English or American or Western—it is universal, and it beats in every heart.”
Magna Carta is a rare piece of legislation, perhaps unique, that has not just endured but evolved over the centuries. Although many of its provisions have been repealed, and rightly so, by later legislation, its principles none the less echo throughout the ages and across the globe today. Today, we need to rein in the power of an overbearing nanny state just as much as our forebears of the 13th century had to restrain the power of the king.
I am not asking that we declare a bank holiday to mark the signing of some dusty old piece of 13th century paper or, indeed, the actions of an unpopular monarch some 800 years ago. We need a special holiday so that the British people can celebrate today’s freedoms on 15 June 2015—Magna Carta day. Our constitution, our civil liberties, our individual rights, the rule of law and the bedrock of our democracy are all too often taken for granted. However, we must never forget that the price of freedom is eternal vigilance, so let us cherish and appreciate our freedom, and let us celebrate it.
I urge the House to support the Bill to give the people a holiday to celebrate Magna Carta and all that it still stands for.
Question put and agreed to.
Ordered,
That Mrs Eleanor Laing, Mr Graham Allen, Helen Goodman, Robert Halfon, Oliver Heald, Mr Bernard Jenkin, Mr Peter Lilley, Mrs Anne Main, Stephen Metcalfe, Mr David Ruffley, Iain Stewart and Mr Jack Straw present the Bill.
Mrs Eleanor Laing accordingly presented the Bill.
Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 25 November, and to be printed (Bill 227).
Health and Social Care (Re-committed) Bill
(12 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
14:14 - The House divided: - Ayes: 118 / Noes: 368 - Question accordingly negatived.
18:01 - The House divided: - Ayes: 255 / Noes: 304 - Question accordingly negatived.
18:17 - The House divided: - Ayes: 240 / Noes: 318 - Question accordingly negatived.
19:00 - The House divided: - Ayes: 316 / Noes: 251 - Question accordingly agreed to.
Nadine Dorries (Mid Bedfordshire) (Con)
I beg to move amendment 1, page 6, line 8, at end insert—
‘(c) after paragraph (f) insert a new paragraph as follows—
“(g) independent information, advice and counselling services for women requesting termination of pregnancy to the extent that the clinical commissioning group considers they will choose to use them.”.’.
Mr Speaker
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 2, page 6, line 8, at end insert—
‘(2A) After subsection (1) insert a new subsection as follows—
(1A) In this section, information, advice and counselling is independent where it is provided by either—
(i) a private body that does not itself provide for the termination of pregnancies; or
(ii) a statutory body.”.’.
Amendment 1221, in clause 14, page 9, line 37, at end insert—
‘( ) After paragraph 8 insert—
“Provision of independent information, advice and counselling services for women requesting a termination of pregnancy
8A (1) A local authority must make available to women requesting termination of pregnancy from any clinical commissioning group the option of receiving independent information, advice and counselling.
(2) In this paragraph, information, advice and counselling are independent where they are provided by either—
(a) a private body that does not itself refer, provide or have any financial interest in providing for the termination of pregnancies; or
(b) a statutory body.’.
Amendment 1252, page 9, line 37, at end insert—
‘( ) After paragraph 8 insert—
“Provision of advice relating to unplanned pregnancy
8A The Secretary of State must ensure that all organisations offering information or advice in relation to unplanned pregnancy choices must follow current evidence-based guidance produced by a professional medical organisation specified by the Secretary of State.”.’.
Amendment 1180, in clause 240, page 226, line 31, at end insert—
‘(1) Regulations must require NICE to make recommendations with regard to the care of women seeking an induced termination of pregnancy, including the option of receiving independent information, advice and counselling about the procedure, its potential health implications and alternatives, including adoption.
(2) The regulations must require health or social care bodies or any private body that provides for the termination of pregnancies to comply with the recommendations made by NICE under subsection (1).’.
Nadine Dorries
Four weeks ago I was not sure whether I would get to the point where I could speak in the Chamber today. This has been a long and hot-under-the-collar summer. Following my announcement of my intention to table the amendment, I have been threatened with being throttled, car-bombed, burned alive and a host of other distasteful and unpleasant ways in which I would meet my end.
I shall not go into detail about any of these responses to my amendment. Needless to say, some of them involved bodily functions to a graphic degree, and some of the scatological messages were unbelievable. I will not repeat the bile that has poured into my inbox every day. I do not think there is anything that I or my staff could be threatened with, or that we could read or be told now, that would elicit any shock from us. There is nothing worse that we could hear.
Before I go into the detail of the amendment, I shall talk about a significant and substantial shift as a result of the amendment. It has always been the tradition of the House that abortion issues have been discussed and debated in the Chamber and the media have commented on what happened, usually in a reasonable way. But the amendment has changed the game for ever. All Members in all parts of the House know, particularly from the 2008 debate, that we debate with passion. I would say that the 2008 debate was one of the best debates of the previous Parliament. However, we all remain courteous and friendly with each other following the debates. The usual parliamentary knock-about and the usual games take place—I shall say more about that in relation to the amendment in a moment—but the debate usually takes place here and the media comment on what happens here as it happens.
I have no greater opponent in the House on this issue than the right hon. and learned Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman). In 2008 she was the whipper-in and the mover behind what happened in that debate, but I have no greater respect for almost any other woman in the House than I do for her. I hugely respect what she has achieved for women and humanity, and I know that she approaches the issue honourably, as I hope I do. It is incredibly sad, therefore, that my summer has been made so difficult not by Opposition Members, who have all been incredibly quiet, but by the nastiness and the response of the left-wing media and union-funded organisations.
The past four weeks have been incredibly difficult. The campaign against the amendment has been co-ordinated by an organisation known as Abortion Rights, which is funded by Unison and a number of other small unions. It also received membership contributions, but, as I was told in a meeting with the organisation, it is largely funded by the unions and Unison is the biggest contributor. [Interruption.] I am not saying that every penny is not accountable; I am just informing the House that the campaign has been funded by the unions. I do not think that there is a problem with that.
Nadine Dorries
I will tell the hon. Lady exactly who funds my campaign—nobody. Neither I nor my office has received a single penny. Here, to me, is the disadvantage of the amendment. The unions can contact Members’ constituents and ask them to e-mail individual MPs, but I cannot afford to promote the amendment in that way. The press barons, whom the unions have fed with their response to the amendment, can pour what they want into the newspapers, but I cannot. What we have seen is an absolute divide.
Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)
Will the hon. Lady give way?
Nadine Dorries
I will give way, because the hon. Lady has commented previously on the press in this regard.
Luciana Berger
Will the hon. Lady please tell the House exactly who funds the Right to Know e-mails that many of us have received in our constituency inboxes?
Nadine Dorries
I will answer that question, and after I do I hope the hon. Lady will tell me who funds Labour Friends of Israel. I have no idea who funds Right to Know, as I am sure Labour Members have no idea who funds a number of campaigns that support them.
Rachel Reeves (Leeds West) (Lab)
At what point will the hon. Lady move on to the substance of the amendment, rather than issues such as Israel and how Unison funds political campaigning?
Nadine Dorries
I absolutely will—that is why I am here—but it is important to explain the context and the background to some of misinformation that Members have received in their inboxes. This is my opportunity to correct the misinformation MPs have been fed about the amendment.
The amendment has created a divide that was not present before, including in 2008. The Guardian and The Times and the union-funded Abortion Rights have mounted a campaign against the amendment. I must say that the core Conservative vote newspapers, The Daily Telegraph, the Daily Mail and so on, have been supportive, so this chasm and the politicisation of abortion has begun as a result of the amendment and as a result of the unions and the left-wing media.
Nadine Dorries
There are lots of comments being made from a sedentary position, Mr Speaker, but The Times has actually fed that divide directly and repeated much of the information it has been given. I want to answer some of the accusations made about me in response to the amendment. I do not have the press barons’ money to mount and fund a campaign. I have not received a penny. In fact, I am broke. My office has not received a penny in funding.
Nadine Dorries
No.
I have also been accused of being a religious fundamentalist. Like 73% of the country, I am a member of the Church of England and have Christian beliefs, but I am not sure when that became a crime and prevented me from having an opinion. On Saturday, The Guardian printed a flow chart showing the conservative Christians who are supposed to be mounting a sphere of influence with the amendment. I did not know who 95% of the people mentioned were or the organisation they represent. If I followed Islam or Judaism, I wonder what the response would have been to such a flow chart in The Guardian. I found the chart absolutely reprehensible and disgusting.
Nadine Dorries
I absolutely will not.
I want to mention some of the other lies that have been printed about me. I have been accused of wanting to reduce the number of abortions by introducing the amendment. That is absolutely not the objective. However, if any individual in the street was asked about the amendment and told that it might bring down the number of abortions, would they say, “Well, that’s a good thing,” or would they say, “We’re proud of the fact that 200,000 abortions a year are performed in the UK”? That is the highest number in western Europe. Would the individual in the street say that that is a good thing? No, they would say that it probably would be a good idea if something could help to bring that number down. I do not want to restrict access to abortion. The amendment is not about restricting access. I do not want to return to the days of Vera Drake-style back-street abortionists. That is not what the amendment is about. I am pro-choice, although I am presented as pro-life in every newspaper. The pro-life organisations are in fact e-mailing pro-life MPs to tell them not to vote for the amendment. I am pro-choice. Abortion is here to stay.
It is absolutely ridiculous that the amendment has been portrayed as something that would restrict access to abortion. The amendment is about medical practitioners making to a woman who presents at their surgery or organisation an offer of independent counselling, not compulsory counselling. Every single day I have read a headline stating that the amendment is intended to drive women into the arms of religious fundamentalists via compulsory counselling. That is absolutely not true. Any Member who rose and claimed that the amendment would make counselling compulsory would be being untruthful. It is nothing more than an offer. It is an offer made to some women who, when presenting at a GP’s practice, may have doubts, may be confused and may feel that they would like to accept. That is all it is—an offer. I find it very difficult to understand how anyone can object to a vulnerable woman being made an offer of counselling when she is suffering from a crisis pregnancy.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the hon. Lady for giving way, and I commend her courage and perseverance. Does she share the concern of many in this House and outside about the businesslike and commercial decisions that are taken in relation to abortion and feel that, because one hour of counselling a week for everyone is not enough, it is wrong that a commercial industry has been made out of abortion? Does she agree that when abortion becomes a business, the feelings of people have been lost?
Nadine Dorries
The hon. Gentleman makes a pertinent point about the relationship between financial incentive and abortion counselling, which I will talk about in a moment to make it quite clear how the amendment relates to the issue.
Dr Julian Huppert (Cambridge) (LD)
Does the hon. Lady accept the comments of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, which essentially says that there is not a problem? It has commented:
“The system, as it stands, works well.”
Nadine Dorries
Well, that comment is probably the most fatuous we will hear in the debate, and probably the most disrespectful to women. I would like to know what the hon. Gentleman thinks about the report published last week in the British Journal of Psychiatry that women who have an abortion are twice as likely to suffer from mental health problems. Of course, I realise that the report he quotes from was probably written by men. I realise that the women who go through abortion and suffer as a result do not go back to the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists to give feedback.
Nadine Dorries
I will not give way again to the hon. Gentleman, as I am sure that he will have an opportunity to make his point when he is called to speak later.
Mr David Burrowes (Enfield, Southgate) (Con)
My hon. Friend was right to introduce her remarks to the House and highlight the unacceptable personal attacks that have been made against her, which denigrate an issue of vital importance and interest to the whole House. The House needs to rise above that in today’s debate. With regard to evidence of change, could she indicate what research she has done on how much face-to-face counselling takes place in organisations such as the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, for example?
Nadine Dorries
I thank my hon. Friend, and in a moment I will come on to the difference between counselling and consultation, and what is available to women.
Nadine Dorries
I want to finish this point, and then I will give way.
The counsellor would be completely impartial, give no advice or direction and be entirely independent, so if the woman had been through the process and then continued to abortion, she would do so knowing that she had talked through her options with somebody.
Nadine Dorries
No, I have given way to the hon. Lady once. I will give way to the hon. Lady who also acts as a Whip.
Nadine Dorries
I have spoken to organisations that provide counselling and have 80,000 registered counsellors throughout the UK. [Hon. Members: “Who?”] The British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy. I asked, “If somebody required counselling, was at a GP’s practice and a telephone call was made, how long would it take to get a counsellor to a particular woman?” The answer was that counselling could be delivered in the GP’s practice, at another venue or in the woman’s home, and that it could be anything from immediate to within 48 hours.
Registered counsellors, who have e-mailed me regularly since the amendment was tabled, say that they would love to work—counselling is a growing industry—and to have the opportunity to work with women in that situation. Unfortunately, however, counselling is available on the NHS only via the abortion provider or via the hospital.
Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)
I am grateful to my courageous and honourable Friend for giving way. As 147 babies were terminated after 24 weeks in the past year—a 29% increase on the previous year—does she agree that such counselling should also include the fact that many of those terminated babies, who had minor disabilities such as cleft lips, cleft palates, half an ear or having only one ear, could have been dealt with through modern cosmetic reconstructive surgery?
Nadine Dorries
I thank my hon. Friend for that comment. That is a different debate, but he highlights an important issue, and it is abhorrent that 147 babies were aborted for cleft palate, hare lip and minor cosmetic issues. I have a godson who had a club foot, and he was a wonderful young boy and is a wonderful young man. I find it quite amazing that anybody would choose to abort a baby because they had a club foot, but that is an issue for another day. The amendment does not cover it, but it is an important point.
Mr Stewart Jackson (Peterborough) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend share my incredulity at those Opposition Members who maintain that an organisation such as BPAS—the British Pregnancy Advisory Service—can be independent in its counselling, when in its March 2011 report and financial statement it notes that
“an increase in procedures of 13 per cent against the background of falling national trends in 2010-11”
is
“a significant achievement”?
How can the opponents of the amendment maintain that there is no fiscal link and no conflict of interest?
Nadine Dorries
That is a very important point, and in a moment I will come on to the financial link and the financial incentives, with some other information that we have.
Mrs Helen Grant (Maidstone and The Weald) (Con)
Will my brave hon. Friend confirm her belief that existing counselling services have the capacity to deal with the level of referral?
Nadine Dorries
That is precisely the next point in my speech; my hon. Friend must have been looking over my shoulder!
I now turn to the counselling provision available to women today. Many women do not want or need counselling. They find out that they are pregnant and know exactly what they want to do, but those are frequently the women who are supported—who have partners, family and friends who will support them through that awful situation. No woman wants to have an abortion, but many know that they have to, for various reasons, and this amendment is not about them. A mystery shopper, however, recently approached several abortion clinics posing as a young woman who was pregnant and unsure of what to do. Every time I mention BPAS there is a howl from Opposition Members, but I am going to mention it in this instance, because this is irrefutable evidence.
The individual posed at a central London clinic as a 26-year-old pregnant woman who did not know what to do, and she asked for counselling. I shall come on to the difference between counselling and consultation, but she said that she did not know what to do, because she had been given the immediate consultation, was not sure whether to go through with the pregnancy, and therefore wanted an abortion. She was told that, at that very busy clinic in central London, one hour of counselling was available at one set time per week. I believe that when she revealed her identity she was offered another hour.
In fairness to BPAS, it says that it has flexibility in the system and can offer more hours. Why did it not do so? If it has flexibility, how much is there?
Chris Bryant
I am very grateful—[Interruption.] The hon. Lady says something from a sedentary position. I wholly deprecate the fact that she has had threats made, but it is inappropriate to bring forward this amendment to this Bill, because if we are going to consider abortion we should be considering the whole issue in the round, not just appending something to this kind of Bill. As she knows, I disagree with her, but she will also know that the whole point of counselling, in any circumstance, is to allow a person to come to the right decision for themselves. That is precisely what BPAS, Marie Stopes and others provide, because any counsellor who does not do that is not worth their salt.
Nadine Dorries
I would love to hear how the hon. Gentleman knows that that is what happens in Marie Stopes and BPAS. He always speaks on such issues as someone with huge experience, but I am highlighting at this moment what happens. If he thinks that one hour per week, at a set time at a busy London clinic, for the entire throughput of women having abortions, is enough counselling, so be it; that is his opinion.
Nadine Dorries
I should like to make this point before I take any more interventions, because I also want to defend BPAS. I do not want it to look as if I am attacking the organisation, because it and, probably more so, Marie Stopes, do what they do—the clinical procedure of carrying out abortion—incredibly well. The service that they provide for the NHS is absolutely vital, and I do not want to see Marie Stopes or BPAS disappear or to diminish their roles. They have a job to do, and they do it well. Their job is the provision of clinical abortions, and I want that to continue.
Louise Mensch (Corby) (Con)
Will my hon. Friend confirm that it is still safe for those of us who do not have concerns about the counselling that BPAS and Marie Stopes offer to support her amendment, because it does not prevent BPAS and Marie Stopes from offering counselling? I, for one, have no such concerns, yet I am prepared to vote for her amendment, because it does not prevent those organisations from offering advice. Will she confirm that?
Nadine Dorries
My hon. Friend is not totally correct, because the whole purpose of the amendment is to separate out the financial situation. I shall come on to that in a moment. I disagree with my hon. Friend, and if she listens to the rest of the debate she will understand why. I do not believe that the place where an abortion was carried out is the right place for someone suffering from post-abortion distress to receive their counselling—a situation that many women suffering from post-abortion distress have told me about.
Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)
I am grateful to my hon. Friend and parliamentary neighbour. May I for a second take the debate from the general to the particular? I think that she is on to something. I mentioned a 23-year-old constituent of mine who, having been to an abortion clinic, then went to a clinic such as my hon. Friend advocates. It was then her decision: she decided to change her mind, and today has a beautiful three-month-old daughter. She is pleased that she had the opportunity for that counselling, which no one forced her to take. That is why I think my hon. Friend is on to something.
Nadine Dorries
I hope that my hon. Friend is talking about the Crisis pregnancy centre in Dunstable, which I have visited along with many others. It does amazing work with young women.
Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) (Con)
Marie Stopes International said in the briefing that it sent to all MPs that only 2% to 2.5% of women who go through the abortion counselling process opt to keep the child. Does my hon. Friend agree that that may indicate an incredibly poor success rate among counselling services?
Nadine Dorries
I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention, because I am coming to another interesting statistic that I have not yet included in my speech.
Nadine Dorries
I will give way in a minute.
There is a huge disparity between the figures that show both where a woman received her counselling and her decision. In 2008, BPAS announced that the proportion of women who came to it and decided not to proceed with an abortion was as high as 20%. Unfortunately, freedom of information requests asking for the figures and the contracts with PCTs show that that is not true: the real figure is 8%, and sometimes even lower in some PCTs. I am not sure why an abortion organisation would say that its figures for women who do not proceed to an abortion are higher than they actually are.
Nadine Dorries
I want to finish this point, and then I will give way. I know that the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) wants to intervene, and I will take an intervention from the hon. Member for Luton South (Gavin Shuker) first, in a moment.
There is a huge disparity in the figures, and the freedom of information request shows an even bigger disparity. Marie Stopes had told me—I hope I get this right—that the proportion of women who go to the organisation and do not proceed to termination is about 15%, although I do not know what freedom of information requests would show about those figures. The fact is that abortion providers are saying that 20% or 15% of women do not proceed to abortion, although freedom of information requests show that the figure is 8%, as was shown in the press this week. I have no idea why there is that disparity, or why they would say that the figure is 20% when it is not.
Gavin Shuker
The hon. Lady has rightly probed the relationship between counselling and abortion on behalf of those of us who feel uncomfortable about that relationship. However, does she agree that 90 minutes does not seem like a long time for us to debate the implications of what is going on? The Bill is substantively about the nature of the NHS, and not about abortion provision. In that light, I urge her to consider whether it is appropriate to divide the House on this issue.
Nadine Dorries
I do feel that it is appropriate to divide the House on this issue, because I would like the amendment to be part of the Bill.
Nadine Dorries
I am not going to take any interventions for a few minutes. I would like to go back to the fact that only one hour of counselling is available in a busy London clinic. I ask Members, just for a moment, to put themselves in the shoes of a 16-year-old girl who turns up at that clinic and does not know what to do. She is pregnant and panicking. Some of her friends tell her to have an abortion and some tell her not to. She does not want to tell her parents because she is scared of doing so. Her boyfriend is saying to her, “You’ve got to have an abortion and get rid of it.” That is a mish-mash of the four or five stories a day that we hear in my office.
Nadine Dorries
I know that others want to speak. I have been speaking for a while and I want to get to the end, so I will keep going for a bit longer. I will take interventions in a minute. [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. Let us try to maintain proceedings on an even keel. The hon. Gentleman has said that he is sorry, and that is fine.
Nadine Dorries
As I said, I do not want to look as if I am knocking abortion providers. As a nurse, I assisted with many terminations. I do not want to look as if I feel that there is no place for abortion provision. I am pro-choice and do not want to return to those other days.
Mr Speaker
Order. It is important that the hon. Lady makes it clear to whom she is giving way.
Mr Umunna
The central point of disagreement for many people is the implication in the amendment that the abortion providers—BPAS has a presence in my constituency—are incapable of providing impartial independent counselling to those who come to them. The manager and staff at the centre in my constituency have said that they find insulting the idea that when they are giving counselling they are somehow seeking to persuade those who come to them to have an abortion, when that is not the case. In fact, when I visited BPAS recently a couple of young ladies had come to the centre intending to go through with an abortion but subsequently decided not to because of the counselling that they received.
Nadine Dorries
All I can say is that we will look at the freedom of information figures that have come from the clinic in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency. If what he says is the case, that must have been the year’s allocation for that clinic, because the FOI request information that we have received does not show that.
Nadine Dorries
No, I will carry on for a bit longer.
I want to talk about the difference between consultation and counselling. I doubt very much whether the constituents of the hon. Member for Streatham had counselling; I think they probably had consultation. There is a big difference. Every woman who turns up at an abortion clinic has a consultation, but that is about the medical process—the side effects and what is going to happen. Every e-mail that we receive from women on this subject involves a consultation. This is how the law stands today; my hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe (Anna Soubry) might want to listen to this, as most of the way through she has been nodding in agreement with the adverse comments.
When a woman turns up at an abortion clinic, the clinic does not offer counselling. It does offer consultation, but the woman has to ask for counselling; it is not offered. She has to ask—or the doctor in the clinic has to see that a woman is in a particular position, or be alarmed enough by her state to offer counselling. I want to make the point very clear: counselling is not offered, but has to be asked for. [Interruption.] Someone says from a sedentary position that it is, but if it is, the centre is operating outside the guidelines, because counselling is not offered.
Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
I am sure that many abortion providers do their level best to give advice, but that is not the point being made. Surely in any field of endeavour it is not appropriate for the provider of a service to give the so-called independent advice. That is the key point—and, frankly, the only point.
Nadine Dorries
As I have said to many people, I will come on to the financial situation and the reasons for it.
To recap, the amendment proposes that abortion clinics make an offer of counselling, which they do not make because under the guidelines they have no provision to make it—the woman has to ask for it.
Last week, The British Journal of Psychiatry reported that women who abort are twice as likely to suffer from mental health problems.
Nadine Dorries
No.
I do not want to ban abortion—I want it to continue—but should we not be taking better care of our young girls and women? Should we not be offering them something better? How do women get to the position of suffering mental health problems as a result of abortion?
Jim Shannon
The hon. Lady will be aware of facts and figures that indicate that a number of people who have had abortions regret it afterwards. Does she feel that if the consultation process is done correctly and the information is shown to the person who wishes to have the abortion, they would perhaps then decide that the child they are carrying could develop into a young lady and have life? Does she feel that the consultation process is clearly where the issue has to be addressed and that the emphasis has to be on the counselling, not on the abortion?
Nadine Dorries
The hon. Gentleman makes a point that is pertinent to his own beliefs. What I believe about counselling is that no advice should be given, that there should be no direction, and that it should be completely impartial. It should be an influence-free zone—a bubble—where a woman can sit and talk through the issues with somebody who is not guiding her. That is what counselling should be.
Every single day I receive e-mails from women who do not want other women to experience what they have experienced—who do not want their daughters to go through what they have gone through. I receive e-mails from staff who are working in, or have worked in, abortion clinics. I am in dialogue with some very senior members of staff of a number of organisations and abortion clinics across the UK—
Nadine Dorries
No, I will not give way again.
Those members of staff are themselves not necessarily happy with the guidelines and the way in which they are forced to operate. I speak to people at abortion clinics across the UK who would like the guidelines to change because they do not necessarily feel that women receive the counselling that they should receive because it is not offered but has to be asked for.
Nadine Dorries
I give way to the hon. Lady, who has tried to intervene several times.
Kate Green
Where in the hon. Lady’s amendment is there a guarantee of the quality of counselling that women would receive from such organisations?
Nadine Dorries
I hope that the quality of counselling is determined by the professional bodies by which the counsellor is accredited—they determine the standard of counselling. It does not matter whether counselling is for an abortion, for cosmetic surgery, or for anything else—it has a defined manner in which it is delivered, which is that advice is not given, that influence is not asserted, and that it is totally impartial. Any counsellor who is trained as such and accredited by a professional body delivers counselling in that manner.
Let me return to the mental health issue and the e-mails that I receive on a daily basis. One of the problems—
Nadine Dorries
No, I should like to continue. [Hon. Members: “Give way!”] I will give way once more and then not until I have finished the next section.
Dr Wollaston
My hon. Friend has twice quoted the Royal College of Psychiatrists and asserted that there is a much higher rate of mental illness after termination of pregnancy, but the RCP has made it clear—any Member can look online at the draft of its very comprehensive evidence review—that we have to compare like with like. In other words, we have to make a comparison with rates of mental illness after unwanted pregnancy. Looking at the rates after unwanted pregnancy, we see that there is no difference between the rate of mental illness after termination of pregnancy and live birth. Indeed, the biggest predictor of mental ill health after a termination of pregnancy is whether somebody was suffering with problems beforehand.
Nadine Dorries
The hon. Lady makes the assumption that I want women to continue with unwanted pregnancies. That is not the case. I have made the point that abortion is here to stay for any woman who wants an abortion. The amendment simply proposes that any woman who feels that she wants or needs counselling can be offered it—that is all. I find it very difficult to understand why the hon. Lady would feel that anybody in a crisis pregnancy should not be offered counselling. Why should they not?
Mr Stewart Jackson
The hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert), who is currently fulfilling his role as Dr Evan Harris’s vicar on earth, expressed the view that everything is fine at the moment. Does my hon. Friend share my concern that it is routine for primary care trusts absolutely to refuse to reveal the financial relationship they have—for instance, with Marie Stopes or BPAS—on the basis of commercial confidence, and that it takes freedom of information requests to get that information? The system is clearly not working, and if we want transparency and openness, things have to change.
Nadine Dorries
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Not only that, but the accounts of BPAS and Marie Stopes, which are revealed via the Charity Commission, can sometimes be three years out of date—we do not get to see them until three years later. That is amazing when one considers that the Charity Commission is paid £60 million of taxpayers’ money each year.
This, for me, is about the women who have contacted me and asked me to propose this amendment on their behalf, and I have to dedicate some of this speech to them. Every day I receive e-mails and speak to people—
Nadine Dorries
No.
I constantly speak to people at a high level across the abortion industry, and they always tell me that no woman goes through those doors wanting to be there. All women’s stories are the same; there is a theme that runs through every single one. The individual circumstances may be different, but the stories all start in the same way and with the same questions: “Will I lose my job or won’t I lose my job?”; “Will he leave me or won’t he leave me?”; “Will my parents kick me out or won’t they kick me out?” The questions are all the same; there are no surprises. Many women say that once they are referred—
Dr William McCrea (South Antrim) (DUP)
Perhaps this is not about this particular debate on the amendment, but I have to say that some of us in this House have the conviction that the emphasis seems to be on the right of the woman and that it is about time we spoke about the right of the unborn child. They have rights too.
Nadine Dorries
The hon. Gentleman is a man of great conviction and, I think, a lay preacher, and we all respect and honour his views. However, the amendment is not about the unborn child; it is about the woman accessing counselling.
Nadine Dorries
No, I want to continue for a bit longer.
The diagnosis of pregnancy happens very quickly. One can buy a pregnancy testing kit for £1. It is possible that the reason some women suffer distress following an abortion is that they can be tested before they have even missed their first period. For some women, that is fantastic and they go straight for an abortion when they find out. For others, however, it all happens so quickly that they can be aborted by the time they are seven or eight weeks pregnant, and then afterwards, when the pressure has gone and the coercion has disappeared, they realise—
Nadine Dorries
May I just finish this point? When those women would have been 10 weeks pregnant, two or three weeks after the abortion, they realise that they could have worked it out and that they could have got there somehow. That is when the problems are beginning to kick in. That is why an increasing number of women are becoming very anxious about the fact that they do not receive pre-abortion counselling. That is why I receive so many e-mails and why other organisations receive them.
Dr Lee
I want to place it on the record that as somebody who wants a reduction in the time limit on abortions provided in this country; who wants independent counselling to be provided; who has seen many patients who have had mental health problems post-abortion, such as self-harming and depression over 10 years; and who has been present at a termination and watched an eye go past in a tube, with a cursory reference made to it by the consultant, unfortunately I am frustrated by the way in which the amendment has been tabled. The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) made the point that abortion as an issue should be talked about in the round. As a consequence, I cannot support the amendment, but that does not mean that I do not support the principles and the desire to make abortion as infrequent in our society as possible.
Nadine Dorries
I thank my hon. Friend for his candour. However, I inform him that opportunities to debate abortion in this House do not come very often. In fact, the last time it happened was in 2008 when I had to table an amendment to another Bill, which was controversial. The same criticism was made that the amendment should not have been tabled to that Bill. The fact is that the Government do not make provision for abortion to be discussed in this House. Therefore, it either has to be attached to a Bill like this or it does not happen at all, unless one is drawn first in the ballot for private Members’ Bills.
Dr Lee
Yes, but my point is that this is such an emotive subject—we can tell from the responses on both sides of the House that people feel passionately about this—that the debate needs to be calm and considered and the language both here and in the media must not be inflammatory or incendiary, because if it is, it polarises the debate and those of us who want to see progress towards abortion not being so prevalent in society get terribly frustrated.
Nadine Dorries
Well, I hope that the unions and the left-wing media will take my hon. Friend’s comments on board.
Andrew Selous
I wonder whether my hon. Friend will clarify something. It is my understanding that if she chooses to press any of her amendments to the vote, it will be amendment 1221. I wonder if that might be more acceptable to my hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell (Dr Lee) than amendment 1, which he may have been speaking about.
Nadine Dorries
The amendments are grouped, but when I spoke to the Table Office last night, I was told that I would speak to amendment 1 and that amendment 1 would be pressed to the vote. I hope that the Clerks will clarify that. [Interruption.] I will take advice from the Clerks, but when I spoke to the Clerk last night, I was told that it was amendment 1. [Interruption.] My hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) is going to find out for me now.
On the offer, the amendment would provide space and time to talk and think for women who are feeling confused—that is all.
I now come to the financial arrangements between abortion clinics and counselling providers. If anybody in this House were to take out a mortgage today, the person who sold them the mortgage would have to refer them elsewhere for independent advice. If it was a husband and a wife, I believe that they would have to go to separate advisers, because they cannot both take advice about taking out the mortgage from the same person. I wonder why we feel it is appropriate that organisations that take £60 million a year of taxpayers’ money and are paid to carry out abortions give advice on the procedure.
Penny Mordaunt (Portsmouth North) (Con)
I am a former director of the largest patient organisation in Europe, which provides services on the commissioning side and the provider side through advice and support. It is a charity that deals with long-term conditions. We had to follow extremely strict rules to ensure that there was no conflict of interests and we could not provide commissioning services to an area of the country if we were also on the provider side. Why does she think that that situation has not existed for this particular area of health care?
Nadine Dorries
Because, unfortunately, abortion provision and counselling is never scrutinised thoroughly or legislated on. No legislation happens in this place to deal with abortion. It is an issue that can never be debated. People shy away from debating abortion because of the uproar that results so things do not happen that perhaps should happen. If one is to have cosmetic surgery and it is deemed that it might have a psychological effect, one would be offered independent counselling. That does not happen with abortion.
Nadine Dorries
No, I would like to continue on the financial incentives.
BPAS and other organisations would say that they do not have to meet targets and that they have no financial concerns. However, BPAS has advertised for business development managers, whose primary function is to increase its market share—those are its own words in the advert. If an organisation advertises that it wants to increase the number of abortions, can we trust it to provide vulnerable women who walk through the door with the counselling that they need? On pensions mis-selling, this place has separated by law the people who provide and sell pensions from the people who advise on pensions.
Mr Frank Field (Birkenhead) (Lab)
Does the hon. Lady accept that she might further her case if she concluded her contribution soon?
Nadine Dorries
Yes, I will.
I will come to a conclusion now, as time is whizzing away because of the interventions. I thought long and hard before tabling this amendment. Like so many issues—
Nadine Dorries
No, I am going to close. I thought long and hard about tabling this amendment. Like so many issues concerning abortion, it is a highly emotive area. There are those who believe that the right to an abortion is so sacred that, no matter what, it should never be touched, debated or reformed. There is not a single MP in this House who has not been asked by a constituent about their beliefs on this issue. I am sure that many prefer, understandably, to fudge a response, particularly when the reaction to discussing abortion can be so aggressive, as I have found to my cost.
The amendment is about one thing and one thing only: providing women with more choice. It would allow women who are at their most vulnerable greater access to support. It must be wrong that the abortion provider that is paid £60 million to carry out terminations also provides the counselling when a woman feels strong or brave enough to ask for it. If an organisation is paid that much for abortions, where is the incentive to reduce them?
I will move on to the tactics that have been used in this House to thwart the amendment. I wish to be very clear and will take no more interventions. I went to see the Prime Minister regarding this amendment and he was very encouraging. In fact, it was at the Prime Minister’s insistence that I inserted the word “independent”. I have attended a meeting at the Department of Health at which it was decided what process would be implemented to make this a reality.
Last weekend, the former MP for Oxford West and Abingdon, Evan Harris, who has spent most of the day in the office of the hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert)—he is still here, tabling his amendments—turned up on the airwaves expounding the theory that there is no evidence of a problem, that the amendment is unnecessary as nothing needs to be fixed, that the status quo should remain and that the abortion industry should be allowed to continue under the veil of secrecy that it has.
I received a message informing me that the former Member for Oxford West and Abingdon had approached the Deputy Prime Minister’s office and exerted pressure. In fact, he tweeted exactly that, saying that he had applied pressure on the Deputy Prime Minister, who had now forced the Prime Minister to make a climbdown. Basically, a Liberal Democrat—in fact, a former MP who lost his seat in this place—is blackmailing our Prime Minister and our Government. Our Prime Minister is being put in an impossible position regarding this amendment. Our health Bill has been held to ransom by a former Liberal Democrat MP, who has focused on this amendment.
The interesting thing is that ComRes polling shows that 78% of the public support the amendment.
Nadine Dorries
I will not give way. The right hon. Gentleman may be interested to know—
Mr Speaker
Order. I apologise for interrupting the hon. Lady, but there is so much noise in the House that it is sometimes difficult to know whether somebody is seeking to intervene or standing for another purpose. Point of order, Mr Martin Horwood.
Martin Horwood
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Is it in order for an hon. Member to accuse a former hon. Member of blackmail in the course of their speech? That is an accusation of a criminal offence.
Mr Speaker
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. My understanding at present is that there has been no breach of order. However, I would say to the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) and to the House that temperate language, moderation and good humour are the essential features referred to in “Erskine May”, and it is best if they inform our debates.
Nadine Dorries
Thank you, Mr Speaker.
I think our Prime Minister has been put in an impossible position. I want every Liberal Democrat Member to know that in the polling that was done, support for the amendment was 78% among the public, but it was highest among those who voted Liberal Democrat in the 2010 election, at 84%.
Nadine Dorries
No, no, no.
I think that is because Liberal Democrats traditionally support choice. Is it any wonder that the person in question is now the former Member for Oxford West and Abingdon?
Nadine Dorries
It is time to make a decision not informed by the Liberal Democrats, and without being blackmailed by a Liberal Democrat or held to ransom by the Liberal Democrats. It is time to make a decision based on our conscience. I say to hon. Members: be prepared to stand by your view today for a long time, as it will be on everyone’s parliamentary record. In weighing up whether to support the amendment, Members should bear in mind the fact that 78% of the public support it. This is why we are here as Members of Parliament—to make difficult decisions such as this, not to be blackmailed or held to ransom. This is why we are MPs—because our constituents expect us to be brave. They expect us to stand up in the face of blackmail and be accountable.
Nadine Dorries
It does not happen very often in the House, but we have a conscience vote. It hardly ever happens, but we are all personally answerable for the decisions that we take. This decision is about nothing more than supporting an offer of counselling to vulnerable women who may need it and who may use it as a lifeline.
Nadine Dorries
How many times do I have to say no to my hon. Friend?
This is about being accountable for our views, which is what Parliament is all about. I do not see why we should shy away from putting our positions on the record. If Members want to stand in the way of a woman’s basic right to independent counselling, then they should vote against this proposal. However, if they want to ensure that a woman can have access to very basic support, they should vote for the amendment. It is up to them—support these reasonable measures to provide all women with independent counselling, or stand in the way of that basic support.
This vote is about women. I want every woman in this country to be able to look every MP in the eye and ask, “How did you vote for me and my daughters? What was the decision that you took?” Every MP will be accountable for that vote and that decision today.
Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)
The decision to seek an abortion may be the most serious and difficult that many women face in their lives, and I think it deserves some seriousness and calm in this debate.
For nearly five decades, this House has been in agreement that abortion and matters related to it should be above mere party and partisan politics. For nearly five decades, there has been a settled pro-choice majority in this House and in the country, and for nearly five decades the House has believed that when Members of all parties have religious or ethical objections to abortion, their right to vote against it should be absolutely respected. However, this amendment is not about that. It is a shoddy, ill-conceived attempt to promote non-facts to make a non-case.
Ms Abbott
I am afraid that we are an hour into an hour-and-a-half debate, and I am anxious to allow time for other Members to speak.
The case that the amendment is intended to make is that tens of thousands of women every year are either not getting counselling that they request, or are getting counselling that is so poor that only new legislation can remedy the situation. I might say, after many years in the House, that in matters of this kind, if legislation is the answer we have almost certainly asked the wrong question.
The amendment is the opposite of evidence-based policy making. We know that the British Medical Association advises its members:
“A decision to terminate a pregnancy is never an easy one. In making these decisions, patients and doctors should ensure that the decision is supported by appropriate information and counselling about the options and implications.”
We know that the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists guidance on abortion states:
“Women should be given counselling according to their need—including post-abortion if she needs it. All women should be offered standalone counselling. The counselling should include: implications counselling (aims to enable the person concerned to understand the…course of action…); support counselling (aims to give emotional support in times of particular stress) and therapeutic counselling (aims to help people with the consequences of their decision and to help them resolve problems which may arise as a result)”.
We know that Department of Health regulations state:
“Counselling must be offered to women who request or appear to need help in deciding on the management of the pregnancy or who are having difficulty in coping emotionally”.
We also know that all the clinics that have been discussed in the debate are inspected and regulated.
Yet the proposers of the amendment are asking us to believe, on the basis of purely anecdotal evidence, that tens of thousands of doctors, nurses and charity workers involved in the 190,000 abortions a year are wilfully ignoring both the law and the guidance of the British Medical Association and the Royal Colleges. They go further than that, arguing that tens of thousands of doctors, nurses and charity workers are merely in it for the money. They imply that those men and women are involved in some sort of grotesque piecework. It is almost as though they were paid per abortion. The proposers of the amendment, I might add, also seem to be arguing that thousands of women do not actually know what they are doing. It tells us something about the validity of their claims that they are obliged to smear tens of thousands of doctors and nurses to make any kind of case. No wonder that a journalist for The Sunday Times—no friend of the liberal left, but one who happens to have served as a lay member of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists—last weekend described the amendments as a “senseless and sinister bid” to cut abortions.
Mr Kevin Barron (Rother Valley) (Lab)
I agree with my hon. Friend. Any evidence that we have heard has been anecdotal—we have heard of a 16-year-old’s journey and of e-mails that hon. Members have seen but that I have not. However, my hon. Friend makes a real point. The conclusion of the consultation might be that a termination takes place, but this is the only procedure in this country that requires the informed consent of two doctors. Government Members besmirch doctors by saying that such things happen daily, but that is not true. From my nine years on the General Medical Council, I recognise that we have good ethical guidelines for doctors. Nothing is done without the informed consent of two medical practitioners.
Ms Abbott
I would be more willing to give way were we not so far advanced in a debate that will last for only an hour and a half. I was not aware that so many Back Benchers wanted to contribute, because they have not hitherto tried to intervene.
Some colleagues have expressed their surprise that yet again we are discussing women’s reproductive rights in this House, but they should not be surprised. Abortion has never stood on its own as a technical issue; it is part of a century-long debate about women’s sexuality, womens’s rights and women’s freedoms. Sadly, for some people that is apparently still contested ground in 2011. Some even argue that the proposals are best seen as part of a wider push on the socially conservative agenda that has been so successful for right-wing politicians in America. Thankfully, in this country, that agenda has come up against a determination to keep such issues above party politics, the absence of a Fox News pumping out socially conservative propaganda 24 hours a day and British common sense.
I could say many things on the lack of an evidence base behind the amendments, but let me say this: women—both individual women and women in general—have been called in aid in this debate, and indeed they face very real problems in this society, here in 2011. They face spiralling unemployment as a direct consequence of the coalition’s policies and the sexualisation of our culture, which affects younger and younger female children—[Interruption.] I hope that hon. Members listen to this, because it is a point that many mothers and fathers will understand. Too many young women in communities up and down the country think that the only road to fame and fortune is to pump their bottom and their breasts full of silicone and tout themselves as some sort of media celebrity. Another issue is the number of very young women who have been badly parented, who have children too young and who, with all their good intentions, parent their own children badly in turn. Even in an era of financial constraint, those are the issues that this House should be addressing.
Nobody is saying that arrangements in relation to counselling cannot be improved. I believe that the hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert) has tabled a good amendment to that effect, which some of us hope finds favour in another place. However, the Bill and the amendment are not appropriate for a full and careful debate on abortion. The amendments deal with matters that are amply covered by existing law and regulations.
Dr Poulter
The hon. Lady is making an excellent speech and has outlined the fact that there is adequate provision for counselling in the status quo. Doctors, nurses and other medical professionals who must deal with such situations every day have adequate measures in place, as the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists has outlined. They do not look only at the medical consultation, but at the whole patient, as we have heard. If that means that counselling is required, they will ensure that their patient gets it. Does she agree that this is not the place for the amendment, which serves no purpose, and that we need to get on and debate the Bill?
Ms Abbott
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, who is, of course, a practising doctor who knows a great deal more about these matters than many of us in the House.
As hon. Members have heard, the amendments deal with matters that are amply covered by existing law and regulations that are well known to doctors and nurses. They deal with matters that must, at the end of the day, be between a woman and a doctor. I deprecate the extent to which amendment 1 is an attempt to import American sensationalism, confrontation and politicisation into these issues in a way that will be of no benefit to ordinary women.
There is no evidence base for the amendments, and on the basis of all the recent polls there is no substantive support for amendments of this nature. Legislation addressing the issues raised by Government Members is already in place. This House should have more respect for the medical profession and for the vulnerable women who put themselves forward for abortion in one of the most difficult periods in their lives, rather than support an amendment of this nature, which is spurious and baseless. I urge the House emphatically to reject the amendment.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Anne Milton)
I feel that I need to start by saying that this debate is about women; it is not about hon. Members. It is about ensuring that women get the very best possible services that they not only need but deserve.
There was much comment and speculation ahead of the debate, not all of it accurate or helpful. It might therefore be useful if I explain the Government’s approach to meeting the spirit of the amendments without primary legislation. I associate myself with my hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell (Dr Lee), who urged calm and balance. Today’s debate has not necessarily reflected either of those things.
How do the Government intend to meet the spirit of the amendments?
Anne Milton
I need to make a little progress.
The Bill gives new public health functions to local government. In some cases, the steps that local authorities must take will be prescribed in regulations, which include the provision of sexual health services and abortion services. That will be a duty of local authorities and not of clinical commissioning groups—some of the amendments in the group have caused confusion about that. We intend to specify in regulations that local authorities must ensure that part of what they commission is a choice of independent counselling.
Amendments 1 and 2 would fragment the service by splitting responsibility for the commissioning of counselling and for the commissioning of the rest of the service. If they and amendment 1221 were to be made, clinical commissioning groups and local authorities would have different but overlapping duties in relation to independent counselling, and the definition of “independent” would be different for each. We would have a fragmented service, which none of us wants. Most women go to their GP, which is not the same as a clinical commissioning group, or they self-refer to an abortion provider, so amendment 1221 would not work.
Anne Milton
I am afraid that time is against me.
I hope that what I have said reassures my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert), who I believe is trying to be helpful, but we do not support any of the amendments. We intend to ensure that the independent counselling offered to women follows the highest standards of good practice. My hon. Friend’s amendment 1252 is therefore unnecessary, as well as, we believe, unenforceable as currently drafted. It does not define “information or advice”, and crucially, it does not mention independent counselling. Counselling is different from advice and support. However, the Government support the spirit of the amendments, and we intend to present proposals for regulations after consultation. Not only is primary legislation unnecessary, but it would deprive Parliament of the opportunity to consider the detail of how the service will develop and evolve.
Amendment 1180 would oblige the Government to make regulations requiring NICE to produce guidance on abortion services. It would also oblige NICE to make specific recommendations in the guidance. That conflicts with other provisions in the same clause that prevent central interference in the substance of the NICE recommendations. Clearly that would seriously damage the independence of NICE and its reputation for evidence-based guidance. The second part of the amendment would require health or social care bodies, or private providers of abortion services, to comply with all recommendations made by NICE, which would effectively mean that NICE was setting essential requirements for abortion services, which is not its job or function. That is the role of the Care Quality Commission, and those standards and qualities are driven by good commissioning.
Andrew Selous
We all greatly appreciate the calm and measured way in which the Minister is responding. Is she aware that, in 2006-07, a Labour-dominated Science and Technology Committee recommended that those functions should be taken over by NICE?
Anne Milton
No, and I thank my hon. Friend for raising the point. The only reason why I took his intervention was that NICE had not been given a mention yet.
Anne Milton
I will not, I am afraid. I must make progress.
The amendment would not, incidentally, require local authority commissioners of abortion services to comply with NICE recommendations.
This does not, of course, mean that NICE has nothing to contribute. Hon. Members may know that it is currently considering a draft library of NHS quality standards, which includes a proposed topic on abortion services. We may have an opportunity to air the issue further at that point.
I hope that hon. Members are reassured by our proposals and by my personal involvement in the issue.
Anne Milton
The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) is clearly not reassured, but perhaps he will let me finish.
It is a very long time since I worked in a maternity unit, but I worked in one run by the Salvation Army, and I have seen many young women go through the trauma of an unplanned and unwanted pregnancy. Yes, we need to do a great deal more to prevent unwanted pregnancies from happening in the first place, but when faced with such a situation, young, and indeed older, women need help and support to make the decision that is right for them without interference from any vested interests. The amendments were tabled in a spirit of improving services for women, but they will not work. They will not deliver what my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) wants, or what I want. They will not work for women. I urge my hon. Friend to withdraw her amendment and to work with me to ensure that we secure the right services for women.
Mr Frank Field
I will be brief, because I know that others wish to speak.
I thought that I would be addressing the House about an amendment with my name on it, but, for reasons unknown to me, my name was dropped from it. What I wanted to say, however—and it is reinforced by the way in which the Minister has approached the matter—is that while I thought that the original amendment involved an issue that we should consider, I believe that the Minister has dealt with it. The hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) and I embarked on this journey together, and my plea to her now is not to press the amendment. The Minister has provided us with an advance which I hope will signal a change in the temper of the abortion debate in the House.
This has been one of those debates in which people emphasise motives and rarely take voting records into account. I put my name to that amendment because in every vote on the subject that has taken place in the 30 years for which I have been in the House, I have voted against wrecking the Abortion Act, and I thought that there was an issue here that should be considered. However, I feel that the Minister has more than met the point, and she has widened the debate about what the inquiry will cover. I hope that the whole House will pay attention to her and to my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott). Presumably a report will be produced once the consultation has been completed, and perhaps we shall then be able to have a debate opened by Front Benchers in which Back Benchers’ speeches are time-limited.
Despite what has happened today, I think it important for us to try to use this event to make it clear that we will have different debates about abortion in the House of Commons in future, for we should have such debates. We should be more concerned with facts, and less concerned with trying to put our sticky fingers into other people’s souls and pronouncing that they have failed.
Dr Huppert
I am delighted to have a chance to speak in the debate. It is tempting to respond to all the comments made by the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries), but I shall avoid doing so. Instead, I shall make just two points.
First, let me quote something that was said by the right hon. Member for Bristol South (Dawn Primarolo) before she became Deputy Speaker. She said of the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire:
“The hon. Lady has asserted many things to be facts that are not… Some of the things that she is saying are not borne out by the evidence.”—[Official Report, 20 May 2008; Vol. 476, c. 263.]
I think that that is extremely true.
Nadine Dorries
Would the hon. Gentleman care to be absolutely specific? Will he focus on what he thinks those facts are and then give me a chance to respond?
Dr Huppert
I am afraid that there will not be time to go through all that. The hon. Lady challenged me to comment on some evidence that she had provided, and then would not allow me to do so. The hon. Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston) remarked on that.
The Royal College of Psychiatrists has clearly done a much better systematic review than the one the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire looked at. It shows:
“Where studies control for whether or not the pregnancy was planned or wanted, there is no evidence of elevated risk of mental health problems.”
As I have said, that is a much more detailed review.
Unfortunately, there is not sufficient time to cover all the other topics the hon. Lady would like to talk about. I congratulate her, however, as it takes a lot to unite Abortion Rights with the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, both of which oppose her amendments. The SPUC has been very clear that it cannot ask MPs to support the amendments.
Let me move on, however, and ask whether there is actually a problem that we need to address: are there too many abortions? The best way to reduce the number of abortions is by empowering individuals, by providing better access to contraception and by providing better sex and relationships education at school to both boys and girls. Are there areas where we need better advice and counselling? Absolutely there are. People who have had a miscarriage do not get the counselling support that they desperately need. We should focus attention on that. For all the reasons that have been discussed, I urge the House to reject these amendments.
I want to speak in favour of my amendment 1252, which proposes that evidence-based advice should be given. Although the Government will not support the amendment if it is put to a vote, I was pleased to hear that they accept the principle behind it, which is that we want that expert advice. I am not a medical doctor—I am not an obstetrician or gynaecologist—but they have clearly stated what they think the best advice is, and it should be followed. We should expect all groups giving advice to live up to this high standard. Women—all people—should get proper medical advice, and it should be the best advice available. They should not be misled, and they should not have made-up risks told to them. The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists has excellent guidance from 2004, and all organisations should stick to it. I confirm that the British Pregnancy Advisory Service and Marie Stopes stick to that guidance, and so should all other groups.
I trust the Government when they say that they will stick to that advice—the best medical advice. I have some concerns about some of the Government’s other comments however, and I hope to have a chance to talk to the Minister in greater detail, although this debate has not been the forum in which to do that. I urge the House to stand up for what it believes in, to reject the presentation we heard earlier and to reject the amendments.
Nadine Dorries
First, I should point out that the hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert) was referring to an older study.
We have heard a number of points of view. I take on board the comments of the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr Field) and I appreciate the response from the Minister. She is my friend, and she has gone out of her way to understand the issue and to bring this debate to a calm and reasoned conclusion.
This debate is not just about my amendment. There are many people who support it, as I have frequently stated. [Interruption.] I have no idea why whenever I stand the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) always feels the need to continue chatting; he should just be quiet.
I heard what the right hon. Member for Birkenhead said, and I have listened to the Minister. Unfortunately, I am being urged by many other people, not least those who have told their stories, to go to a vote, because there are people who want a line drawn in the sand here. I shall therefore press amendment 1221 to a Division.
I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 14
Other Services Etc. Provided As Part Of The Health Service
Amendment proposed: 1221, page 9, line 37, at end insert—
‘( ) After paragraph 8 insert—
“Provision of independent information, advice and counselling services for women requesting a termination of pregnancy
8A (1) A local authority must make available to women requesting termination of pregnancy from any clinical commissioning group the option of receiving independent information, advice and counselling.
(2) In this paragraph, information, advice and counselling are independent where they are provided by either—
(a) a private body that does not itself refer, provide or have any financial interest in providing for the termination of pregnancies; or
(b) a statutory body.’.—(Nadine Dorries.)
Question put, That the amendment be made.
The Minister of State, Department of Health (Paul Burstow)
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
Mr Speaker
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
New clause 10—Requirements as to transparency—
‘(1) Regulations may impose requirements on the National Health Service Commissioning Board and clinical commissioning groups for the purpose of ensuring that they are open and transparent in their decisions in commissioning health services for the purpose of the NHS.
(2) Regulations under this section may in particular impose requirements relating to—
(a) the imposition of minimum waiting times for patients,
(b) the imposition of clinical thresholds that a patient must reach before being eligible for treatment.
(3) The regulations may provide for the requirements imposed, or such of them as are prescribed, not to apply in relation to arrangements of a prescribed description.’.
New clause 11—Financial duties on clinical commissioning groups: administrative costs—
‘After section 223K of the National Health Service Act 2006 insert—
“223L Financial duties on clinical commissioning groups: administrative costs
(1) The Board must direct clinical commissioning groups to ensure that their expenditure on administrative costs does not exceed a prescribed percentage of their resource.
(2) The Board must ensure that the total national limit on clinical commissioning groups expenditure on administrative costs in any year from April 2014 does not exceed 55 per cent. of the total spent on administrative costs by primary care trusts in the financial year 2009-10.”’.
New clause 12—Secretary of State’s duty as to education and training—
‘After section 1F of the National Health Service Act 2006 insert—
“1G Secretary of State’s duty as to education and training
For the purposes of improving the quality of patient care, the Secretary of State has a duty to maintain a comprehensive, multi-professional education and training system for health professionals and to ensure the continued professional development of all staff delivering NHS services.”’.
New clause 13—Providers’ duty as to education and training—
‘For the purposes of improving the quality of patient care, all providers of services for the purposes of the health service have a duty to contribute towards the maintenance of a comprehensive, multi-professional education and training system for health professionals and to ensure the continued professional development of all their staff delivering health services.’.
New clause 14—Duties of clinical commissioning groups as to persons for whom they are responsible—
‘After section 3B of the National Health Service Act 2006 insert—
“3C Duties of clinical commissioning groups as to persons for whom they are responsible
(1) A clinical commissioning group has responsibility for persons who usually reside in the clinical commissioning group’s area.
(2) Regulations may provide that for the purposes of this section a clinical commissioning group also has responsibility (whether generally or in relation to a prescribed service or facility) for persons who—
(a) were provided with primary medical services by a person who is or was a member of the clinical commissioning group,
(b) have a prescribed connection with the clinical commissioning group’s area, or
(c) are provided with primary medical services by a member of the clinical commissioning group.
(3) The power conferred by section 3(1B)(b) must be exercised so as to provide that, in relation to the provision of services or facilities for emergency care, a clinical commissioning group has responsibility for every person present in its area.
(4) Regulations may provide that section 3(1A) does not apply—
(a) in relation to persons of a prescribed description (which may include a description framed by reference to the primary medical services with which the persons are provided);
(b) in prescribed circumstances.
(5) The duty in subsection (1) does not apply in relation to a service or facility if the Board has a duty to arrange for its provision.”.’.
New clause 16—Distribution of health service functions—
‘(1) The Secretary of State may direct the NHS Commissioning Board, or a clinical commissioning group, to exercise any of his functions relating to the health service which are specified in the directions.
(2) The functions which may be specified in directions include functions under enactments relating to mental health and care homes.’.
New clause 17—Secretary of State’s directions to health service bodies—
‘(1) The Secretary of State may give directions to any of the bodies mentioned in subsection (2) about its exercise of any functions.
(2) The bodies are—
(a) the NHS Commissioning Board; and
(b) clinical commissioning groups.
(3) Nothing in provisions made by or under this or any other Act affects the generality of subsection (1).’.
New clause 18—Care Quality Commission: duty as regards stability of existing NHS services—
‘The Care Quality Commission, in exercising its functions, must have regard to the need to avoid existing NHS services, including but not restricted to, emergency care, intensive care, chronic and complex care, teaching, training and research or case-load, becoming viable or unstable due to an unplanned reduction in income or caseload.’.
New clause 20—Clinical commissioning group commissioning work: public function—
‘The Secretary of State must issue directions to clinical commissioning groups which will ensure that commissioning work is predominantly retained as a function by staff directly employed by the clinical commissioning group.’.
New clause 23—Chief environmental health officer for England—
‘(1) The Secretary of State shall appoint a Chief Environmental Health Officer for England.
(2) The Chief Environmental Health Officer for England shall give advice to and report to the Chief Medical Officer for England on all such aspects of environmental and public health as are relevant to the public health functions referred to in section 2A of the National Health Service 2006 Act and the duties referred to in section 2B of that Act.
(3) The Secretary of State shall report to Parliament annually on the work of the Chief Environmental Health Officer for England.’.
Amendment 1222, in clause 1, page 2, line 2, leave out ‘promote’ and insert ‘provide or secure a’.
Amendment 1223, page 2, line 3, leave out from ‘must’ to ‘improvement’ in line 4 and insert ‘provide or secure a comprehensive Health Service designed to promote’.
Amendment 1239, page 2, line 4, after ‘improvement’, insert ‘and to ensure improvement’.
Amendment 1176, page 2, line 7, leave out subsection (2) and insert—
‘(2) The Secretary of State must for that purpose provide or secure the provision of services in accordance with this Act.’.
Amendment 1224, page 2, line 8, leave out ‘secure that services are provided’ and insert ‘provide or secure, either directly or indirectly, services’.
Amendment 48, page 2, Leave out lines 10 to 12 and insert—
‘(3) The services so provided must be free of charge.’.
Amendment 1174, page 2, line 10, after ‘services’, insert ‘so’.
Amendment 1175, page 2, line 10, leave out ‘as part of the health service in England’.
Amendment 1177, page 2, line 12, at end insert—
‘(4) For the purposes of this Act “the health service in England” is defined as those services provided under section 3 of this Act.’.
Amendment 1240, in clause 2, page 2, line 17, leave out ‘with a view to securing’ and insert ‘so as to ensure’.
Amendment 1241, page 2, line 23, leave out ‘with a view to securing’ and insert ‘so as to ensure’.
Amendment 1212, page 2, line 33, at end insert—
‘(5) In discharging the duty under subsection (1) the Secretary of State retains the power to create a new NHS trust or provider organisation.’.
Amendment 1169, in clause 3, page 2, line 38, leave out from ‘State’ to end of line 40 and insert ‘, so far as is consistent with the interests of the health service, must exercise the functions conferred by this Act so as to secure—
(a) that inequalities between the people of England with respect to the benefits that they can obtain from the Health service are reduced, and
(b) a continuous reduction of inequalities between the people of England with respect to the outcomes achieved for them.
‘(2) The Secretary of State must publish and lay before Parliament an annual report detailing the progress which has been achieved in discharging this duty, and the means by which the Secretary of State intends to fulfil this function in the following year.’.
Amendment 1183, page 2, line 38, leave out ‘have regard to the need to reduce’ and insert ‘act with a view to reducing’.
Amendment 1197, page 3, line 1, leave out Clause 4.
Amendment 1194, in clause 5, page 3, line 16, leave out ‘have regard to the need to’.
Amendment 1242, in clause 9, page 5, line 32, at end insert—
‘(h) promoting co-operation between each of the authority’s relevant partners.’.
Amendment 1243, page 5, line 35, at end insert—
‘(4A) For the purposes of this section each of the following is a relevant partner of a local authority—
(a) where the authority is a county council for an area for which there is also a district council, the district council;
(b) the police authority and the chief officer of police for a police area any part of which falls within the area of the local authority;
(c) a local probation board for an area any part of which falls within the area of the local authority;
(d) a youth offending team for an area any part of which falls within the area of the local authority;
(e) a clinical commissioning group for an area any part of which falls within the area of the local authority.
(4B) The relevant partners of a local authority must co-operate with the local authority in the making of arrangements under this section.’.
Amendment 5, page 5, line 43, leave out Clause 10.
Amendment 1178, in clause 11, page 7, line 15, leave out from ‘Subsections’ to ‘apply’ and insert ‘(1), (3) and (4) of section 3C’.
Government amendment 49.
Amendment 1172, in clause 14, page 9, line 35, after ‘blood’, insert ‘, haematopoietic stem cells’.
Amendment 1173, page 9, line 37, after ‘tissue’, insert ‘, haematopoietic stem cell’.
Government amendments 50, 51 and 54.
Amendment 42, in clause 20, page 16, line 34, at end insert—
13DA Duty of the Board as to commissioning of services
In carrying out its duties in respect of the commissioning of services the Board must in the exercise of its functions have regard to the interdependency of services and the impact that the arrangements for the provision for one service may have on the financial and clinical sustainability of other services.’.
Amendment 1198, page 17, leave out lines 12 to 19.
Amendment 1184, page 17, line 21, leave out ‘have regard to the need to reduce’ and insert ‘act with a view to’.
Amendment 1185, page 17, line 23, leave out ‘reduce’ and insert ‘reducing’.
Amendment 1186, page 17, line 25, leave out ‘reduce’ and insert ‘reducing’.
Amendment 1187, page 17, line 36, leave out ‘act with a view to enabling’ and insert ‘have regard to the need to enable’.
Amendment 1188, page 18, line 4, after ‘functions’, insert ‘have regard to the need to’.
Amendment 1195, page 18, line 17, leave out ‘have regard to the need to’.
Government amendment 60.
Amendment 1203, page 19, line 28, at end insert—
13OA Duty as regards stability of existing NHS services
The Board must not exercise its functions, in particular in respect of section 13I (Duty as to patient choice) or 13K (Duty to promote innovation) in a way which could lead to existing NHS services, including but not restricted to, emergency care, intensive care, chronic and complex care, teaching, training and research, becoming unviable or unstable due to an unplanned reduction in income or case-load.’.
Amendment 46, page 22, line 12, at end insert—
‘(1A) The Secretary of State must publish guidance to the Board, to which the Board must have regard, about the exercise of its powers under subsection (1).’.
Amendment 1167, page 24, line 16, at end insert—
‘Duty to reduce bureaucracy
132ZA Duty to reduce bureaucracy
‘(1) The Board must exercise its powers so as to reduce administrative costs in the NHS.
(2) For that purpose the Board must exercise its duties under 14A and 14C to ensure that at no time there exist more clinical commissioning groups than there were primary care trusts on 1 April 2011.’.
Government amendments 67 and 68.
Amendment 1206, page 26, line 41, at end insert—
223E1 Financial duties of the Board: needs-based allotments
(1) The Board must make allotments to clinical commissioning groups based solely on the need of the population served by each commissioning group.
(2) The Secretary of State may give directions as to how the needs set within subsection (1) are determined.’.
Amendment 1218, in clause 22, page 27, line 17, at end insert ‘provided that the members of a clinical commissioning group cannot consist entirely or mainly of persons who are providers of primary medical services under section 83(2).’.
Amendment 1211, page 27, line 22, at end insert—
‘(c) shall be co-terminus with the social services local authority, unless it is notified by the relevant health and wellbeing board, and the local authority, that they approve an area which is not co-terminus.’.
Government amendments 70 and 71.
Amendment 43, in clause 23, page 34, line 20, at end insert—
14PA Duty of clinical commissioning groups as to commissioning of services
In carrying out its duties in respect of the commissioning of services each clinical commissioning group must in the exercise of its functions have regard to the interdependency of services and the impact that the arrangements for the provision for one service may have on the financial and clinical sustainability of other services.’.
Amendment 1189, page 35, line 2, leave out ‘have regard to the need to reduce’ and insert ‘act with a view to’.
Amendment 1190, page 35, line 3, leave out ‘reduce’ and insert ‘reducing’.
Amendment 1191, page 35, line 5, leave out ‘reduce’ and insert ‘reducing’.
Amendment 1192, page 35, line 22, leave out ‘act with a view to enabling’ and insert ‘have regard to the need to enable’.
Amendment 1193, page 35, line 36, after ‘functions’, insert ‘have regard to the need to’.
Amendment 1196, in clause 20, page 36, line 3, leave out ‘have regard to the need to’.
Amendment 1230, in clause 23, page 36, line 7, leave out from ‘consortium’ to ‘that’ in line 8 and insert ‘has a duty to secure’.
Amendment 1231, page 36, line 16, leave out from ‘consortium’ to ‘that’ in line 17 and insert ‘has a duty to secure’.
Amendment 37, page 36, line 36, at end insert—
14YA Duty as to conflicts of interest
(1) Each clinical commissioning group must exercise its functions so as to ensure that any conflicts of interest, and personal and prejudicial interests are dealt with.
(2) The Secretary of State must issue guidance on how conflicts of interest and personal and prejudicial interests should be dealt with by clinical commissioning groups as part of their decision making.’.
Amendment 1204, page 36, line 36, at end insert—
14YA Duty as regards stability of existing NHS services
Each clinical commissioning group must not exercise its functions, in respect of section 14U (Duty as to patient choice) or 14W (Duty to promote innovation) in a way which could lead to existing NHS services, including but not restricted to, emergency care, intensive care, chronic and complex care, teaching, training and research, becoming unviable or unstable due to an unplanned reduction in income or case-load.’.
Amendment 41, page 36, line 43, leave out from second ‘are’ to end of line 44 and insert ‘fully consulted—’.
Amendment 45, page 38, line 22, at end insert—
‘(1A) The Secretary of State must publish guidance to commissioning consortia about its exercise of powers under subsection (1), to which each commissioning consortia must have regard.’.
Amendment 1181, page 38, line 26, at end insert—
‘(3) For the avoidance of doubt it is hereby declared that nothing in this section authorises a clinical commissioning group—
(a) to disregard any enactment or rule of law, including but not limited to section 1(3), or to override any person’s contractual or proprietary rights; or
(b) to charge for anything the group does in the exercise of its powers under this section which relates to any accommodation, service or facility of a type to which section 3(1) applies; or
(c) to charge for anything in relation to the exercise of its functions under section 3 or 3A.
(4) A clinical commissioning group shall exercise the powers specified in section 7(2)(f) only after consulting (to the extent that it appears to it to be practical) any person who appears to it to have an interest through its own previous research in the ideas or intellectual property in question as to whether it should exercise them and, if so, as to any financial arrangements.
(5) A clinical commissioning group shall demonstrate in its annual report under section 14Z3 how the exercise of its power conferred by subsection (1) has not interfered to a significant extent with the performance by the group of its functions.
(6) Income raised by a clinical commissioning group as a result of the exercise of powers under this section shall be specified in its annual accounts, referred to in its annual report under section 14Z13, and paid annually to the Secretary of State.’.
Amendment 1250, page 41, line 38, at end insert—
‘(6A) If the opinion of a Health and Wellbeing Board given to the clinical commissioning group under subsection (5) is that the Health and Wellbeing Board does not consider that the draft takes proper account of each joint health and wellbeing strategy referred to in that subsection, and if the clinical commissioning group does not so consider it, the group shall inform the Health and Wellbeing Board, whereupon it may report to the Secretary of State that it does not consider that such a plan takes proper account of any such strategy and the Secretary of State may require the clinical commissioning group to carry out such further consultation with the Health and Wellbeing Board as he considers appropriate, or may make a final decision on the plan and require the Commissioning Board or the clinical commissioning group to take such action, or desist from taking such action, as he may direct.’.
Amendment 1171, page 42, line 23, at end insert—
‘(3) If in the Board’s opinion, having considered any opinion submitted to it by a Health and Wellbeing Board under 14Z12(1)(a), the plan published by the clinical commissioning group does not take proper account of each joint health and wellbeing strategy published by the Health and Wellbeing Board which relates to the period (or any part of the period) to which the plan relates, the Board must instruct the clinical commissioning group to revise its plans under 14Z10(1).’.
Amendment 1202, page 42, line 23, at end insert—
14Z12A Power of Referral of Commissioning plans to the Secretary of State
(1) If the Health and Well-being Board is of the opinion under section 14Z12(1) that a plan published by the CCG under section 14Z9(6) or 14Z10(2) and which is submitted to it in accordance with section 14Z9(6) and 14Z10(3) or 14Z11(4) or (8), does not take proper account of any relevant joint health and wellbeing strategy it may refer the matter to the Secretary of State for a decision.
(2) Regulations under this section may provide for the mechanism by which such referrals are made.’.
Amendment 38, page 43, line 9, at end insert—
‘(ab) section 14YA’.
Amendment 1199, in clause 24, page 49, line 35, leave out from beginning to end of line 37 on page 50.
Amendment 1213, page 50, line 27, at end insert ‘and must consult with local Health and Wellbeing Boards prior to any decision on this matter with a view to securing their agreement.’.
Amendment 1255, in clause 27, page 53, line 5, leave out ‘the Secretary of State’ and insert ‘Public Health England’.
Amendment 1256, page 53, line 6, leave out ‘an’ and insert ‘a suitably qualified’.
Amendment 1257, page 53, line 20, after ‘authority’, insert ‘, reporting to the Chief Executive of that authority,’.
Amendment 1253, page 53, line 21, at end insert ‘, and will be accountable to—
(a) the local authority, and
(b) the Secretary of State for Health.’.
Amendment 1258, page 53, line 21, at end insert—
‘(2A) The individual so appointed is to be employed by Public Health England, which shall have responsibility for their professional qualification and development.’.
Amendment 1259, page 53, line 30, after ‘authority’, insert ‘or Public Health England’.
Amendment 1254, page 53, line 42, leave out ‘consult’ and insert ‘obtain the agreement of’.
Amendment 1260, page 53, line 42, leave out ‘the Secretary of State’ and insert ‘Public Health England’.
Amendment 7, in clause 29, page 54, line 30, at end insert—
‘(3) This section comes into force on a date to be specified by order by the Secretary of State.
(4) The time specified in subsection (3) must be after such time as the Secretary of State is satisfied that the workforce education and training functions of strategic health authorities are being fulfilled by another body.’.
Amendment 1237, page 256, line 31, leave out Clause 299.
Amendment 1238, page 257, line 29, leave out Clause 300.
Amendment 47, in clause 304, page 261, line 19, at end insert—
‘(1A) Section 29 comes into force in accordance with sections 29(3) and (4).’.
Amendment 1245, in schedule 2, page 269, line 21, leave out from ‘consortium’ to end of line 24.
Amendment 1244, page 269, leave out lines 25 to 29 and insert—
‘(3) The arrangement must include provision for the functions of the clinical commissioning group to be exercised by, and only by, its employees on its behalf.’.
Amendment 1249, page 269, leave out line 29.
Amendment 1234, page 269, line 29, at end insert—
‘(4) Nothing in paragraph (3) shall authorise the inclusion of any provision for any of such functions to be exercised by—
(a) any of the clinical commissioning group’s members who hold or benefit from contracts to provide primary medical services under section 83(2); or
(b) individuals who have been employees of such members; or
(c) by a governing body, committee or sub-committee which consists entirely or mainly of such members.’.
Government amendments 292 to 299.
Amendment 1170, in schedule 4, page 278, leave out lines 35 and 36 and insert—
‘(a) omit “Strategic Health Authorities” and insert after “(a)”— “the National Health Service Commissioning Board”, and
(b) omit “Primary Care Trusts” and insert after “(b)” — “Clinical Commissioning Groups”.’.
Amendment 1247, page 281, line 10, at end insert—
‘(2A) Regulations made under this section must specify that—
(a) direct payments can not be made in respect of the whole or part of a course of private health care or in respect of insurance premiums which have the purpose of providing healthcare, and
(b) direct payments can only be made in respect of services which NICE has specified are services that can be provided by the health service, having particular regard to safety, efficacy and cost-effectiveness.’.
Amendment 1248, page 281, line 23, at end insert—
11A In section 12C (Direct payments pilot schemes) omit subsection (8).’.
Amendment 31, in schedule 23, page 417, leave out lines 18 to 21.
Amendment 32, page 418, line 34, leave out lines 5 to 8.
Paul Burstow
I rise to support the Government’s amendments and to explain the Government’s thinking on the amendments tabled by Opposition Members and other Members in the House. This large group of amendments covers a range of key clauses that enable us to deliver on a number of key tenets of the Bill: first, an NHS led by clinicians; secondly, an NHS with quality at its heart; thirdly, an NHS that is open and collaborative; and, fourthly, an NHS with clear, stronger political accountability. It is on the last point that I would like to start my remarks today.
The role of the Secretary of State has been the subject of great debate, especially in recent weeks. It is right that we should have this debate and it is a very important issue, especially given its particular complexity, but let us ensure that the debate is based on the facts. Too often, opinions have been offered and accusations made without full knowledge of what the Bill does and does not do.
Let me start by clearly setting out what the Bill does not do. First, it is absolutely not the Government’s intention in this Bill to allow the Secretary of State to wash his hands of the NHS. The Government believe in a comprehensive, tax-funded NHS that is free at the point of use, based on need and not ability to pay. Nothing in this Bill will change that. Secondly, I want to reassure hon. Members that there is no question but that the vast bulk of NHS-funded health care will continue to be delivered by NHS bodies that are bound by law and their constitutions to remain as public sector bodies and to fulfil a primary duty of providing services to the NHS. Indeed, the Bill contains a new provision—for the first time—specifically to prevent any future Secretary of State or NHS bodies from acting to promote the private sector over the public sector.
Let me turn to what the Bill does. It ensures not only that the Secretary of State will remain politically and legally accountable for a comprehensive health service but that he will retain the capacity to intervene where necessary to ensure that a service is provided.
Let me start with the accountability of the Secretary of State. Not only does the Secretary of State retain a raft of specific duties that mean he cannot wash his hands of the NHS but the Bill retains the legal requirements that services should be free of charge except where already specified. It now includes requirements, too, on securing continuous improvement in the quality of services, on promoting research and the use of evidence learned from research and, for the first time ever, on the need to have regard to the need to reduce health inequalities.
Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)
Will the Minister explain to the House why, rather than providing a duty to act to reduce health inequalities, the Bill requires bodies only to have regard to health inequalities? It is quite possible to have regard to them and to do nothing to reduce them.
Paul Burstow
There is a clear duty on the boards to act, too, and I ask the hon. Lady why the Labour Government, in 13 years, chose not to do anything about that matter. There was never a legal duty of any sort in the past and we now have clear duties on all the bodies and on the Secretary of State. Of course, I shall come on to talk about the mandate, which has a role to play, too.
Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)
I merely wish to seek clarity from my hon. Friend on some of the briefings that his Department has been putting out about the duty to provide, to which he has referred already. Those briefings indicate that there was somehow no provision in the National Health Service Act 1946 for a duty on the Secretary of State to provide. I wanted my hon. Friend to acknowledge that section 1(1) states
“and for that purpose to provide or secure the effective provision of services in accordance with the following provisions of this Act.”
Equally, the National Health Service Act 1977 contains the same reference to the
“purpose to provide or secure”.
The requirement to provide or secure is repeated throughout all the Health Acts.
Paul Burstow
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. If he listens carefully to what I am saying, he will hear that I am developing an argument that will go towards answering that question. Rather than trying to answer it in a very small way now, I would rather answer it in a comprehensive way through reference to what I had planned to say to the House.
As I was saying, hon. Members should ask themselves how the Secretary of State would be able to wash their hands of the NHS while simultaneously being legally required to deliver on all the duties I have just outlined. Crucially, the Secretary of State also retains the duty to promote a comprehensive health service, which dates from the Act that founded the NHS in 1946 and has been unchanged by this Bill. The Secretary of State will also have the duty to secure that services are provided for that comprehensive health service and will have failed in that duty if they are not.
The Secretary of State also has the ability—the obligation, in fact—to set goals and priorities for the NHS through the mandate. That will set out what the Secretary of State wants the NHS to deliver, which will be updated every year. It will be widely consulted on and Parliament will scrutinise it, for the first time ever giving Parliament a detailed say in what the NHS is tasked to deliver.
The Secretary of State has further powers in addition to the mandate to impose standing rules by which the NHS commissioning board and the clinical commissioning groups must operate, which will be subject to scrutiny and control by Parliament—a power Parliament does not currently have. What is changing, however, is the Secretary of State’s relationship with the NHS in terms of the role of Ministers in the commissioning and provision of services to the NHS. The Government believe that it should not be the job of Ministers to provide directly or commission NHS services, either. It should be the role of front-line professionals, who should have the freedom to focus on driving up quality of care, free from interference by Ministers in operational decisions—something that all parties in this House have said that they want to see.
We understand that all Government legislation has a responsibility to foresee the unforeseeable, to ask questions about the worst-case scenario and to ensure that the answers stand up to scrutiny. That is why this Bill contains a number of back-stop provisions to make it absolutely certain that any future Secretary of State will not be able to turn a blind eye to failings of service provision, so we have ensured that the Secretary of State has the power to step in if the board, or Monitor, is failing to deliver on its duties, including any duties imposed on the board through the mandate.
Finally, in the event of a significant emergency such as a pandemic, the Secretary of State will have powers to direct any commissioner or provider of NHS services.
Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)
In the event where there is not an emergency, will the Minister confirm that under the new provisions the Secretary of State will not have the power, as he has, to direct a commissioning group to do what he thinks is appropriate for the people in that area?
Paul Burstow
No, he will not have powers of direction. Of course, powers of direction are not subject to any form of parliamentary scrutiny and can be issued by a Secretary of State by fiat. In future, this House, through regulations, will be able to look at and agree—or not—standing rules that in most effects will have the ability to direct clinical commissioning groups and the NHS commissioning board on a wide range of matters. I direct the hon. Gentleman to clause 17, which sets those out at great length.
Simon Hughes
I am listening very carefully and, as my hon. Friend knows, we have had conversations and a wider debate about this issue. I understand what he is saying about the specific power of the Secretary of State both to act and to direct if things are failing, but does he accept that some of us would still like to be persuaded that the best way of enunciating the fundamental duty at the beginning of the legislation is not to say that the principal job is to secure the provision of the services of the NHS but to write in that it is to provide them? The back-stop encompassing statement, as it were, would mean that we could be sure that the duty rested with the office holder of the role of Secretary of State in England at any one time.
Paul Burstow
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for having given me the opportunity to talk about this at some length, and I want to give him some reassurance. However, it is hardly a back-stop to have in clause 1 something that is not what the Secretary of State on a day-to-day basis actually does. It is a back-stop to say that when things fail, the Secretary of State should be able to exercise those functions to make sure that things are put right. I would like to say a bit more about that now.
I want it to be clear that we do not envisage the Secretary of State having to intervene other than in exceptional circumstances. Nevertheless, the measures are the legislative back-stops in the Bill and it is right that they are there to protect the comprehensive nature of our NHS and to provide reassurance. To answer my right hon. Friend the Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) directly, there are a number of ways in which the Secretary of State could secure the provision of services. In particular, he could impose requirements on the NHS commissioning board and clinical commissioning groups using both the mandate and the standing rules. He could establish, and has the powers to do so, a special health authority, and could direct it to carry out any NHS function. That power has been used in the past to establish NHS Direct—a service-providing organisation. Also, he could intervene, including by replacing the management and directing them in the event of a significant failure. Those measures are the belt and braces in the Bill to make absolutely sure that the NHS and the public are protected from all eventualities. We have ensured that the Secretary of State’s powers are sufficient to ensure that a comprehensive NHS is provided, including through the public sector, rather than simply relying on existing providers and the market.
The position is clear: we are giving the NHS more freedoms and autonomy—something that many of us in the House have for many years argued should take place—and we are increasing its accountability. We are making watertight the obligations to provide a comprehensive health service that is free to all, based on need and not ability to pay.
John Pugh (Southport) (LD)
Will the Minister confirm that the Secretary of State will retain his powers to create new hospital trusts and that the Bill does not change that power ?
Paul Burstow
The power to establish NHS trusts is contained in previous legislation. The Bill provides for, in due course, the repeal of the provision to establish NHS trusts. As we indicated in our response to the NHS Future Forum, that will not take place for several years to come. Regardless of that, however, the Secretary of State will retain the power to establish special health authorities that can exercise a provider function.
Rosie Cooper (West Lancashire) (Lab)
The Minister just said that the Secretary of State will have the power directly to remove the management of hospitals or provider organisations. Will that apply both to NHS and private providers? Will the Secretary of State’s reach go that far?
Paul Burstow
We discussed yesterday at some length the role of Monitor and its powers through the licensing regime, which will apply not just to NHS public sector providers but to private and voluntary sector providers. The powers there are extensive and I recommend that the hon. Lady should look at the debate we had yesterday.
Another issue that comes up is the duty of autonomy. Amendment 1197, which was tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives—not all of Cornwall—(Andrew George), seeks to remove clause 4, entitled “The Secretary of State’s duty as to promoting autonomy”. This clause was highlighted by the legal team advising 38 Degrees about the changes to the role and functions of the Secretary of State. The specific purpose of the autonomy duty is to free front-line professionals to focus on improving outcomes for patients rather than looking up to Whitehall. It does not undermine the overarching duty to promote a comprehensive health service, nor enable Ministers to abdicate responsibility for the NHS.
It is our view that the legal opinion published by 38 Degrees overstates the effect of clause 4. The opinion suggests that the court will expect the Secretary of State to demonstrate that any steps he took that interfered with the autonomy were “really needed”, or “essential”, and that no other course of action could be followed. This is not the Government’s intention and we do not believe that that is the effect of the clause. It would be sufficient for the Secretary of State to demonstrate that he had reasonable grounds for concluding that a course of action was the most effective way to act in the interests of the health service and fulfil a duty imposed on him by, for example, clause 1 or a new section 1A in the Bill.
Paul Burstow
I will give way to my right hon. Friend the Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark and then I shall make some progress because this is a very big group of amendments.
Simon Hughes
I am very grateful and I will not keep the Minister long. I have listened very carefully, as colleagues will have done, to my hon. Friend’s extremely reassuring comments. If he and the Secretary of State are committed to working on some wording that will alleviate concerns at the beginning of the Bill, I know that my colleagues and I will be very happy to work with him.
Paul Burstow
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend. I can say no more than I have said and I think I have said what is necessary to make the Government’s intentions clear. Of course, I will now give way to my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives, who has been so diligent in tabling so many amendments.
Andrew George
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way and for his appreciation of the efforts I am making. I, too, appreciate his comments on the Government’s intentions. It has not been my argument at any stage to suggest that the Government’s intentions are dishonourable. He has mentioned the possibility of tabling amendments, but may I have some reassurance that this is a genuine and serious issue—that we need to have policy, but also, clearly, the restraint of the Secretary of State at the same time?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. We must have shorter interventions, as we have a lot to get through. Hon. Members should not take advantage of the Minister’s generosity in giving way.
Paul Burstow
I am grateful for your protection, Mr Deputy Speaker. I will take that as advice in relation to further interventions.
I have heard my hon. Friend’s comments and I think he needs to look again at what I have said. I have been very clear that we are listening and that, if necessary, we will offer clarifications or further amendments, and I am very happy, as is the Secretary of State, to carry on those discussions.
There are a number of amendments regarding other duties on the Secretary of State that I believe would not improve the drafting of the Bill. Amendments 1240, 1241, 1169 and 1183 seek to revise the duties of quality and inequality. I know that the amendments are well meant, but they would make the duties undeliverable. The Secretary of State cannot improve quality and reduce inequalities in isolation, and the duties have to reflect that. Amendment 1194 is unnecessary as the Bill already recognises the need to promote research and the use of research evidence, and creates, for the first time, responsibilities for taking a whole-system approach to achieving this. Amendments 1184 to 1193, 1195, 1196 and 1198 seek to change the extent of similar duties on the board and the clinical commissioning groups. Each of the board’s and clinical groups’ duties has been drafted to ensure that the duty is suitably strong, realistic and appropriate.
Let me address the role of the Secretary of State in relation to another issue that has been misunderstood—charging. I want to be very clear that nothing in the Bill enables the board or clinical commissioning groups to charge for services provided as part of the comprehensive health service. Services will remain free at the point of need, except where legislation specifically allows for charges to be made—for example, prescription charges and charges for dentistry. The Government have also committed not to introduce any new charges.
Amendment 48, tabled by the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas), who is not in her place at the moment, would prevent charges from being imposed for any service provided by the NHS. It has always been possible for Ministers to provide for charges for certain health services. There are limited provisions for charging even in the original NHS legislation introduced by Nye Bevan and the Labour Government of 1946. Under the current system, there are extensive exemptions: about 60% of the English population do not pay prescription charges, but—it is an important but—NHS charging raises over £1 billion a year of revenue that is ploughed back into services for patients, and it does make an important contribution to the overall affordability of the NHS. Therefore, I cannot accept the amendment.
The hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion also tabled several amendments on direct payments. The amendments are unnecessary and too restrictive. Amendment 1247 would restrict direct payments to being spent on services approved by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence. The great opportunity of personal budgets is that they allow people in areas where less medicalised services are provided to have much greater control over aspects of their care—those community-based services that are so important in maintaining the quality of life for many people with long-term conditions.
Finally, amendment 1248 would remove the power to extend direct payments nationally following the pilots, which are continuing. The Health Act 2009 provided that direct payments could be extended with the active agreement of Parliament using the affirmative procedure, and that seems a perfectly reasonable way of having a parliamentary check over the outcomes of the pilots that will be reported to the House next year. Amendment 1247 would prevent direct payments from being used for private health care or health insurance. The amendment is unnecessary. NHS funds could never be used to pay people’s private health insurance premiums.
I shall now turn to education and training. We have already committed to introduce at a later stage in the Bill’s proceedings an explicit duty for the Secretary of State to maintain a system for professional education and training. Work is ongoing and an amendment will be tabled in the House of Lords. That will be more effective and more precise than the long-term measure of simply blocking the abolition of strategic health authorities, so amendments 7 and 47 will not do.
Our vision of a modern NHS has clinical commissioning at its very heart. We want clinicians, GPs, nurses and other health care professionals to have the autonomy to commission innovative new services, and to have the true responsibility that the previous Government denied them. That involves striking the right balance between freedoms for clinical commissioning groups and their essential responsibilities to other parts of the health care service.
We made many changes in response to the recommendations of the NHS Future Forum report. We always wanted clinical commissioning groups to have a robust set of governance arrangements, to involve a wide range of other professionals and to be transparent in how they conducted their business, and we have now further strengthened those parts of the Bill so that they are very much improved.
As I said at the start of my remarks, I should like to speak briefly to a number of amendments, as I am conscious that many other hon. Members wish to speak. First, I will address some amendments that are very similar, if not identical, to those that we had the opportunity to debate at least once, and possibly twice, during the first stage of the Committee and in the re-committed Committee.
Amendment 1181, which is like amendments 45 and 46, seeks to restrict clinical commissioning groups’ powers to raise additional income. As was explained in Committee, those amendments are unnecessary. The Secretary of State has already published guidance, which can be easily updated, specifically on the powers to generate income, which applies to current NHS bodies, including primary care trusts.
Amendments 37 and 38 are on conflicts of interest. We have listened to the concerns that were expressed in the listening exercise and made changes, so the Bill already requires clinical commissioning groups to make provision for dealing with conflicts of interest.
Amendments 31 and 32 would prevent any property currently held by PCTs or strategic health authorities from being transferred to any provider that is not a public authority. As we said in Committee, we have no intention of giving away NHS property to private companies. That will not be the case and, given the safeguards that are in place, it cannot happen.
Several amendments have sought to probe accountability within clinical commissioning groups. I repeat what we said in Committee. A clinical commissioning group is not able to delegate its statutory responsibilities for carrying out its functions. It cannot palm them off or pass them on to others. Amendment 1245 would limit representation on CCG committees and sub-committees, preventing those clinical commissioning groups from inviting other professionals and experts to participate—something that we were told during the listening exercise was widely welcomed and wanted.
Amendment 1249 restricts the use of sub-committees—an essential part of any organisation with a wide range of functions. Similarly, amendment 1234 would prevent GPs or their employees from working on behalf of a clinical commissioning group, which would be a severe constraint on those groups’ ability to function. Amendment 1244 would prevent a clinical commissioning group from delegating its functions to anyone other than its employees. That would make it very difficult for those groups to carry out their statutory functions effectively.
New clause 20, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives, similarly would restrict the support that clinical commissioning groups can draw on. We want to allow those groups to access the best support and advice available—to be able to work with local authorities, third sector organisations and charities, research organisations and the independent sector. I mentioned in Committee several times, and it is worth repeating, that the support organisation established by the Neurological Alliance is proving of invaluable assistance to commissioners, and amendments such as new clause 20 would prevent it from doing the work it does for the clinical commissioning groups. I can follow the intention behind the amendments, but I hope my reassurances about the final responsibility—the statutory responsibility—for decision making in clinical commissioning groups resting with their members and the governing body are clear.
There is a raft of amendments dealing with the relationship between local authorities and commissioning groups. We want that to be a dynamic relationship, with constant dialogue and collaboration, which is precisely why the Bill proposes the establishment of health and wellbeing boards. Amendments 1202, 1171 and 1250 would introduce a new, centrally imposed procedural requirement on health and wellbeing boards and clinical commissioning groups. Clinical commissioning groups will have a duty to have regard to the relevant joint health and well-being strategy.
Where commissioning plans vary significantly from the joint strategy, the group will need to justify or consider amending its plans. Health and wellbeing boards also have the power to refer their views and concerns to the NHS commissioning board when they feel that the plans have not had proper regard to the joint health and well-being strategy. That indicates to the NHS commissioning board that the health and wellbeing board believes the CCG is actively failing to fulfil its duties. Anything further would undermine the important balance that needs to be struck in what is fundamentally a partnership relationship between two organisations that have separate sets of sovereignties and responsibilities.
The importance of that partnership approach highlights why it would be impossible to create an obligation on clinical commissioning groups to act alone to secure integration of services. How can one body decide to integrate with another against the wishes of the other? A duty cannot be imposed on one side unless the relationships exist that will allow that to take place. That can be achieved only by both parties working together, and for that reason amendments 1230 and 1231 do not contribute to that relationship’s working well.
Amendment 1211 seeks to make the clinical commissioning groups coterminous with local authorities. We have accepted the NHS Future Forum’s recommendation that the boundaries of local clinical commissioning groups should not normally cross those of local authorities, with any departure needing to be clearly justified as part of the establishment process set out in the Bill.
Amendment 1213 would prevent a clinical commissioning group that had received a reward under the quality premium from using that money without first securing the agreement of the local health and wellbeing boards. That would severely limit the CCG’s freedom to spend its quality payment as it saw fit. Health and wellbeing boards will shape commissioning priorities through the joint health and well-being strategy, by being consulted by the CCG on their commissioning plans. Under the duties set out in proposed new section 14Z14 of the National Health Service Act 2006, the NHS commissioning board must also consult each relevant health and wellbeing board in making its annual performance assessment of those CCGs.
Rosie Cooper
Great play keeps being made about consultation. I do not hear any play being made about the right to be heard or a right of veto, or whatever. CCGs can ask the health and wellbeing boards what they think; health and wellbeing boards might make a recommendation, but there is no obligation for anyone to listen.
Paul Burstow
The hon. Lady is completely wrong when she says that there is no obligation. There are clear duties in the Bill for health and wellbeing boards’ views, and their preparation of joint strategies on health and well-being and joint strategic needs assessments, to be legally binding documents, in the sense that CCGs must have regard to them. They are not pieces of paper that can be just tossed aside and dismissed. They are very important documents in the emerging system.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
A number of us are trying to understand what will trigger some kind of higher-level arbitration if it becomes abundantly clear to a significant group of people in a local community that the health and wellbeing board’s view is not being properly considered by the CCG. At that point, when there is a clear conflict, how will that conflict be exposed so that the Secretary of State or someone else clearly arbitrates so that there is fairness, not lip service? A lot of people are anxious about that.
Paul Burstow
That anxiety was expressed in Committee by some Opposition Members. As a result of the NHS Future Forum’s recommendations, we have put in place further checks to ensure that those concerns are allayed. Not least of those—as well as our view that the health and wellbeing boards should have on them a majority of elected councillors—is that they will have clear rights of membership from the local healthwatch, which will be listening to the wider community and will represent those wider concerns. They will have the views and expertise of the director of public health, the director of adult social services and the director of children’s services. If they feel that the strategy that they have all agreed is not being honoured in the commissioning strategy, they can ultimately refer that matter to the NHS commissioning board, and that can lead to changes being made.
Helen Jones
Many of us are concerned that we will not know properly what is going on in CCGs, because there is no requirement for them to be subject to the Public Bodies (Admission to Meetings) Act 1960 and to meet in public. They can decide whether to meet in public. How on earth is accountability to be maintained if those bodies can decide in private—[Hon. Members: “No, they can’t.] Yes, they can. They can decide in private how they will consider input from the health and wellbeing boards, and what they will do about it. Where is the line of public accountability?
Paul Burstow
I fear that, unfortunately, the hon. Lady might well have dusted down an old copy of the Bill, before the Future Forum made its recommendations and we made amendments to make it absolutely clear that a CCG’s governing board must meet in public. That is the decision-making body. Moreover, we also require those boards to set out in detail and publish all their decision-making arrangements—unlike PCTs, whose decisions could be made in private and no one would know.
Let me move on to health and wellbeing boards influencing commissioning decisions. Other people have questioned why we should have a quality premium at all. Indeed, amendment 1199 would remove the NHS commissioning board’s ability to reward CCGs financially for the quality of services—I emphasise that—and the outcomes that they secure, or reductions in health inequalities, which is something that all hon. Members across the House want to be promoted. That is the basis on which we want things to move forward, and high-quality services should be recognised and rewarded.
With amendments made in the second Bill Committee, we made it absolutely clear that such payments will provide an incentive to CCGs to focus on improving quality and outcomes. We will work with patients and professional groups to draft the regulations to reinforce that clear undertaking, which was made as a result of listening.
Paul Burstow
I am conscious of the time, and the fact that other hon. Members want to move and speak to other amendments. If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I will make a bit more progress.
Paul Burstow
I am talking about my hon. Friend’s amendment, so I will, of course, give way.
Andrew George
I am grateful to the Minister for giving way to me, as he is referring to my amendment. I think that I understand what the Government are trying to achieve here, but in order to assess properly what quality and outcomes are, that assessment must not be pre-empted. The purpose of my amendment is to ensure that good quality and outcomes are not rewarded too early after treatment, before people can make a proper assessment and know the long-term impact of a new procedure.
Paul Burstow
My hon. Friend makes a fair point—one that, I think, we would agree with entirely. That is why the Government published, for the first time ever, an outcomes framework for the NHS that is all about considering how clinical care leads to the sort of longer-term outcomes that he seeks, so I hope that that addresses his comments. That will be built into the way in which we go forward with drafting the regulations to reinforce that approach.
On the stability of services, my hon. Friend has tabled amendments 1203 and 1204 and new clause 18, which link very closely to Opposition amendments 42 and 43 on the interdependency of services. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State spoke to two similar amendments that my hon. Friend moved yesterday. We agree with hon. Members about the need to secure continued access to services for patients. We have introduced substantial new proposals to improve on our previous plans. However, I repeat what my right hon. Friend said yesterday: this is not about securing access to the same services in perpetuity. That has never been the case, and it should not be the case. Services evolve, and we must allow new providers—whether NHS, social enterprise or private sector—to come in where they can deliver high-quality care for patients.
I shall turn now to excessive prescription and a number of issues that arise from several amendments, which would tilt the balance in a way that would turn the system much more into a command-and-control one than many hon. Members have argued that we should have for many a year. Amendment 1218 would break a fundamental principle at the heart of our proposals: that the membership of CCGs should consist solely of GPs, and that we should encourage, rather than prescribe, how they involve other professionals.
Amendments 1237 and 1238 would remove the Secretary of State’s power to make transfer schemes for property, staff, rights and liabilities, thus making it less flexible to make transfers from, for example, a PCT to a CCG. I am well aware that many people feel that the ability to transfer staff in that way is an essential part of managing a smooth transition. Therefore, to deny the Secretary of State the ability to do that seems very odd. Amendment 1167 is unnecessary for the same reason. CCGs are different entities from PCTs, with different structures, duties and functions. It does not make sense to set a limit on the number of CCGs by comparison with PCTs.
Opposition amendment 5 would delete clause 10, but Opposition new clause 14 would reinstate it, so it is a sort of hokey-cokey set of proposals, whereby a provision would be taken out and then put back in again. As the Bill includes a power to make regulations to take account of people in specific circumstances, new clause 14 and amendment 1178, which is consequential on it, are unnecessary.
New clause 11 would require the NHS commissioning board to limit the administration spend of CCGs individually and collectively by comparison to 2009-10. In other words, it would set an arbitrary starting line and effectively lock the budgets that way. An absurd shackling of the NHS commissioning board or CCGs in that way belies common sense and sound financial governance.
Amendment 1206 runs the inherent risks, as discussed in Committee, of trying to prescribe the setting allocations in legislation. I understand the concern expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives (Andrew George), and the White Paper made it clear that we want to ensure that access in every part of the country is fair and equitable. We will want to ensure that that is achieved, and I am happy to continue to discuss those issues with my hon. Friends.
Amendment 1167 is unnecessary for the same reason. CCGs are different entities from PCTs, with different structures, duties and functions, and it would not make sense to set limits in such a way. The additional statutory provisions set out in new clause 10 are also unnecessary. Imposition of a minimum waiting time would not take account of the clinical needs of individual patients, and it is for clinicians to plan care on the basis of the clinical needs of patients and their right to access the best service.
We are considering how best to prevent PCTs from imposing clinically inappropriate blanket minimum waiting times, but there are already sufficient powers in the Bill to address the issue when it comes to CCGs.
Amendment 41 is also about consultation and transparency. We have already changed the Bill to enhance the duty on CCGs to involve and consult the public, but the commissioners must have sufficient flexibility to be proportionate in how they involve patients and service users. CCGs will not be able to use that flexibility to underplay their duty to involve the public.
I want to discuss a section of the Bill that I know concerns some of my hon. Friends and which perhaps was not much discussed in Committee—public health. A number of amendments are relevant here. New clause 23 would create the role of a chief environmental health officer. The chief medical officer, however, is already able to provide the very advice that the new clause would establish a new role to provide. The chief medical officer can provide independent advice on environmental health issues. At a time of financial stringency, the new clause would create a layer of wasteful bureaucracy.
Amendments 1253 to 1260 relate to the role of directors of public health. Our position is that they should be employed by the local authority to support local government in the new role that the Bill confers on local authorities in respect of public health.
Fiona O'Donnell (East Lothian) (Lab)
The Minister and the Government are fond of pausing with this Bill. I want to offer him the opportunity to pause as he comes near to the end of this long list of amendments and apologise to the many health organisations and patients organisations across the country for the anxiety and concern that he and his Ministers have caused.
Paul Burstow
I am sure that as people read the transcript of the debate they will wonder why that intervention came at this point, other than to make a cheap party point. It is one that many Members of the House will know has set the tone for much of the Labour party’s contribution to debate on the Bill.
I was about to discuss an important issue, which is how we improve the health of our nation through our public health services. Returning to amendments 1253 to 1260 and the role of director of public health, we are having discussions about how best to ensure that the director of public health has an appropriate status within the local authority. There is concern about who directors report to and are accountable to. We intend to return to that matter once the consultations are concluded to make that absolutely clear, and to address those concerns.
Mr Stephen Dorrell (Charnwood) (Con)
Will my hon. Friend repeat the statements that were made in a Select Committee hearing about the status of directors of public health? Is it the Government’s view that, at the very least, they should encourage—and preferably make mandatory—the status of a director of public health as a senior officer of the local authority, not reporting through any other senior officer of the authority?
Paul Burstow
My right hon. Friend is right to remind the House of the clarifying statement that was made before his Select Committee. That is what we want to encourage. We are listening to the results of the consultation exercise at the moment. Such people should be officers who report to the council and to the chief executive. Those are the issues that we are considering, and we will return to the matter.
Amendment 1254 would require the local authority to obtain the agreement of the Secretary of State before dismissing its director of public health. Our view is that as the local authority is the employer, it is not appropriate for the Secretary of State to intervene directly. The Bill already requires local authorities to consult the Secretary of State before dismissing a director of public health, so there is a safeguard already built into the legislation.
Amendment 1256 would require the director of public health to be suitably qualified. It is important to be clear that, as the Bill sets out, the director of public health must be jointly appointed by the Secretary of State, who can ensure that only appropriately qualified individuals are appointed. The amendment is therefore unnecessary.
Owen Smith
I am grateful to the Minister for his contribution. Questions about the Bill just keep coming. That is how I feel on rising to speak. We have had eight months of debate on it. So far, more than 1,500 amendments have been tabled and we have learned today that more are coming, which was news to us at least. We have two—soon to be three—versions of the Bill, as well as a very real issue between Ministers and the Opposition over how it ought to be interpreted and what tone we ought to take when debating it. I would like to address some of those questions and talk about the tone. I also want to outline how we are interpreting the Bill and state that we feel very sincerely that the Government are misrepresenting what is in it.
By way of illustration, I shall pick up on a few things that the Minister said, which I feel either raise further questions or misrepresent what is in the Bill. I want to discuss in particular the issue that was debated by him and my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington North (Helen Jones)—whether, under the aegis of the Bill, the meetings of CCGs are to be held in public. He was very clear about that. In fact, he was so clear that he had his Liberal Democrat friends bouncing up and down, shouting, “Must, must! They must meet in public. Haven’t you read the Bill?” He went on to suggest that my hon. Friend had perhaps read an earlier iteration of the Bill. I know her well enough to know that she does her homework and she will indeed have read the second version of the Bill. There have been so many that it is quite easy to lose track. She will also have read schedule 2 of that Bill, which states—I will quote directly; I will not just make it up, like the Minister—
“The provision made under sub-paragraph (3) must include provisions for meetings of governing bodies to be open to the public, except where the consortium considers that it would not be in the public interest to permit members of the public to attend a meeting or part of a meeting.”
Meetings will therefore be held in public unless the consortium decides on a whim that it is not in the public interest for the public to come to the meeting—that is, for the meeting to be held in public. That is the tone that Ministers have set throughout the Bill. It is misrepresentation. It relies on the fact that there are thousands of words, acres of clauses and endless amendments. Ministers are trying to bore people into failing to look at the details, but I am far too much of an anorak; I will keep reading the Bill, keep looking at the amendments and keep drawing them to the public’s attention.
Helen Jones
Does my hon. Friend agree that experience shows that when bodies are left to determine when it is in the public interest not to know what is going on, they usually do so on the basis of what would be embarrassing to them? Does he not fear that when difficult decisions are to be taken, commissioning groups will shut down public debate by making their meetings not open to the public?
Owen Smith
One needs to look at the top of institutions in this country—at the Government, and the extent to which Governments of all stripes choose what they are going to reveal to the public and what they deem not to be in the public interest. That standard is set and applied throughout public and private bodies in this country and elsewhere.
I have no doubt that there will be many instances when CCGs will determine that it is not in the public interest that the public be admitted to their meetings—in particular, for example, when they are discussing hospital reconfigurations or closures, and changes to public services that people consider to be vital in those areas. CCGs must consider all those crucial issues, but they must do so in a transparent manner, which is what we said in Committee last time round, on the previous iteration of the Bill. We have said it again and the Government still have not answered the point to our satisfaction. I call upon the Minister to amend schedule 2 once more. There is time to do so in the other place and he may well want to give that consideration.
Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)
As a shadow Minister, is the hon. Gentleman aware that there is a standard clause in the standing orders or constitution of every public body and every local authority throughout the country? It is for those bodies to justify what is in the public interest. That is standard in public sector organisations across the country. He is trying to make something out of nothing.
Owen Smith
No, I am trying to make a point about what the Minister said at the Dispatch Box not five minutes ago, which was that CCGs must meet in public. I am pointing out that that is not accurate. They do not always have to meet in public; they may choose not to. Whereas that may apply across the board in other public institutions, these are crucial new bodies about which there are grave concerns. We on the Opposition Benches are concerned to ensure that they should be obliged to meet in public on all occasions.
Paul Burstow
My hon. Friend the Member for Bradford East (Mr Ward) is right. That is why the outrage was expressed as it was. This part of the Bill and the schedule have the same effect as the Public Bodies (Admissions to Meetings) Act 1960. That Act does not say in a blanket way that every meeting must be held in public. It allows local authorities to exercise judgment about confidentiality. We are applying the same principles in that regard in exactly the same way as to PCTs, with the additional provision that for the first time all these arrangements must be published.
Owen Smith
I am grateful to the Minister for that further intervention, just as I assume that he is grateful for the intervention of the civil servants in the Box, who must have passed him a note. Clearly, he was not aware of that earlier. When he said that CCGs must meet in public, he was under the impression that that was the case.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
My hon. Friend is right to be concerned about the way this part of the Bill is drafted. It is incredibly open-ended for the consortium to decide what is exempt from public knowledge. That is quite different from the situation in local government in England, where the Local Government Act 1972 prescribes what is exempt from the press and the public.
Owen Smith
Indeed. The key difference is that it is for the clinical commissioning groups, in establishing their constitution, to determine what the rationale will be for allowing the public in or not. That is not set down in statute or in direction from the Minister or the Secretary of State. It is for individual CCGs to determine when they should let the public in. I give way to my colleague on the Bill Committee.
Nicky Morgan
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I remember discussing with him whether he was a lawyer, and he was proud to say that by background he was not a lawyer. As he knows, there will be occasions when a clinical commissioning group is considering a matter which is sub judice. It could be an employment law matter; it could be a confidential matter relating to a patient—for example, a mental health patient for whom there has been very sensitive care. There will be times when it is appropriate and in the public interest and that of relatives—[Interruption.] I am making the point to the hon. Gentleman, not to those on the Opposition Back Benches. There will be occasions when it is appropriate for the CCG not to meet in public, as I am sure he will concede as a matter of common sense.
Owen Smith
I will not dispute that there may be occasions when it will be appropriate for the CCG to meet in private, but that is not what the Minister said. My point was to do with the tone and the misrepresentation that has been systematically applied by those on the Government Benches. That is the difference.
Owen Smith
I shall not give way any more on that issue. [Interruption.] I was enjoying it too, although I would be surprised if the Minister was. I shall move on, if I may, to questions. As I said, there are many questions.
The Minister said today with his usual candour and clarity that the vast bulk of health care will in future be delivered by NHS services. That is a new one on me—“the vast bulk of health care”. That raises two questions. Will he characterise what he means by “the vast bulk”, and what he means by “NHS services”? In a world in which we will have a much more mixed economy, with a much greater mix of public and private providers working under the banner of the NHS, it is far from clear whether those things will be provided through what we have understood traditionally to be a public NHS or through some new hybrid NHS that the Minister is cooking up in the laboratory at the Department of Health.
The Minister said a moment ago that there were many amendments. He is a master of understatement, as ever. There are about 100 amendments in the first group, and a further 100 or so to be debated later today—part of the 1,000 amendments that have, extraordinarily, been tabled at this stage of the Bill, eight months after it first appeared.
Paul Burstow
Is it still the Opposition’s policy to seek a division between the role of commissioning or purchasing health services and the provision of those services? Does the hon. Gentleman believe in that split?
Owen Smith
Yes. The current situation is clear: the Secretary of State has a legal duty placed upon him in the legislation to secure and provide—not just to promote—a comprehensive health service in this country, and to issue direction to PCTs and SHAs, such that they so do. Those two crucial aspects of the current legislation are being changed in the Bill, and I intend to discuss them in a moment.
In version 1 of the Bill, the Government were less coy, because it actually excised section 1 of the original 1977 Act. After the deluge of criticism, however, they decided that they needed to put it back in, making it explicit, as they put it, that the Secretary of State will be responsible, as now, for promoting a “comprehensive health service”.
Section 1 of the Act was duly reinstated, as was the duty to promote, but there was a critical change, in clause 1(2) of the new Bill, which diluted the traditional duty to provide and secure. Ultimately, it placed a duty on the Secretary of State only to
“exercise the functions conferred by the Act so as to secure that services are provided”.
I shall come on to the reason why that is significant, but equally significant and allied to it was the retention—against the advice of Opposition Members and many others—of clause 10, which amends section 3 of the 2006 Act, thus keeping commissioning bodies, not the Secretary of State, as the parties with a legal duty to provide health care in England.
The net effect of those changes—despite what the Minister said earlier, and despite what the Secretary of State has said on several occasions, including notably on Second Reading—is no change. The Secretary of State is still, as the Minister put it, washing his hands by divesting himself not of the NHS but of a direct duty to provide a comprehensive health service. That is the distinction which the Minister failed to make today. The Secretary of State is palming off that precious duty, which has been placed upon successive Secretaries of State, and handing it on, via the mandate, to a quango and to unelected commissioning bodies.
The Secretary of State for Health (Mr Andrew Lansley)
If the shadow Minister is so concerned about the Secretary of State’s legal ability directly to provide services, will he answer me a question? Does he know the last time the Secretary of State for Health actually directly provided any services? In the Department of Health, we cannot find out when it was.
Owen Smith
With the greatest respect to the Secretary of State, who I have to confess knows a lot about the NHS and about the health service in this country, I think that that question is completely erroneous—a total red herring. As I said earlier, the practical reality is that the Secretary of State delegates—[Interruption.] No, no, no. The Secretary of State delegates to PCTs and SHAs his powers to provide, but, as I am going to tell the Secretary of State, he will know that under the aegis of this new Bill he will not have the power to direct clinical commissioning groups to do what he says, so he will not have a direct personal duty to provide. On the courts, we heard another interesting thing earlier from the Minister of State. He said that it was okay, because the Secretary of State will be able to justify in court when he directs a CCG to act. That is very important, and I am keen to hear the Secretary of State’s response to it, but I do not think that he has one that will convince us.
Mr Lansley
The hon. Gentleman has admitted that for decades the Secretary of State has not directly provided services, and I know that that is true. The issue is about having a legal duty, not to provide services but to secure the provision of services. He admits that that is done through delegation, which is in the structure of the Bill through the delegation of that responsibility to the national health service commissioning board and the CCGs. The mandate, which my hon. Friend the Minister has clearly explained, is much more transparent and accountable to Parliament for the manner in which the Secretary of State secures the discharge of those duties.
Owen Smith
With respect, there is not a legal duty on the Secretary of State to provide, as there has been in successive health Bills. When Bevan talked about hearing the bedpan dropped on the ward in Tredegar, he did not mean that he wanted to pick it up. [Interruption.] I do not know whether the Secretary of State wants to listen. Bevan did not mean that it needed to be picked up by the Secretary of State, but he certainly meant that he would like to be able to direct those responsible operationally for picking it up so to do.
The critical difference in this Bill is that the Secretary of State will divest himself of not only the duty to provide that service, but the power to direct the operational parts of the NHS, save for—[Interruption.] The Minister is waving his head, nodding or something; I know what he is going to say. Under the Bill, save for in cases of crisis or emergency, the Secretary of State will not have responsibility for running the day-to-day operations of the NHS.
Paul Burstow
The hon. Gentleman is wrong again. Unlike the previous Government, who were happy to have directions that did not have any parliamentary accountability, this Government are putting in place the ability, through regulations, to set the standing rules for the NHS, which, as set out clearly in clause 17, include all the issues that the hon. Gentleman is concerned about and show that the Government are committed to ensuring that there is a comprehensive health service.
Owen Smith
As the Minister has just confirmed by omission, there will be no power to direct and therefore no power to deliver absolutely a comprehensive, universal health service as we have come to expect and understand it. Those are the key differences. [Interruption.] The Minister can shake his head, but that is an accurate interpretation of what has happened.
Rosie Cooper
My hon. Friend has been talking about mandates. Will he explain under what mandate and how the Secretary of State is implementing all these structural changes? The House has not voted on them and the process started before the Bill came to the House. You are making structural changes, damaging the health service and making it impossible—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. I am sure that the hon. Lady will not be using “you”.
Rosie Cooper
Forgive me. I am for ever doing that, and I must stop. In essence, I am saying that the Secretary of State and Ministers keep talking about mandates and what they will and will not do, yet they are disregarding everything because they are implementing the Bill before it has been sanctioned by the House or the other place.
Owen Smith
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. As she will know, the Government have no mandate for any of these things—they were not in the manifesto, the election or the coalition agreement. There is a mandate, but not one to effect these sorts of changes. That is another disgrace given how large the changes are.
I am going to move off this issue, but I will conclude by reading back to the Government their own words, which make it absolutely clear what they are doing in getting rid of direction. Paragraph 66 of the explanatory notes states:
“Currently, the Secretary of State is directly responsible for providing or securing the provision of all health services as set out in the NHS Act, a function which is largely delegated to Strategic Health Authorities and Primary Care Trusts…However, the new commissioning structure proposed by the Bill means that this would no longer be the case.”
The explanatory notes also state that
“functions in relation to the health service are conferred directly on the organisations responsible for exercising them”.
Effectively, the Secretary of State will move on and his focus will shift to public health.
Paul Burstow
I want to be absolutely clear about this. The hon. Gentleman is happy with an arrangement that allows the Secretary of State to make directions to the NHS that do not require him to come to this House to account for his actions—is that correct?
Owen Smith
I am happy—we are happy—with the Secretary of State being properly, publicly accountable through this House and having a legal duty placed on him to secure and provide politically accountable health services in this country. We are deeply concerned that the changes envisaged in the Bill, which radically alter the nature of the NHS, will not be able to be held to account through the Secretary of State in future Parliaments. That is our profound concern about the line of direct political accountability that so many of the Minister’s hon. Friends share, which is why they have tabled amendments to that effect and why they have repeatedly raised these concerns in the Bill Committee and elsewhere. The Minister does not have those concerns, but many other Liberal Democrats do.
Andrew George
I have to say that I entirely respect my hon. Friend the Minister. The hon. Gentleman’s point echoes what I said earlier in contradicting the Department of Health’s claim that the original 1946 Act did not have a requirement to provide or secure services. My quote provided evidence that that requirement has always been there. The Department also claims that because of the changes it is no longer legally acceptable for the Secretary of State to have that responsibility, but that issue has not been properly addressed. Would the hon. Gentleman care to deal with the point that it may no longer be legally acceptable for the Secretary of State to have that duty?
Owen Smith
As I said earlier, or rather as somebody said on my behalf, I am not a lawyer—I am a historian. As a historian, I agree with the hon. Gentleman that the 1946 Act does indeed say:
“provide or secure the effective provision of services”.
He was entirely right in that, and I could not understand the response from the Minister.
The key thing is that eight months, two Bills and 1,500 amendments later, we are still debating clause 1 and its legal interpretation. That is testament to just how badly botched this Bill has been and just how alarming it is for many people—patients and NHS staff—that we, the legislature, do not understand, or have divided views about, our understanding of the critical responsibility of the Secretary of State.
Steve McCabe
Before my hon. Friend moves on to the next section of his speech, perhaps I can return to the question of a mandate. Given that this is such a botched Bill, given what he says about the tone of the proceedings, given that at this stage nobody seems to understand exactly what are the implications of some of the Government’s claims, given the fact that the Government are not willing to entertain people’s legitimate concerns, and given that there is no mandate in either Government party’s manifesto for this Bill, the other place is presumably not bound by the Salisbury convention, and if the Government will not entertain those concerns here, it will be the duty of the other place to address them.
Owen Smith
It will. I have no doubt that the very many lawyers in the other place will have a field day in addressing these issues—just as, we fear, lawyers the length and breadth of this land will have a field day, not only during the passage of the Bill but for many years to come. That is because so many things will be contested, not only relating to the issues we are debating but, far more importantly, in relation to competition, which we debated yesterday, where it is undoubtedly the case that decisions that have hitherto been made to provide services from within the family of the NHS will be challenged by carpetbaggers—profit seekers—from outwith the NHS. Under the future provisions, those issues will need to be tested in the courts. The Government have conceded that on several occasions, and I am sure that they would do so today if they were asked.
Finally on the issue of the Secretary of State, and once again to hammer home the point that this is not just Labour scaremongering and that lawyers will be involved at every step of the way, I draw Members’ attention to the independent legal opinion that was provided by Stephen Cragg QC. Paragraph 1 of the executive summary states:
“It is clear that the drafters of the Health and Social Care Bill intend that the functions of the Secretary of State in relation to the NHS in England are to be greatly curtailed.”
It goes on:
“Effectively, the duty to provide a national health service would be lost if the Bill becomes law. It would be replaced by a duty on an unknown number of commissioning consortia with only a duty to make or arrange provision for that section of the population for which it is responsible.”
It states that the Bill is
“fragmenting a service that currently has the advantage of national oversight and control, and which is politically accountable via the ballot box to the electorate.”
That was the view of an independent QC on reading the Bill. It is a view that I and the Opposition share. I suggest that Ministers read it very carefully and do not dismiss it, as they have done today, as an inaccurate reading of the Bill.
Nicky Morgan
Is that the independent legal advice given to the campaign organisation, 38 Degrees? If it is and if the hon. Gentleman has any influence over that group, can he persuade it to release and make public the instructions given to counsel, because any instructing solicitor who instructs counsel to give advice usually gives very clear guidelines on, or an indication of, what they want the advice to say?
Owen Smith
I am ever so grateful to the hon. Lady for that intervention, because it is profoundly rich for anybody on the Government Benches to suggest that we should prevail upon an independent organisation to publish the instructions that it offered to an independent QC, when the Government will not even publish the independent advice that they have commissioned. They have refused to do so repeatedly. They will tell us that they do not agree with this independent opinion, but they absolutely will not publish their own. I suggest that she makes representations to those on her Front Bench, and I will do the same to 38 Degrees if I have a chance.
The independent legal advice goes on to say:
“Encouraged by the structure and clear intention of the Bill to give consortia autonomy from the Secretary of State,”—
which is, of course, in clause 4 of the new Bill—
“there is a real risk of an increase in the ‘postcode lottery’ nature of the delivery of some services, depending on the decisions made by consortia.”
That increase in the postcode lottery takes me on to the second set of proposals that I wish to touch on, which we believe would stop the Government effectively legislating to hardwire the postcode lottery into our NHS. We accept that it is already too variable across the country and that there needs to be greater equity and standardisation, with excellence provided to everybody across the country. That will become all the more difficult with the new provisions.
New clauses 10 and 11, which were tabled by the Labour Opposition, are designed to combat some of the possible malign consequences of the changes that hand to clinical commissioning groups the ability to determine the needs of the local health population and to set their priorities without interference or support from the Government, or indeed from regional strategic health authorities.
Owen Smith
I am delighted to give way to the hon. Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich (Dr Poulter), who has such an acute interest in Wales.
Dr Poulter
The hon. Gentleman is making some good points. Does he accept that within a national framework of gold standard and good treatment, there will be regional or local variations in the needs of patient groups? For example, given health care inequalities, mental health and the higher rates of cardiovascular problems in ethnic minority populations, patients in Bradford may have very different health care needs and priorities from patients in the area of rural Suffolk that I represent. Does he agree that the Bill goes some way towards allowing local flexibility that will better address some of the different local health care needs?
Owen Smith
I accept that there are obviously different needs and that there is a good case for a needs-based assessment model being used by PCTs in the current situation or by CCGs. Indeed, one of the amendments tabled by Liberal Democrat Members on a needs-based assessment is excellent and I wish that we had tabled it. However, the crucial difference, which I alluded to earlier, is that previously the Secretary of State has had a direct duty under section 3 of the National Health Service Act 2006 to provide and secure a whole range of relevant and necessary pieces of the health ecosystem, such as hospitals, within a given area. Under the Bill, that duty will pass to clinical commissioning groups. That is a further crucial removal of responsibility and accountability from the Secretary of State and transference of them to CCGs.
Under the aegis of the Bill, many CCGs may well plan well for their local population, and perhaps better than primary care trusts, but what if they do not? What if they get it wrong and determine for clinical reasons—or, dare I say it, because in this new world they are sitting cheek by jowl in the boardroom with commercial players who have a stake and a skin in the game financially—that they no longer feel it is “reasonable”, as the Bill puts it, to provide certain services? I think that is perfectly foreseeable.
We already know that because of the cost pressures that PCTs are under, they are having to make difficult decisions about which services they will provide and which they will not. They have always had to do that. It is just possible that CCGs will make duff decisions with which local residents disagree. As we heard earlier from my hon. Friends on the Back Benches, they will not be able to be held to account in the way that the Secretary of State, and eventually PCTs through the Secretary of State, can currently be. Those changes are critical, and I suggest that the Minister reflects on them.
Another crucial change to the Bill that we would like to be brought about is in respect of the costs of bureaucracy. We are changing from 150 PCTs to more than 250 clinical commissioning groups and counting. The latter are smaller and less strategic, and certainly less experienced in commissioning, than PCTs or strategic health authorities, and they are arguably too small to compete equitably with very large and financially powerful foundation trusts. That is a real risk. Crucially, they will also increase transaction costs, bureaucracy and administration costs.
That is why, in new clause 11, we have decided to ask the Government to put their money where their mouth is. The Minister asked earlier why we had chosen an “arbitrary” figure of 45% for a cap on the volume of expenditure on administration by CCGs. The answer is simple: it was the number that the Secretary of State came up with. He said that that was how many percentage points he was going to trim off the administration and bureaucracy costs of the NHS. He boasted that he could deliver 45% savings, so we are calling on him today to put his money where his mouth is and legislate for that. Let us measure him against that, because there is not going to be much else that we can hold him accountable for.
We have tabled new clause 10, on waiting times, because targets and standards absolutely matter in the NHS. No matter what the Government keep telling the public, we still believe in clinical targets, including some that the Government would denigrate as “bureaucratic” or “administrative” targets. In new clause 10, we ask the Government to take the power to set transparent regulations relating to waiting times. Waiting times are going up under this Government. There have been 400,000 people with long waits since the Tories came to power. The trajectory and the sense of history repeating itself are depressingly clear to me and my hon. Friends.
David Tredinnick (Bosworth) (Con)
I think the hon. Gentleman might inadvertently have misled the House. He said that waiting lists were going up in the NHS. My recollection is that they are going up in Wales. He is shadow Wales Minister, I think.
Owen Smith
I was waiting for that intervention and looking forward to it. I was slightly concerned, when the hon. Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich intervened and failed to mention the fair and beautiful country of Wales, that I was not going to get the opportunity to put the record straight. I hate to tell the hon. Member for Bosworth (David Tredinnick) this, but he is wrong. Waiting lists in Wales are coming down. We have been hitting 95% of our target week in, week out, month in, month out since September 2009.
Owen Smith
The Minister has not said it before in a public realm of which I am aware. He certainly did not say it in the Public Bill Committee, all 40-odd sessions of which I feel I sat through. The Minister knows that the issue is crucial, because the Future Forum that he commissioned said so. Indeed, it said that
“one of the most widely voiced criticisms of the proposed changes was a deeply felt concern at the risks to healthcare education and training in England posed by the fast pace of change.”
The Government responded by saying:
“we will introduce an explicit duty for the Secretary of State to maintain a system for professional education and training as part of the comprehensive health service.”
We are still waiting. What will that duty look like? [Interruption.] The Minister says “We have said that we are going to do it”, but here we are, eight months and 1,500 amendments later. How long must we wait? Are we sure that we will see the duty introduced in the House of Lords? Are we positive about that? I must say that I am not certain about it.
Paul Burstow
The shadow Minister rarely criticises the Government for telling the House again what they said in the response to the Future Forum, which is that we would introduce that explicit duty. We will introduce it in the House of Lords, as I have told the House today. We are committed to doing so, having listened carefully to the concerns of NHS professionals.
Owen Smith
The very simple question to be asked is “Why the delay?” Why could the Minister not have introduced it earlier? We have known about the problem for eight months and more. The Secretary of State, who has been keen on changes such as this for a long time, must have given some thought to what he was going to do about staff training and work force planning in the NHS.
Mr Barron
It was clear from the day of its publication that the Bill, which abolishes the structure that had kept education and training in place, would create chaos in the national health service. Here we are, hundreds of amendments later, with a resubmitted Bill. Our debate on the outcome has been crammed into two days, which is wholly unsatisfactory, and the Government still cannot tell us what will replace the structure that has been in place for so many years. That is a nonsense.
I listened to the Minister’s speech earlier. He was telling people—people outside, including professionals who want this kind of professional development on a continuing basis—to have faith in what might happen at some stage. I have to say that I have little faith in what the Government have done with the Bill from the very beginning.
Owen Smith
I entirely agree, and my faith is diminishing by the minute. I do not understand why the Government cannot simply concede that they have signally failed to deal with this crucial aspect of the Bill. It took them months to produce the revised failure regime. They managed to drag that out in time for Report, but they have not produced the impact assessment, they have not produced any figures showing how much this will cost the public purse, although we know that the amount is rising—I should love the Minister to tell us by how much—and they have not produced a solution to the crucial problem of staff training and work force planning. That is a disgrace. They could have and should have done it by now.
New clause 13 would place a further duty on providers, related to what is in the earlier new clause. It would oblige them to make provision for training and work force planning for their own staff, thus filling another gaping hole in the Bill. As the Minister might say if he intervened on me, Monitor may well have powers, under the pricing clauses, to pay less under the tariff to providers who do not engage in training, but nothing in the Bill compels new entrants—especially private providers—to give their staff any training, or to deal with any costs that the NHS has traditionally had to bear for the education of the work force.
We all know that in the incredibly fast-moving and innovative world of health care, keeping staff up to date is absolutely crucial. That is why—I hate to say it—despite the news that we are to have an amendment ín the Lords, we will attempt to press amendment 7 to a vote. It proposes the retention of SHAs until and unless we know precisely what the Government will put in their place in respect of training and administration.
NHS staff is another group that is profoundly concerned by the shambles, chaos and confusion that Ministers have overseen. Under the Bill, they are described as assets and will be transferred lock, stock and barrel between new providers. The new providers may be a private company—such as Helios, Bupa, UnitedHealth, or whoever else decides it is interested in running the NHS in future—and the staff may be transferred to the new providers. The Minister shrugs, suggesting that that is a misrepresentation, so I challenge him to intervene on me and state what he seemed to imply earlier: that what I have just said is not the case.
Schedule 23 makes that explicit, however. It provides for the transfer of NHS staff and other assets. It allows such so-called assets to be passed in future from NHS entities to the new CCGs. That can happen to any
“person who provides services as part of the health service in England and consents to the transfer”.
Under schedule 23, any NHS member of staff—or a building or intellectual property—can, so long as they agree, be transferred to anybody else who is licensed to provide services to the NHS. I find that extraordinary, but not quite as extraordinary as the next provision, which refers to NHS bodies being able to transfer all such assets—what a delightful way to refer to people—to a “qualifying company”, whatever that means. I will be delighted if the Minister tells us what the term “qualifying company” in schedule 23 means.
Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)
Does my hon. Friend join me in sharing the concerns of many public health consultants in this regard? They sometimes cover three areas of work, so in one area they could go to the commissioning board, in another they could go to children’s health commissioning, and in another area of their job they could go to the local authority. What are those people supposed to do? I suspect some of them will leave the service.
Owen Smith
My hon. Friend is close to health workers and health professionals in her constituency, and she knows that people are leaving the service in droves. It is not just managers who will be sacked from primary care trusts or transferred across to they do not know what kind of organisation elsewhere. Clinicians are also deciding that they no longer think the job is worth the candle, because of the endless top-down reorganisation—something we were told we would not see from this Government, although it just keeps on coming. I fear that the situation will get worse in coming months. We will have to wait and see what the capacity of these new CCGs—and, potentially, the national commissioning board—will be, because we do not yet know who will be left standing at the end of this endless round of changes.
In summary—[Interruption.] It is a long summary, and if hon. Members keep talking it will get longer. In summary, we have had eight months of debate in this place, two—and soon to be three—versions of the Bill, with 1,500 amendments, hundreds of protest meetings across the country, and 450,000 signatories to a petition trying to “kill the Bill”. Those extraordinarily high numbers are a reflection of the importance of the NHS to the British people, to the NHS workers and to us, the Labour party.
For many in our society the NHS remains the shining symbol of the civilised collectivist values that first informed its creation 60 years ago, and they rightly view its continuation and their stake in it as part of their British birthright. We in the Labour party view it as a cherished part of our heritage. It also shines a light for us to the future, and we will not stand by and let how we have known it to be for these past 60 years fall into the pages of history. In 1946 we legislated to realise the vision of a collaborative and comprehensive national and public service, as part of the essential glue of that post-war society. This Bill promises instead to give birth to a denationalised NHS—a denatured NHS—divided by competition law, and conquered by profit seekers and carpetbaggers from across the globe.
Ministers, especially the Secretary of State, should remember that it is never too late to change one’s mind—it is never too late to save the NHS. We are appealing for them to do so and they would do well to do so. They should remember, too, the dire and, I trust, accurate prediction and warning given by the man who was proud to be the midwife to the NHS—the Welshman, Nye Bevan—in 1946. He said that
“no government that attempts to destroy the Health Service can hope to command the support of the British people.”
That was true when he wrote it in 1951 and it will be true in 2015 when the Prime Minister asks the people to trust him on the NHS. I hate to tell the Secretary of State and, indeed, the Prime Minister this, but no amount of Ashcroft-funded airbrushed billboards pleading with people to trust the Tories on the NHS will count, because the evidence of their perfidy is written in black and white throughout this Bill, and it will be remembered at the next election.
Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)
I wish to start by making it clear that I am a big supporter of the NHS. I probably should declare an interest, because I have spent too much of the past six months discovering it from the inside. As is commonly known, I had a brain tumour in April, which was removed by the national hospital for neurology and neurosurgery in Queen square, where I received outstanding care and treatment from the doctors and nurses.
That was not the first time that I had had my life saved by the NHS. Although my girth would deceive hon. Members, I used to be a jockey, and when I was trying to win a race at Stratford, the second last fence proved too much for the horse and me, we turned over and on my left hand side I was entirely crushed by a steeplechaser. I broke about 11 bones and cut my left kidney in half. I had a splenectomy and a very good doctor at Warwick hospital saved my life. I also wish to make the point that I have an NHS background: my grandmother was a matron in a district hospital, and we have spent an awful lot of time in the Hexham constituency supporting the Hexham hospital and the Freeman hospital, in particular.
I support the Bill, and I wish to touch on a couple of the points that have been raised. For a time I earned a living as a barrister, reviewing health care bodies and public bodies of a general nature. I hope that that qualifies me to discuss competition law briefly. If hon. Members were to read, as I have had to over the past few months, some of the representations that have been made about competition, they would believe that it is a new evil being introduced into the NHS. However, that is manifestly wrong, as the Enterprise Act 2002 and the Competition Act 1998 were introduced under the previous Government and have been operating in the health service for a considerable time. I see some hon. Members shaking their heads, but the argument supported by the shadow Minister cites that exact point: in the form of a variety of institutions and undertakings, the UK health service is subject to competition law under the 2002 Act, the 1998 Act and European community laws on competition. This is therefore not a new thing, nor should it be, because it was introduced by the previous Government and large parts of the Bill follow on from what was done previously.
I shall touch briefly on procurement, because the issue has been raised in this House. It is not a new thing for procurement matters to be challenged or to be subject to judicial process. Judicial process itself is not a bad thing. I have heard people say countless times in these past two days of debate, “This is going to be a den of iniquity for lawyers. It will be so bad that there will be lawyers all over this case. It will be really difficult for people to proceed with the health system.” I brought a case against a primary care trust in 2005, 2006 and 2007, with a view to trying to change the law and the way in which that PCT was operating. Before anyone jumps up to discuss that approach, I am pleased to say, first, that we changed the law to assist the patients, secondly, that the whole case was conducted entirely pro bono—for free—and thirdly, that two separate Labour Attorney-Generals gave me national awards to support my efforts. I do not expect that to happen again in a hurry. The point is that if we operate the process correctly—I shall talk about the process briefly in a second—we, and the commissioning consortia, will not be the subject of legal challenge.
That will always be the case with any public body: if it operates in a statutory and well-authorised way and provides the degree of consultation that it should, it is not open to challenge. It is not myself or the Government who would decide that, but a High Court judge considering a matter of judicial review. But if the public body—in the form of the NHS or the commissioning consortia—does not act properly, behaves beyond its powers or breaches natural justice in any way, it should and will be open to judicial review and other legal process. That is entirely proper.
I therefore do not believe that this will be a process through which huge numbers of judicial reviews will arise, as new issues for the NHS. I do not think that that will be the case at this stage. The hon. Member for Pontypridd (Owen Smith) talked at great length about the commissioned barrister’s opinion and 38 Degrees, but that barrister’s opinion makes the simple point:
“The Bill does nothing to make the system more amenable to challenge in the courts”.
Let me finish my points about competition and the duty to provide. I suggest that there is no fundamental change whatsoever. That is also the suggestion that the individual counsel made clear. I make the point that he is a junior counsel, not a Queen’s counsel, and there is no disclosure of instructions, the conference notes or any of the other things that would be vital to an understanding of the opinion. It has been wholly misrepresented by 38 Degrees, and there is no change—
Guy Opperman
I am sorry, but I am going to keep going. The hon. Gentleman had about an hour to talk, and there are an awful lot of people who would like to talk about these matters.
I suggest that there is no fundamental change, and this is clearly a way forward that is being implemented for the benefit of patients. We are concerned with patient care and the quality of outcomes. I as a patient, like many other people in this House, am not concerned with the quality of outcomes other than to ask, “Is it a good outcome?” That is the important thing, and to suggest that private provision of the outcome and of the service provided is fundamentally bad is simply wrong. Such provision was introduced and brought in by the previous Government, and it assisted the public provision. The two can work together, and that is a good thing. I shall support the Bill, and I make this point to finish: the NHS is clearly a wonderful institution that all in the House cherish and support, and this is a Bill that supports it.
Valerie Vaz (Walsall South) (Lab)
It is always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Hexham (Guy Opperman), and it is good to see him sitting in his place. I welcome him back to the House and commend him on his great recovery. He is actually looking better than before, if I may say so.
Let me take up one point that the hon. Gentleman made. As a barrister, he will want people to go to litigation, but as a solicitor I mostly counsel people not to. It is the most terrible, prolonged and costly event—but I appreciate that he wants litigation, because that is his bread and butter.
As for the legal advice, I asked on a number of occasions for the legal advice that the Department had and it was refused on all those occasions. The hon. Gentleman can talk about 38 Degrees, but thankfully that organisation is interested in the public and knows that they need the legal advice that was not provided, even though it was paid for with taxpayers’ money. I challenge the Secretary of State to lay it in the House of Commons Library, if the other advice is so hurtful to him. What is the problem? His Bill is being discussed and there is nothing to hide. I say that he should place his legal advice in the Library.
I am a Member of the Select Committee on Health and Sir David Nicholson, the new chief executive of the NHS commissioning board, appeared before us when I was first elected. He was then on the verge of retirement—
Valerie Vaz
He was: he had a very big smile on his face and he said, “I’m about to retire.” [Interruption.] With the greatest respect, the Secretary of State was not there. Sir David was asked to stay on to preside over the NHS commissioning board, which he has described as
“the greatest quango in the sky.”
I think that the NHS commissioning board is going to be the new Secretary of State for Health, with all the powers but none of the accountability. The NHS has been quangoed—not coloured orange, as in the advert, although that might happen when the Bill goes to the other place, but coloured the blue of betrayal. These are not reforms: they are a complete dismantling and looting of our precious resource. This is not selling off the family silver, but selling off the whole estate, the freehold and the family crest.
It is not just Opposition Members who are concerned about accountability. There are widespread concerns about the accountability of the NHS commissioning board and commissioning consortia regarding public money.
Valerie Vaz
No, I will not.
I again ask the Secretary of State for Health what discussions he has had with the Cabinet Secretary about the change regarding accountability for the public money that will be transferred—£60 billion of it—to those quangos. If he is asked questions about this in the House he will say that it is an operational matter.
I want to show hon. Members what the scenario will be like, because this is already happening in my constituency and this is what it will be like throughout England. The out-of-hours GP and urgent care service provider Waldoc has just lost the contract to provide out-of-hours services after 16 years, without a right of appeal to the strategic health authority and despite a patient satisfaction rate of 95%. When the contract was lost and staff turned up to find out whether they had jobs, they did not even know whether they would have a job the next day. That is how they have been treated. This has been happening in most PCTs, as some Members will know from their constituencies. People have left, vital expertise has gone and no one from the Government side has been able to give us a figure for the redundancy costs. When I asked the Minister how much this whole reorganisation would cost, he said he did not know the figure and that there was no new money. That must mean that money has come out of services.
We have, however, had a figure—£1.4 billion—from Professor Kieran Walshe of Manchester university. No wonder waiting times have gone up. Members of the public need to know that in an increasing number of areas, consortia will be conducting competitive tenders in which, potentially, foundation trusts, the constituent members of consortia and commercial providers will be bidding. Clearly, there will also be a conflict of interest. It has been estimated that a single procurement process can cost from £5,000 to £30,000. That is a waste of public money, and the whole regime of procurement is a waste of costs.
Valerie Vaz
What is so extraordinary is that the Secretary of State does not want to be the Secretary of State; he wants to let the Future Forum consult and listen to people, but that is not how decisions are made in government. In government people hear the evidence from all sides—[Interruption.] I have made it pretty clear: the Minister has had his time, but I am a Back Bencher and I do not get much time to speak.
People in government hear the evidence from all sides and weigh things up. Then they make a decision reasonably and give their reasons. The Secretary of State is hiding not only behind the Future Forum but behind the NHS commissioning board. He is like Macavity the mystery cat:
“At whatever time the deed took place—MACAVITY WASN’T THERE!”
I would like to draw hon. Members’ attention to a paper dated 29 August 2011 by Dr Lucy Reynolds, Dr John Lister, Dr Alex Scott-Samuel and Professor Martin McKee, “Liberating the NHS: source and destination of the Lansley reform”, which I will place in the Library. It draws a link between a paper written in 1988 by the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) and the Minister of State, Cabinet Office, the right hon. Member for West Dorset (Mr Letwin). It is therefore no surprise that when the Minister of State, Cabinet Office was called in to look at the proposals he endorsed them, because they were his. Paragraph 3 of the paper is entitled “Implementation of the Redwood/Letwin Plan in the Lansley reform”. The paper was sent to me by a young academic who said that his life had been saved twice by the NHS but would not have been saved under an American-style privatised health system.
The most recent satisfaction survey by Ipsos MORI last March showed 72% public satisfaction with the NHS, but it was not published by the Department of Health even though the Department had asked for it to be done. Members will have seen a report from Colin Pritchard and Mark Wallace which said:
“In cost-effective terms, i.e. economic input versus clinical output”,
the UK health service was “the most cost-effective” in reducing mortality rates, compared with the US health care system.
Finally, I say to hon. Members—including the hon. Member for Hexham—as they think about what has been said, “Stand up for democracy, stand up for the trust between elected representatives and their constituents, and stand up for the NHS: vote against this Bill.”
David Tredinnick
I am most grateful for being called to speak and for the opportunity to follow my colleague on the Health Committee, the hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz), and my hon. Friend the Member for Hexham (Guy Opperman), and to say how pleased I am to see my hon. Friend in his place. I know from experience—not personal experience—just how tough that operation can be, so many congratulations to him on his recovery.
I want to make a short speech on just one issue—patient choice, which is one of the most important, if not the most important, aspects of the Bill—and to challenge my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on one or two points. Chapter A1 13H sets out the duty that the board has, in the exercise of its functions, to
“promote the involvement of patients, and their carers and representatives…in decisions about the provision of health services to…patients.”
That patient choice depends on clinical commissioning, the subject of the amendments before us, and that in itself hangs on the “any qualified provider” policy, modified recently from “any willing provider”. There I have some concerns.
The TUC brief summed up “any qualified provider” very well:
“Under AQP, patients will be able to choose which provider to use for their treatment, from a list of approved providers (private, public or voluntary sector) who perform the service in exchange for a locally or nationally set tariff.”
Where I have a slight problem is that although the categories of treatment that can be employed, certainly in the transitional year 2012-13, have been set out in the operational guidance, I think there is a strong case for the guidance to be in the Bill itself.
However, I am very pleased to see at the top of the list musculoskeletal services for back and neck pain, and I presume, although it is not set out, that that means greater use of osteopathy and chiropractic, both regulated by Acts of Parliament, in 1993 and 1994. I had the honour to serve on the Committees considering those Bills. As the public are to have greater choice, we must look at providing that choice, and they will be asking for those services. They will also want acupuncture for musculoskeletal problems. Acupuncture has been approved by NICE and there are now NICE guidelines supporting acupuncture for use in these services. I would like my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State to consider at some point making a more positive, more specific commitment to the use of those services in the provision for patient choice.
There is a strong case for the “any qualified provider” policy to be set out in the Bill too, although it is set out in the operational guidance. The problem that may occur is in the qualification process. I have no problem with its asking for safe, good-quality care or with the governing principle of qualification being that practitioners be registered with the Care Quality Commission and Monitor, but what about those therapies that do not have those badges in their passport? What about traditional Chinese medicine, which is about to be regulated by the Health Professions Council? May we have a specific assurance that its practitioners can be part of this patient system? Traditional Chinese medicine and acupuncture have increased in popularity dramatically—Chinese practitioners may now be found in any town in the country.
I suggest to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State that other therapies should be included in the list. He has produced a second list of services to be introduced in 2013-14, which includes community chemotherapy and home chemotherapy. If we are to offer patients choice on those chemotherapy services, we really ought to consider those who can support people who are exhausted after chemotherapy and radiotherapy. I am thinking of not only those who practise traditional Chinese herbal medicine and acupuncture, but the healing fraternity and those who use therapeutic touch, many of whom now work in NHS hospitals to great effect.
I should also like to refer to homeopathic medicine, which I have discussed when you have been in the Chair before, Madam Deputy Speaker. I think I am right in saying that your constituency is not far from the Bristol homeopathic hospital, so perhaps you will not call me to order on this, especially as I am trying to stay in order. Many people use homeopathy every day to cure simple ailments, because it is cheap, easy to understand and very effective. Even if there are not umpteen double-blind placebo-controlled trials, there is a wealth of evidence that it works. I would draw my right hon. Friend’s attention to the fact that the Royal London hospital for integrated medicine, which used to be called the Royal London homeopathic hospital, has the highest patient satisfaction rating of all hospitals in the United Kingdom.
There is a case for including in the Bill clearer direction about the services that will become available. I ask my right hon. Friend to smile on those other disciplines that do not have statutory regulation but perhaps have robust non-statutory, voluntary regulation, such as acupuncture, and ensure that when patients go to their doctors and say, “Doctor, this is what we’ve used; this is what we really want,” they will not be turned away.
Joan Walley (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab)
Following the hon. Member for Bosworth (David Tredinnick) illustrates the problems that we have with the Bill: even at this stage, specific details need to be discussed and have a case made for them, so that the future of NHS provision can be fully taken on board. At the same time, because of how the Bill has been handled—we have had a re-committal—we have a political debate.
The debate on this specific group of amendments is taking place on two levels. I certainly want to ensure that the true principles of the NHS and its founding fathers, such as Nye Bevan, are followed in future provision. We need that political debate to ensure that the NHS is politically accountable. We have almost lost that opportunity, because we are in this mess, with all this uncertainty and not knowing how the Bill will shape up and go forward. We risk losing the whole of the NHS altogether.
Many people who are part of the medical profession and others who are concerned about their own future health care have contacted me, because they want the Government to be in control and the Secretary of State to have a duty to procure and provide services. This is a political debate, as much as anything else, but it is difficult to have that political debate within the confines of the amendments, although they are central to that debate.
Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)
One of my biggest worries about the Bill is that it will stop me intervening in the health service to encourage outcomes for my constituents who come to me for help and advice. Does my hon. Friend agree that it will diminish my ability to represent them, rather than enable me to do so?
Joan Walley
My hon. Friend is right. Constituents go to Members of Parliament as a last resort to try to ensure fairness in how the system deals with everything. I have just had a high-profile case in my constituency relating to the postcode lottery, which my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Owen Smith) referred to.
Paul Burstow
The hon. Lady is making some important points and is trying to respond to that raised by the hon. Member for West Ham (Lyn Brown). Interestingly, the hon. Member for Leicester West (Liz Kendall) earlier recounted all her concerns about the PCT and how it has dealt with GP services in her area. The anxiety seemed to be that the PCTs were not accountable, but the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley) now seems to be saying that they are.
Joan Walley
We have just had an awfully long debate about precisely that issue. Many of us would say that the PCTs were not operating accountably, but Members of Parliament could have influence and bring pressure to bear. The last resort is through the Secretary of State, and it is important that that should be retained in the Bill.
Owen Smith
Does my hon. Friend agree that the critical points are that there is an unknown into which we are stepping with the Bill and that the presumption is that the culture will be different? There will be a presumption of autonomy, being hands off, less accountability and more localised decision making. It is therefore perfectly reasonable to presume that we will have less input.
Joan Walley
That is right and it comes back to the fact that, somehow or other, under the new regime, whatever it ends up being, there will not be the fairness or the universal provision. In certain areas—perhaps those such as mine, which have much greater deprivation and much greater health inequalities than others—things will be more difficult.
Andrew Percy
I do not recognise the picture that the hon. Lady is painting. The real issue with the provision and availability of services is more to do with the funding model that is in place. When my local PCT was unable to provide dental services and when the bed numbers at Goole hospital were reduced a couple of years ago, local people had no ability to influence those decisions, no matter how much they appealed to the Secretary of State, because it comes down to money.
Joan Walley
Of course it comes down to money, but it also comes down to fairness in how the money is allocated. That must relate to an overall sense of direction to deal with health inequalities.
I want to discuss very specifically three amendments that I have tabled, but I did not want to go into the detail without associating myself with some of the concerns that exist across the country which have not yet been resolved. I speak as an honorary vice-president of the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health. I tabled the amendments to ensure that we do not just pay lip service to environmental and public health, and that we truly get a Bill that is fit for purpose in respect of the prevention agenda and the new arrangements under which we will be operating, which should give more status and priority to environmental health.
I want to speak in favour of the Government looking either now or in the other place at the case for a chief environmental health officer for England. The reason for that is the fact that, historically, there was a post of chief environmental health officer, going back to the days before 1974 when local authorities last had lead responsibilities for public health services and when each authority had a medical officer for health.
Today, England has a chief medical officer, but not a chief environmental health officer. I heard what the Minister said about that, but I urge him to have further talks, if necessary, with the professionals to see how we could ensure that a chief environmental health officer for England was appointed. Earlier we talked about Wales, where there is a chief environmental health officer post. In all the arrangements in Wales and in Northern Ireland, there is a recognition of the role played by environmental health in promoting health and well-being, and of the importance, therefore, of ensuring there is an environmental health input to policy making at the highest level and at the strategic level. I believe that is what England currently lacks. If the Bill is to give a higher profile to public health services, and the lead in public health is to be provided by local authorities, which is where the environmental health work force is located, it is necessary to make corresponding arrangements such as my new clause could facilitate, if the Government gave it serious consideration.
Andrew George
It is a great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley), who addressed the issue of political accountability in a considered way. I shall return to that and relate it to a number of amendments in my name and those of some of my hon. Friends. I shall refer to a number of amendments that the Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Burstow) covered in his opening remarks and dealt with in a fair and balanced manner, although not entirely to my satisfaction in every case. I shall also raise further questions.
I have enormous respect for all that my hon. Friend has done. His contribution to the debate on social care is second to none. That expertise is especially beneficial to the Government at present and some important advances have been made, for which we are all grateful. I acknowledge that he approaches all aspects of his work with the best of intentions, and I do not question those. The amendments that I have tabled indicate that I believe we may need to reconsider some of these issues. I should also mention at this stage that I may seek to push one or two of them to a vote.
On Second Reading, I made a speech that was critical of the Bill and refused to support the Government by abstaining at that stage, and of course the Bill has gone through a number of significant changes since then and concessions have been made. I have been criticised by some for making that speech and refusing to support the Government, but I feel vindicated as a result of the pause and the listening exercise. I might be criticised and accused of disloyalty, but that is how Back Benchers exercise our role of holding the Government to account. It is reasonable for us to use our powers to bring forward amendments and, in so doing, probe the Government and ask them to be accountable for the policies that they are bringing forward. I hope that in the weeks and months ahead, I will be vindicated for having done so, but I do not necessarily expect that acknowledgment to be provided now.
I was relatively content with the original coalition agreement. I am no great defender of primary care trusts, but I think that using the existing institutional infrastructure, grafting in accountability to the patients and communities that the commissioning bodies will serve and ensuring clinician involvement in those commissioning decisions, would strike entirely the right balance. That would provide a way of going forward without scuppering, dismantling or exploding the whole system in the way the Bill is doing.
There was no mention in the coalition agreement of changing the duties of the Secretary of State, and I have read a number of legal opinions on that issue. I also believe, as I have indicated in several interventions so far, that some of us have been misled on that point. Some of the legal advice that I have been given by colleagues suggests that the Secretary of State in fact never had a duty to provide in the 1946 Act. That is fundamentally wrong. Perhaps I will discuss this with the Minister after the debate and show him the documents that I have been given and some of the comments that have been made. As some of my colleagues who were there at the time and heard the advice will know—[Interruption.] I hasten to add that they were not there in 1946—I know that I have aged in my time in Parliament, but I cannot recollect that time. My colleagues know that we have been briefed that there was never any duty to provide in the 1946 Act, but there is evidence—I do not need to give the quote a third time—that there was clearly a requirement in the 1946 Act to provide and secure effective provision. That requirement has always been there in successive health Acts in this country. I want to relate that to a point the hon. Member for Pontypridd (Owen Smith) made in a more tribal manner.
Paul Burstow
May I just make it clear that I do not think that I or any other Minister at any point, either at the Dispatch Box or in other discussions, ever suggested that the 1946 Act or any subsequent Act did not have the duty to provide? What we have said is that the duty to provide has progressively, particularly over the past 20 to 30 years, become a duty that is not exercised. It has been delegated and is increasingly exercised instead by separate bodies, such as NHS trusts and foundation trusts, using their own independent power to provide services.
Andrew George
Yes, and my new clause 16 proposes to address that issue through an opportunity for the Secretary of State to intervene as necessary.
The Secretary of State in his intervention on the hon. Member for Pontypridd made it clear that in any case Secretaries of State tend not to micro-manage by intervening or by providing on every whip and flip, and there is no suggestion of that, but as a backstop we require the guarantee that, if all else fails and the whole system does not provide what we believe needs to be put in place to provide for a comprehensive health service, the Secretary of State will be there. There would be no harm in putting that word back in the Bill in one form or another. I do not understand the obstinacy, and in my view there is no legal impediment to the Government doing so.
Stephen Lloyd (Eastbourne) (LD)
Does my hon. Friend agree that, because this is such a totemic issue, the key reason behind the proposed change in the wording is totally to reassure the public that, come what may, and even if delegated powers mean that the Secretary of State has not been involved for a number of years, the buck will stop with the Secretary of State?
Andrew George
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. He has referred to the issue as being totemic, and although I do not want to detain the House for too long because many others have referred to it, he is absolutely right. Now that it has been raised in such a manner, unless there are good legal reasons not to insert it in the Bill, it should be.
On the comments of the hon. Member for Pontypridd, I make a further point. We are talking about major changes, and the issue is not only totemic but contextual, because, in the context of a major—in fact, the most major—reorganisation of the health service, the reassurance of that backstop being in place would be all the more important.
I do not questions the intentions of the Secretary of State, for whom I have tremendous respect, but, having opposed the creation of the health service in the first place, the Conservatives have a problem, because the context is one of a major change, and whether we like it or not the assumption is that, if the Secretary of State is a Conservative, the hurdle will have to be set higher to reassure the nation that there is no untoward intention behind the legislation.
Simon Hughes
My hon. Friend knows that I share his views, and the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley) made the point that this is both a political and a legal debate. First, there is certainly a political argument for keeping the definition the same as it has been throughout the history of the NHS, which was created in concert by a Liberal and implemented by Labour. Secondly, there is a legal justification for doing so, because there are specific powers to provide, and therefore there is a generic logic in stating that, as part of the initial definition, there is provision for and security of health services. I am therefore sure that my hon. Friend will be on a winning wicket in the end.
Andrew George
I hope so, but sporting my cricketing injury I hope that that analogy does not apply.
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on this point and think that he should absolutely stick to his guns. In my constituency, the birthplace of the national health service, 40 people have written to me about the issue in just the past few days, so it is important that he sticks to his guns and we get the message over to the Secretary of State this evening.
Andrew George
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, but I should also say that the Minister acknowledged in his opening remarks that there was an issue that needed further work and clarification. I entirely welcomed that statement and will be happy to be involved in any discussions that might advance the point. However, in spite of the discussions and debates so far, the issue remains unresolved. It might be resolved in another place, but until then it is important to make the totemic point that the matter is of such significant concern that it is worth our while pressing the matter further.
Paul Burstow
I draw my hon. Friend’s attention to the Department of Health’s website. Yesterday we published a detailed response to both 38 Degrees opinions. It obviously draws on the legal advice given to Ministers and provides a full exposition of why we believe the points that I set out in my opening remarks.
Andrew George
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that. During his remarks, he said that he believed that there was a risk that the Secretary of State might be drawn into micro-managing; that was one of his primary arguments. All I can say is that if there were a risk of the Secretary of State micro-managing, the Secretary of State could decide to do or not to do it. Simply removing the power comes back to my point about at least making sure that the Secretary of State has the ability to direct where appropriate. If the Secretary of State had that duty to provide, it would follow that he must have the powers to intervene as I have described.
Paul Burstow
My hon. Friend is making some important points, which give me the chance to underscore the important points that I have made. The Bill retains for the Secretary of State the capacity to intervene and exercise the functions of all the bodies established by it, and—in extremis, as a last resort—to make sure that services are provided. It is clear that that capacity has remained, not least in regard to the Secretary of State’s ability to establish special health authorities.
My hon. Friend is asking for back-stops, and back-stops have to be real and have effect. That is why we put them into the Bill as we have, so that the Secretary of State does have, in extremis—in the circumstances that concern my hon. Friend and others—the ability to take the steps necessary to secure and ensure that services are provided to ensure a comprehensive health service.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. May I gently remind the Minister of two things? First, he has to address the whole House. Secondly, it is not a private conversation between him and his hon. Friend, and his interventions are supposed to be brief. A lot of people are waiting to speak.
Andrew George
On that basis, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will end that part of the conversation and move on, acknowledging that my hon. Friend has made a point that is worth considering.
Amendment 1224 would restore the duty to provide or secure provision of health services. Although that is seen as the headline proposal, it is consequential on new clauses 16 and 17, hence my intention to draw attention to the likelihood of my seeking to divide the House on those issues.
Amendments 1222 and 1223 seek to establish why the Bill has never provided for the Secretary of State to provide or secure a comprehensive health service rather than promote a comprehensive health service. This is an either/or situation, but I draw attention to the possibility that instead of pressing new clause 16, I may, in discussion with others, seek to divide the House on amendment 1222.
Amendment 1183 would beef up a duty of the Secretary of State—a theme that runs through a number of amendments. The purpose of amendments 1183 and 1194 is to address the conflict between having regard to reducing inequalities and placing above that duty the other duties that apply—for example, on choice. Amendment 1183 seeks to ensure that it is the duty of the Secretary of State, in reducing inequalities, to
“act with a view to”
rather than merely “have regard to”. Otherwise, the responsibility, and the duty, on the Secretary of State is rather weak. That applies to amendment 1194 in the same manner.
New clause 18 would impose a new duty on the CQC, the NHS Commissioning Board and clinical commissioning groups not to undermine existing NHS services in an unplanned way through the operation of competition. Rather than extending my description of this issue, it might be worth referring to the debate that we had yesterday about the regulations surrounding the functions and duties of Monitor, as the same question arises. We have to look at the impact that competition is likely to have on the provision of essential services such as major trauma and accident and emergency, where its existence may destabilise emergency services through the loss of, for example, important underpinning elective services provided by the hospital.
New clause 20 would ban the wholesale outsourcing of commissioning work with regard to clinical commissioning groups. That was demanded in a Liberal Democrat conference motion but has still not been delivered. The commissioning process is a public function, not a private function. The amendment therefore seeks to change schedule 2 in different ways to prevent private entities on clinical commissioning group committees and sub-committees from commissioning and making other decisions. This also applies to amendments 1224, 1245, 1244 and 1249.
The Minister said that the work of the Neurological Alliance is important to preserve. I hope he will recognise that new clause 20 talks only about commissioning work being
“predominantly retained as a function by staff directly employed by the clinical commissioning group.”
There is nothing in the Bill that prevents the bulk of the commissioning work—not the decision, but the work—of a clinical commissioning group from being done by a private company and thus, potentially, in secret. I hope he will accept that under the current wording of schedule 2, private entities will be able to sit on clinical commissioning committees and sub-committees and make commissioning decisions.
Amendments 1184 to 1188 and 1195 would demote choice to a subsidiary duty of commissioners to tackle fair access and inequality of outcomes. They relate to page 17 of the Bill. The priority of choice over inequity and inequality was introduced by the Government after the pause and the NHS Future Forum report as a way of promoting competition in ways other than through the role of Monitor. The amendments would reverse that priority for the NHS commissioning board.
Amendment 1211 provides that clinical commissioning groups should be more coterminous with local authorities than is the case under the Bill. The Minister said that there is no intention that clinical commissioning group boundaries will cross local authority boundaries. However, we all know that district councils do not cross local authority boundaries. In Cornwall, for example, we are likely to move from one PCT to three clinical commissioning groups, which will make the streamlining of the pathways between health and social care a lot more difficult. The purpose of amendment 1211 is to enforce that point.
I am aware of time and I hope that the House will appreciate that I will not explain every aspect of the many other amendments I have tabled. I am aware that there are significant issues that other people wish to raise. I simply emphasise that what the Minister said about health and wellbeing boards being able to refer matters to the Secretary of State is once again something that we have always argued for. Local authorities should of course be given a far greater say in commissioning decisions and in setting the strategy for health services in their area. As a back-stop, it is important that matters can be referred to the Secretary of State. My hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Martin Horwood) has tabled some important amendments in respect of public health, some of which I have supported, and I hope that the Minister will consider them. I apologise for the amount of time I have taken, but I hope that the Minister will address the important issues advanced by the amendments.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)
I apologise for not being present for the first half hour of this debate. I was in the Environmental Audit Committee, where I had specifically asked for certain witnesses to be invited, and I have not yet worked out how to be in two places at once, although it is on my list.
I will make a few general points about this part of the Bill before turning to a couple of the amendments that are in my name. I echo the many concerns that have been expressed around the Chamber this afternoon. Many of us argue that there is no legal duty on the Government to provide health services. The new hands-off clause limits the Government’s ability to intervene should health care provision be deemed inadequate, because it says that clinical commissioning groups, the new agents of health provision that can include private companies, must be free to exercise powers and duties without “unnecessary burdens”. I am equally concerned that the powers and duties of a commissioning group, including its ability to award contracts and charge for commercial activities, could be exercised by a private health care company. The Bill opens the way for private companies to determine much of English health care and takes away the Government’s duties and powers, which is why I believe it should be opposed.
Andrew Percy
The hon. Lady is making an interesting argument, and I would just ask her two things. First, how is she suggesting that we should pay for the idea? Secondly, is she seriously suggesting that we should return to millionaires being provided with dental treatment and eye care free of charge?
Caroline Lucas
It seems to me that if Wales and Northern Ireland have been able to abolish prescription charging altogether, it is certainly possible to do it. I would also argue that although everyone collectively having a stake in our public services may well mean that millionaires get a free eye test, under the type of regime that I would like to see they would be paying an awful lot more tax than they are under the Conservative party’s regime.
Fiona O'Donnell
I am aware that the hon. Lady sits close to Scottish National party Members, who may not have given an accurate picture of what has happened in Scotland. We have free prescriptions, but we also have 1,200 fewer nurses. People such as me are getting our prescriptions free, but that puts strain on other parts of the service.
Caroline Lucas
I thank the hon. Lady, but I do not agree that the two points that she makes are causally linked. Of course I do not want to see the abolition of nurses, but that does not mean that we should have to pay for our prescription charges. Either we want an NHS free at the point of delivery and with free eye tests and so forth or we do not. [Interruption.] Someone is speaking from a sedentary position, no doubt asking how we will pay for it. I will be very clear that there is massive potential in cracking down on tax evasion and avoidance, higher tax for the rich, higher corporate tax and so forth. We are essentially talking about political priorities. The priority that I represent—a great many more people are coming to this view—is that we should be willing to pay for the public services that we want.
Hon. Members may oppose amendment 48 on the basis that charging for prescription or for dental and eye care is an important way of raising revenue. In England, eligible patients pay a prescription charge of £7.20 an item. In Scotland the charge is £3 and Wales and Northern Ireland have abolished prescription charging altogether. England raised just £470 million through the charges in 2009-10, which was just 0.5% of the NHS resource budget.
Crucially, we should remember that income from charging in the NHS is not pure profit. There is a real cost to administering the plethora of exemptions and reduced charging rates for which different groups are eligible. For example, there are 11 different groups that are eligible for free dental care, 15 that are eligible for free sight tests and 12 that are eligible for free prescriptions. I hope that hon. Members will see the benefit of doing away with that convoluted and complex system, which provides little benefit in terms of income, and which goes directly against the NHS principles by significantly reducing people’s access to all forms of health care simply because of their inability to pay.
Much has been said by hon. Members on both sides of the House about the founding principles of the NHS, and it will continue to be said. However, I put it to hon. Members that amendment 48, more than any other, seeks to point out that much important NHS care and treatment is charged for, and that we need to go back to NHS services as they were envisaged by its architect, who has been referred to many times this afternoon. Hon. Members might recall that he resigned as Health Secretary as early as 1951, in protest at his Chancellor’s efforts to impose charges for prescriptions, dental treatment and eye care.
Amendment 1181 raises serious concerns about the way in which CCGs will be able to charge for services. Although the power to charge, under proposed new section 14Z3 to the National Health Service Act 2006, is intended to be of benefit to the health service, it is very disturbing. Its scope is unclear—I wrote to the Minister last week to ask for clarification—but the fact is that important limitations on how the Secretary of State can exercise that power would apparently not apply to CCGs. The measure could run a coach and horses through the principle of a free health service, and Parliament needs to be clear on its impact in practice.
It is extremely worrying that CCGs will be able to decide that certain specialist services—for example, for pregnant women or women who are breast feeding young children, or aftercare—are not appropriate as part of the health service. That would mean that the statutory guarantee that the NHS will be free will not apply, because CCGs can decide that certain services and facilities should not be provided as part of the NHS. If that happened, CCGs could use the charging power to decide to charge for supplying, for example, goods to pregnant women, or for instructing people how to use their rehabilitation equipment.
Amendment 1181 would ensure that that could not happen. Ministers might say, “CCGs are commissioners and not providers”. If so, why is a measure that allows CCGs to charge necessary in the first place? The amendment would make it absolutely clear that there is no way in which a CCG could charge for anything that is related to the basic core health service, such as hospitals, doctors, nurses or ambulances, whether they are acting under section 3 or proposed new section 3A of the 2006 Act. The amendment would also impose on CCGs the same limitation that is already imposed on the Secretary of State. Why was that omitted from the Bill?
It is right that raising funds under that power should not interfere with a CCG’s functions. However, the Bill says that raising funds should not interfere significantly, but what on earth does “significantly” mean in that context? How is it to be determined or measured? If companies such as UnitedHealth got hold of that power and reckoned they could make money out of it, they will be on to it in a flash. The very least that they should be required to do is demonstrate that dealing in land and supplying goods and the like will not take them away from fulfilling their commissioning role. I would prefer it if those giant profit-driven companies were nowhere near the health service, but while they are, we need far greater safeguards than currently exist.
Unfortunately, the previous Government gave overseas companies the legal route into the NHS, and this Government are seeking to smooth that route yet further. Hon. Members may recall that at Prime Minister’s questions on 18 May, the Prime Minister claimed that he had not heard of Mark Britnell, one of his health advisers, who was also a key adviser under Tony Blair, until he googled him the previous Sunday. The Prime Minister’s interest was stoked by a report of a speech that Britnell, global head of health care at KPMG, gave to a group of private health companies in New York last October. Dr Philip Hammond pointed out in Private Eye that according to a brochure summarising the conference, Britnell said:
“GPs will have to aggregate purchasing power and there will be a big opportunity for those companies that can facilitate this process…In future, the NHS will be a state insurance provider, not a state deliverer…The NHS will be shown no mercy and the best time to take advantage of this will be in the next couple of years.”
That is a shocking thing to say, and no wonder the Prime Minister was keen to distance himself from it, at least in public.
My last point is about the final proposal in amendment 1181, which would mean that:
“Income raised by a clinical commissioning group as a result of the exercise of powers under this section shall be specified in its annual accounts, referred to in its annual report under section 14Z13, and paid annually to the Secretary of State.”
Without the amendment, it is completely unclear what CCGs will do with the money that they raise and how, if at all, it will affect their budget allocations. I think it would be madness for Parliament to give CCGs the right to charge for supplying goods, dealing in land and providing instruction for the purposes of raising more funds for the NHS, and then not to require them to account for it in any way, and not to ensure that the funds find their way back to the public rather than the private purse. This part of my amendment seeks to ensure that that is done.
Amendment 1234 refers to the fact that once they managed to get into the CCGs, multinational health companies such as UnitedHealth would be allowed to do the actual commissioning, thus creating a very unhealthy form of what is effectively in-house outsourcing. I understand that they will be able to charge for the supply of goods if the Government do not accept the amendment. Parliament cannot trust companies whose primary duty is to their shareholders to be in charge of so much taxpayers’ money, nor should such companies be given the right that the Secretary of State currently holds to charge for the supply of goods or for land deals. We should make it clear that CCGs cannot agree among themselves that their functions will be carried out by one of their private company members. Commissioning is a public function that should be exercised in the public interest, and private companies such as UnitedHealth should not be entitled to charge for any it.
Nick de Bois (Enfield North) (Con)
I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I wish to speak to amendments 1172 and 1173, in my name, which require the Secretary of State to collect haematopoietic stem cells. The issue is, of course, that of the collection of umbilical cord blood and cord bank policy, which was first raised in the last Parliament.
I pay particular tribute to the work of the all-party parliamentary group on stem cell transplantation for its work under the leadership of the hon. Member for Alyn and Deeside (Mark Tami), and to the enormous contribution and determination of my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes). My previous lack of knowledge of the subject was probably no different from that of many other people, but after giving my hon. Friend and neighbour a lift home on several occasions I became a speedy convert. Quite simply, the collection of cord blood can be life-saving. I pay tribute to the work of the Anthony Nolan trust in that regard.
In 1974 the Secretary of State was not obliged to facilitate stem cell transplantation from unrelated donors. Because the Governments of the day took that position, advances made took longer to achieve, which undoubtedly cost lives. The situation is different now: both the Government and the Opposition support expansion of the practice, and in particular of the more modern use of umbilical cord blood for such purposes. However, it would be fitting for the Minister now to make it clear in the Bill that this issue is important, to lock in the bipartisan support while it is strong, and to send a message to future Governments and civil servants that for as long as the Bill remains on the statute book, the issue is not to be lightly disregarded or de-prioritised at a future date.
The amendments involve no financial or political cost, but they are not merely symbolic. They could be described as an insurance policy against the risk of thoughtlessness or distraction on the part of future Governments—a risk that would ultimately cost lives.
Mr Burrowes
It will not surprise the House to learn that I strongly support what my hon. Friend has said about the importance that should be attached to the life-saving cause of collecting cord blood and transplantation. As he has said, the Government are wholly committed to investing in and improving collections and to transplantation, but is it not important for us to consider whether that should form part of the duty of the Secretary of State? Is it not a priority, given that one in five members of black and ethnic minorities cannot obtain a match for the purposes of the transplantations that are sorely needed for life-saving operations?
Nick de Bois
My hon. Friend raises a key point. If we were to make prospective parents aware of the possibility of donation, we could address the major deficit in the BME community.
Mr Burrowes
Is it not also important to ensure, through the Bill or other means, that commissioners are able to make the right decisions? Evidence of some commissioners questioning the economic value of proceeding with stem cell transplants was brought before the all-party group on stem cell transplantation. It is important that we pursue commissioning excellence.
Nick de Bois
I understand that the UK Stem Cell Strategic Forum recommended to the Government that there should be a regional centre of excellence, and I hope Ministers will let us know by letter if that policy is indeed being pursued, as I think it might deal with the issue that my hon. Friend raises.
Cord blood is a natural, safe, ethical and sustainable resource, and it offers many advantages over using traditional bone marrow transplants. We in this country should be proud that the NHS was one of the first bodies to recognise the potential importance of cord blood and significant breakthroughs were made in Britain. In 1996 an NHS cord bank was established, which is now working alongside the Anthony Nolan trust. At a time when the health service is mindful of the need to inform patients fully about their health care, the issue of the collection of a mother-baby’s cord blood does not seem to get the same degree of attention. The principles of full information and consent do not seem to apply to cord blood, which is, in general, treated as a waste product, unbeknown to parents, apart from in exceptional circumstances. By agreeing to my amendments, we can change that situation and the Government can demonstrate that they are giving a lead in the dissemination of information to expectant parents.
Last year academic research said that in order to have a truly effective operation we should strive to obtain 50,000 units of cord blood. I congratulate the Government, who have already committed £4 million to reach the first benchmark of 20,000 cord blood units. I commend the work of the Anthony Nolan trust and the NHS, which have also been sharing in building up to this target. Of course this is only the start, and I know that the Government have already expressed their commitment to helping to develop this very important work.
We have an opportunity for more lives to be saved, for valuable scientific research to be undertaken and for the UK to become a centre of excellence in cord blood. We can avoid the current situation whereby every day two people die waiting for a stem cell transplant, and 65,000 litres of cord blood are discarded every year. I welcome the Minister’s words of support and I appreciate the sentiments behind the Government’s thinking. I urge them to continue to get behind this valuable cause.
Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)
I speak in support of amendment 1169, which seeks to strengthen the Secretary of State’s duty to reduce health inequalities. As presented in clause 3, the Secretary of State’s duty is insufficient to tackle the health inequalities in our society. The clause lacks strength, invites the Secretary of State to disregard its meaning and changes little in the way in which health inequalities will be tackled in the future. By supporting amendment 1169 we can ensure that the Secretary of State can be regularly and properly held to account for his duty to tackle health inequalities across England.
Tackling health inequalities is vital because this is, in many cases, a matter of life and death. The World Health Organisation’s Commission on Social Determinants of Health has said:
“Social justice…affects the way people live, their consequent chance of illness, and their risk of premature death. We watch in wonder as life expectancy and good health continue to increase in parts of the world and in alarm as they fail to improve in others.”
In our own country, Bevan’s dream for the NHS was for a service in which:
“No longer will wealth be an advantage nor poverty a disadvantage.”
Yet, despite the great strides that have been made there is much more to do, and the link between poverty and poor health remains.
Rushanara Ali
As there is not much time left, I would like to proceed in order to allow other colleagues to speak.
That link can be seen as clearly in London as anywhere else. According to the London health inequalities strategy,
“for men, life expectancy at ward level ranges from 71 years in Tottenham Green ward in Haringey to 88 years in Queen’s Gate ward in Kensington and Chelsea—a span of seventeen years”.
Despite the progress made nationally, in the borough of Tower Hamlets, in which my constituency sits, the rate of heart disease or stroke before the age of 75 is more than twice that of a more affluent area such as Surrey, and early cancer rates are nearly 50% higher.
We know that with the right resources and leadership it is possible to reduce health inequalities. In the past 10 years, the rates of early death from cancer and from heart disease and stroke have fallen in my constituency, but they remain worse than those in other parts of the country. That is why it is vital for the Secretary of State to continue the focus on tackling health inequalities, for us to look at the cross-cutting issues affecting health and for there to be co-ordination across government, led by the Health Secretary.
Tackling health inequalities was central and integral to Labour’s policy making in government. I urge this Government to think again, to recognise the vital importance of continuing that commitment and to make sure that there is genuine accountability for reducing health inequalities.
I was saddened to see last month that the Government plan to reduce the funding allocated to tackling health inequalities by altering the weighting given to inequalities in the weighted capitation formula from 15% to 10%. That will lead to a reduction in funding of £20 million over the next three years in Tower Hamlets—
Rushanara Ali
I will not give way, because there is not much time left.
The borough is one of the poorest in the country, with high levels of health inequalities, and the change will have a direct and damaging effect on the health of my constituents and many others around the country.
Rushanara Ali
I will not give way, because the Secretary of State has had long enough to speak. He has had far too long to speak, and I have two minutes left.
The change will have a very damaging effect on my constituents, and if the formula is applied across the country it will increase inequality. I ask the Secretary of State again to show leadership and take responsibility—
Rushanara Ali
The Secretary of State has spoken for long enough—[Interruption.] He has spoken, but there has not been much content—[Interruption.]
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. The hon. Lady is entitled to make her speech and to be heard in this Chamber. As all Members know, this debate ends at 6 o’clock and there are still quite a few Members who have been present all the time who wish to speak.
Rushanara Ali
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.
Amendment 1169 would be of great benefit in tackling health inequalities. It would make a real difference to people’s lives. Requiring the Secretary of State to lay an annual report before Parliament on progress towards ending health inequalities is therefore key in ensuring that proper accountability continues to exist. What is he afraid of? He could see the impact and put in place mechanisms to continue to improve, learning from the evidence and making progress. Considering how we can reduce inequalities in constituencies such as mine is a constructive way forward. I call on the Secretary of State to think again and accept this sensible amendment.
In conclusion, as the Marmot review stated, the
“link between social conditions and health is not a footnote to the ‘real’ concerns with health…it should become the main focus.”
Tackling health inequalities should be a central aim of health care policy for any Government, and the amendment would be crucial for achieving that. I hope that Members on both sides will back it and that the Secretary of State will take note.
Margot James (Stourbridge) (Con)
I want to support the leadership that the Bill ascribes to public health and the role of the patient and empowered individual in taking responsibility for their health care as far as is possible. I congratulate the Government on setting public health free, as I see it, and taking it out of its ivory tower. It has been in the preserve of the primary care trusts and although in some PCTs it is given life, in others it gathers dust and is vulnerable to financial raids from time to time as budget pressures build and people seek to take money from an area where the public do not necessarily see the results for a fairly long time and to give it in preference to things that cause short-term pain. Regardless of which party has been in government, that has always been the case with public health.
If we consider where public health can make a difference in preventing ill health, we can see that the future of the NHS depends on a much better preventive strategy. Perhaps the best thing that the previous Government did in health care policy was the smoking ban, which will probably save more lives in the long run than anything else. We could consider some of the other areas that are ripe for similar treatment. I do not mean that we should ban alcohol, but we could consider public health policy and what it could do to reduce the incidence of sexually transmitted diseases, HIV, alcohol abuse and mental health problems. Many of the issues to do with drugs are about education and prevention, too.
I am pleased to see links being built into other aspects of the Bill. Our proposals for public health in relation to mental health have been strongly welcomed by the Samaritans, because there is so much to do with mental health that takes place in the community. The involvement of local authorities and the leadership role given to them in the Bill should enable aspects of local government policy such as housing, children’s social services and adult and social care to be brought to bear in dealing with these problems.
Margot James
I would love to but I am aware that others are waiting and I am trying to curtail my comments. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!] I will take that as a prompt to get a move on.
I want to address a point that was made earlier about where the director of public health should sit in a local authority. I think it is important that the public health director should report to the chief executive because the public health function will cover so much that is part of children’s services, adult and social care and housing that it is hard to see how they will fit in unless they report at the top level.
In conclusion, I believe that the elevation of public health will enable public health to be placed at the centre of commissioning and that the link between the wellbeing boards and the primary care commissioning groups will enable public health to be instrumental within commissioning. That is where we will see the long-term benefits outrunning the short-term imperatives.
Alison Seabeck
I shall cut to the chase because other Members want to speak and many colleagues have spoken powerfully about the benefits of the NHS. I have two very specific questions regarding concerns that people in the south-west have raised with me. These issues relate to part 1 of the Bill, the role of the director of public health, and the making of complaints, as covered by new clause 1. I want to link these issues to the duty of the Secretary of State to ensure that the basis on which actions are taken—indeed, the information that is used—is in the hands of and is accessible to people in the new set-ups who need that information and can use it.
The concerns that have been raised with me relate to the movement of national health service public health staff into local authority control and the fact that the Office for National Statistics currently has a duty to release certain data only to directors of public health, who are part of the NHS. I gather that the ONS has had concerns about this and I am interested to know whether it has waived the requirement for directors of public health to sign a confidentiality and proper use statement every year, or whether it has agreed to the passing of this role into local authorities. I cannot find that in the Bill, although I must admit that I am coming to this a little late—my apologies to colleagues about that—and I would be very grateful if the Minister could tell me whether that issue has been resolved.
Secondly, the Minister will know that we carry out nuclear decommissioning in Plymouth. Is he confident that public health can be fully protected in the way that it has been in the past? I note clause 54 on radiation, but will the Minister look at how H1N1 was dealt with? The first confirmed case of swine flu was in Paignton and the response was carried out by PCT public health staff in Plymouth and Torbay. They worked together rapidly to administer antiviral drugs to nearly 500 pupils and they provided reassurance and support to extremely anxious children and parents. That response was set up within 45 minutes of the initial phone call, despite the fact that it had not been done before, and it was done without any practical help from the Health Protection Agency, which was swamped with other work. The PCT public health staff just got on with it and they did a fantastic job—no other child was infected. Indeed, they compiled a guide on how to do it all, which was passed on and was commended by the Prime Minister. There is a view that such a response will not be possible in a few years’ time, so complaints from the public—this takes us back to new clause 1—will inevitably follow. Clearly, if we get health protection wrong, we can kill people.
In order to avoid complaints on new clause 1, will the Minister say what power the director of public health, sitting within the local authority, will have to galvanise staff across organisations? Will they be the appropriate authority, or will responsibility sit elsewhere? Will they have to go through another senior officer? Who is ultimately responsible if they get it badly wrong—the local authority, the director of public health or the Secretary of State? Or is it another instance when the Government are saying, “Not me, guv” and passing the buck to the local council and the political leadership of that council? If there was a viral outbreak in various parts of the country, widely spread, would the individual local authorities be held responsible for dealing with it, coming up with solutions and coping with the outcomes, or is this a case in which the Secretary of State actually has a clear duty to take the lead?
Martin Horwood
I am extremely grateful to you for calling me, Madam Deputy Speaker, as you have a tough job this afternoon. I have to declare an interest. I rarely speak in the House on NHS organisation, particularly public health, because my wife is employed as a director of public health. Obviously, the Bill and the public health section of clause 27 will affect her significantly, and by extension those of us in her family, but I make it clear to the House that although my knowledge of her role and profession has informed amendments 1255 to 1260, which stand in my name, she had no knowledge of them or their contents before I tabled them. However, I am grateful to the Faculty of Public Health and others who have given me advice.
Public health is pretty poorly understood, not least in this Chamber at times. There is a constant tendency to confuse it with the traditional, established local authority function of environmental health, and although I have great respect for the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley) in many respects, I think the risk of her new clause 23 is that it extends that confusion between environmental health and public health. There are many key functions to public health, not just the vital five-a-day style health promotion and health improvement work, but a critical role in health protection, including the management of outbreaks of communicable diseases—serious diseases such as meningitis and influenza—and a key role in influencing, at the moment, NHS commissioning at local level, using population-wide data and medical analysis. That, at the moment, happens very simply and straightforwardly within the primary care trust. Under the Bill at the moment, there is no role for the director of public health within the new clinical commissioning groups, and they have to exercise that kind of influence at several removes. That point was well made by the hon. Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Alison Seabeck).
It was suggested to me at one stage by some civil servants working on the Bill that in order to make up for the gap left by the director of public health in the new clinical commissioning groups—then called consortia—they might actually want to employ someone with public health expertise to make up for the reorganisation. That does not seem to me a very good use of public money.
Some of the things that Ministers have announced are to be welcomed. I will have to skip over them briefly, but principal among them is the very good decision to make Public Health England a separate Executive agency and not part of the Department of Health. That was a key request of the faculty, and I think it is very important that it retain that status and objectivity.
I pay tribute to the Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Burstow), for taking a great deal of time and care over the concerns that I had in this whole area, but questions remain to be addressed and my six amendments are an attempt to address three main areas.
The first area is, as the hon. Member for Plymouth, Moor View pointed out, that under this scheme directors of public health will be removed from the NHS, as will their staff. One of my amendments suggests, therefore, that they should continue to be employed by Public Health England and retain that integration within a wider public health profession. At the moment directors of public health sit within primary care trusts and it is reasonably straightforward, but within the spaghetti-like structures created by the Bill, public health responsibilities and leadership are now to be split among Public Health England, the Secretary of State, the local authorities, the national commissioning board, the health and wellbeing boards and clinical commissioning groups. The threat is not just confusion and the unclear fragmentation of public health functions, but the fragmentation of the profession itself and of the career paths, whereby people might move from one bit to another and have to leave and rejoin the NHS, and so on. That is one of the issues addressed.
The second issue is that people should be suitably qualified. The responsibility for their professional qualification and professional development should lie in the hands of Public Health England, not local authority managers, who might have no medical or professional public health training. It is an important function, so they should be senior officers. Several members of the Health Committee, including its Chair, made the important point that they should report directly to the chief executive. It has been suggested in some parts of the country that the post of director of public health could be combined with or report to other directorates in the principal local authority—for instance, the director of housing.
I wrote to the Deputy Prime Minister on the issues, and he replied:
“given the importance of these new local authority public health functions, the leadership position of the DPH in the local community and the critical health protection functions to be carried out by the DPH on behalf of the local authority, we would expect the DPH to be of chief officer status”.
I do not think that an expectation is strong enough. I have great regard for many directors of housing, but if my child had meningitis, I would not want the director of housing to be on the other end of the phone line at a critical moment.
As it is still possible for the Government to address these issues through the consultation exercise on public health that is being planned, I will not press my amendments to a vote today, but I was rather disappointed with the Minister’s response to them. Should any noble Friends be listening from the Gallery, I hope they might take up the theme of public health in another place. Public health is poorly understood and has not grabbed the headlines in the way that the 38 Degrees campaign has, but over recent years it has been quietly becoming a more and more successful, professional and increasingly medically qualified discipline in the NHS. It saves lives, and we should protect it.
Paul Burstow
We have had a full and wide-ranging debate on the many issues covered by this group of amendments. I want to try to pick up a few of the key questions that have been asked. The Bill will increase the Secretary of State’s accountability for a comprehensive health service.
Paul Burstow
No, not at all.
The Bill will provide all the powers and duties necessary: the duty to keep the health service’s functions under review, a duty to report annually on the health service’s performance and a duty to consult on the board’s mandate and to lay it before Parliament and to lay regulations about how commissioners carry out their functions. All those things are new. They are more than backstops; they are guarantees of a comprehensive health service being secured and the Secretary of State maintaining his accountability to the House and Members of Parliament for that purpose.
I have already made it clear to those who are concerned about clause 4 and the possibility, which we do not accept, that it will lead to a hands-off approach that we are willing to listen to and consider the concerns that have been raised and make any necessary amendment to put it beyond doubt that the Secretary of State remains responsible and accountable for a comprehensive health service, which we all want to see.
There has been talk about a postcode lottery. Indeed, the Bill sets out, through the work of the NHS commissioning board, to ensure that the postcode lottery that we inherited from the last Government is something that we can make a thing of the past, as a consequence of the changes that the Bill will introduce.
The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley) made some important points about environmental health officers and the contribution they make locally and nationally. Although we see the chief medical officer having a key role in providing such advice, I would be happy for us to carry on discussions about how we can further strengthen that role nationally.
As the consultations on the issues raised today by my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Martin Horwood) carry on, I am certainly happy to discuss with him how we can address those concerns. I can assure him that, because the Secretary of State will be directly involved in the appointment process for directors of public health through Public Health England’s role, they will be able to assure themselves that they are adequately qualified.
Paul Burstow
No.
The Bill has been changed because the Government have been listening carefully. We have acted on the NHS Future Forum’s recommendations.
Our goals are clear in this Bill: they are to place patients at its heart, ensure that the service is clinically led and ensure that it is focused on driving up quality and outcomes.
Question put and agreed to.
New clause 1 accordingly read a Second time, and added to the Bill.
Mr Lansley
I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
The national health service is among our most valued and loved institutions. Indeed, it is often described as the closest thing we have to a national religion. I am not sure that that was always intended to be complimentary, but I think it should be. People in this country believe in the NHS wholeheartedly, share in its values and the social solidarity it brings, and admire the doctors, nurses and staff who work in it.
It is because I share that belief that I am here. Over eight years, I have supported, challenged and defended the NHS. As a party, and now as a Government, we have pledged unwavering support for the NHS, both in principle, because we believe in the values of the NHS, and in a practical way because we are reforming the NHS to secure its future alongside the additional £12.5 billion of taxpayer funding over the next four years that we have pledged for the NHS in England.
Nicola Blackwood (Oxford West and Abingdon) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend give way?
Mr Lansley
If my hon. Friend will forgive me, I will not give way because other Members wish to speak on Third Reading.
In Wales, a Labour Government are cutting the budget for the NHS. The coalition Government’s commitment to the NHS will not waver. The Government and I, as Health Secretary, will always be accountable for promoting and securing the provision of a comprehensive health service that is free and based on need, not ability to pay.
What matters to patients is not only how the NHS works, but, more importantly, the improvements that the modernisations will energise—a stronger patient voice, clinical leadership, shared NHS and local government leadership in improving public health, and innovation and enterprise in clinical services. Everyone will benefit from the fruit that the Bill and the reforms bring. There will be improved survival rates, a personalised service tailored to the choices and needs of patients, better access to the right care at the right time, and meaningful information to support decisions. The Bill provides the constitution and structure that the NHS needs to work for the long term.
Patients know that it is their doctors and nurses—the people in whom they place their trust—who make the best decisions about their individual care. The Bill is about helping those people to become leaders. It is not about turning medical professionals into managers or administrators, but about turning the NHS from a top-down administrative pyramid with managers and administrators at its zenith into a clinically led service that is responsive to patients, with management support on tap, not on top. It is about putting real power into the hands of patients, ensuring that there truly is “no decision about me without me”. My only motivation is to safeguard and strengthen the NHS, and that is why I am convinced that the principles of this modernisation are necessary.
Of course, the Bill has been through a long passage. There have been questions and new ideas, and many concerns and issues have been raised. We have done throughout, and will continue to do, what all Governments should do—listen, reflect, then respond and improve. The scrutiny process to this point has been detailed and forensic. There were the original 6,000 responses to the White Paper consultation, many public and stakeholder meetings and 28 sittings in Committee, after which the hon. Member for Halton (Derek Twigg) acknowledged that “every inch” of the Bill had been scrutinised, but we were still none the less determined to listen, reflect and improve.
I wish to thank the NHS Future Forum, under Steve Field’s leadership, for its excellent and continuing work. I also thank more than 8,000 members of the public, health professionals and representatives of more than 250 stakeholder organisations who supported the Future Forum and the listening exercise and attended some 250 events across the country. That forum and those people represented the views of the professionals who will implement and deliver the changes, and we accepted all their core recommendations. We brought the Bill back to Committee—the first such Bill since 2003—and we have continued to listen and respond positively. The Bill is better and stronger as a result.
Mr Lansley
No.
At the heart of the changes is support for clinical leadership, which has always been key in putting health professionals, and not only managers, at the heart of decision making in the NHS. That was why we strengthened the Bill to ensure that all relevant health professionals would be involved in the design and commissioning of services at every level and in the leadership of clinical commissioning groups. They will also be brought together through clinical networks on specific conditions and services, as they often are now, such as in the case of cancer networks. They will be brought together in broad geographic areas, through new clinical senates, to look across services and advise.
The Bill was strong in transparency and openness from the outset, and that now flows through every aspect of modernisation. Indeed, the Future Forum is taking forward another of our central principles of reform, which is to develop high-quality and integrated services. Properly integrated services are essential for the quality of individual care and for the most efficient operation of the NHS. That was why we proposed health and wellbeing boards, to bring together all the people who are crucial to improving health across an area and having a real impact on the causes of ill health. We can bear down on the inequalities in health that widened under the previous Government.
The Bill now makes our commitment to integration explicit. Clinical commissioning groups will have a duty to promote integrated health and social care based around the needs of their users, and we will encourage greater integration with social care by ensuring that CCG boundaries do not cross those of local authorities without a clear rationale.
The Bill has deserved the attention and passion that it has attracted, and which I am sure it will continue to attract. I thank all Members who have taken part in the scrutiny of it on Second Reading, in Committee, on recommittal and during the past two days. I especially thank my ministerial colleagues, who have steered the debates and led the preparation of and speaking on the Bill. I thank all colleagues throughout the House who have contributed, especially many of my colleagues who I know have given an enormous amount of time, energy and hard work to supporting the Bill. I also thank the Whips.
I thank the Officers of the House and, especially on this occasion, my departmental officials who have responded tirelessly not only to our requests for information and advice but to those of many hon. Members and thousands of people across the country and in stakeholder organisations.
The intensity of debate and the brightness of the spotlight shone upon the Bill have made it a better Bill than when it was first laid before the House. I believe that it will set the NHS in England on a path of excellence, with empowered patients, clinical leadership and a relentless focus on quality. Let us look at what we have already achieved as a Government: more investment in the NHS, higher quality despite increased demand, waiting times remaining low, MRSA at the lowest level ever, mixed-sex accommodation breaches plummeting, and thousands more people getting access to cancer drugs. The Bill will pave the way for even more progress towards the world-class NHS that patients want, which will be able to deliver results that are truly among the best in the world. I commend it to the House.
John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab)
This Government and this Bill are giving health reform a bad name. The Bill is unwanted and unnecessary. It is reckless to force through the biggest reorganisation in NHS history at the same time as finances are tight and pressures on the health service are growing. The big quality and efficiency challenges that the NHS must meet, and the changes that the NHS must make for the future, will be made harder and not easier because of the Bill.
I thank my shadow ministerial team, who have done such a sterling job. I also thank my Back-Bench colleagues who served on not just one, but two Public Bill Committees, and all my Back-Bench colleagues who have given such strong support to the Opposition in the House.
I should also pay tribute, if I may, to the stamina of the ministerial team, but I say this to them: we will not let up now, because in 13 years of Labour reform and investment, people saw huge improvements in the NHS, the lowest ever waiting times, and the highest ever patient satisfaction; but in this the first year of this Tory-Lib Dem Government, people have instead seen the NHS starting to go backwards. They have seen the Prime Minister breaking the very personal promise that he gave at the election to protect the NHS. As we heard at Prime Minister’s questions today, he and his team are in denial about the damage that his Government are doing to the NHS and the scale of criticism and opposition to it.
The Prime Minister’s pause to listen was supposed to have won back public support and confidence among NHS staff. He failed. It is true that changes have been made to the Bill, but they make the NHS plans more complex, more costly and more confused. Millions of pounds will be wasted on new bureaucracy when it could and should be spent on patient care.
As the House is asked to approve the Bill on Third Reading tonight, the essential elements of the Tory long-term plans to see the NHS broken up as a national public service, and set up as a full-scale market, are still in place. First, on the market, a new regulator will enforce competition law on the NHS for the first time, and it will have the power to fine hospitals 10% of their turnover for working together. The Office of Fair Trading will oversee mergers if a hospital’s turnover tops £70 million. There will be no cap on the number of private patients that are treated in our NHS hospitals as NHS patients wait longer. That means more legal challenges from competition lawyers, more privatisation and the closure of NHS services and hospitals. It means that much of the planning, collaboration and integration that is at the heart of the best of our NHS today will be very much harder, and perhaps illegal, in future.
Secondly, the Bill betrays a founding principle of the NHS. For 65 years, people have known that the Secretary of State and the Government whom they elect are responsible for the definition and provision of a comprehensive health service. The Bill passes that power to at least 250 local commissioning groups and stops the Secretary of State directing them as to the services that they must provide for patients. It makes the Government unaccountable for what health services are provided and unable to guarantee patients a universal service. It is a fundamental and founding principle that our NHS is a national service, equally there for all, whoever we are, wherever we live. This Bill takes the “national” out of the national health service.
In January on Second Reading, I said of the Government’s NHS plans that the more people learn about them, the less they like them. That was true then and it is true now, despite the many changes to the legislation. These are the wrong reforms at the wrong time, driven by the wrong ideology. Labour will continue to lead the challenge against these plans in the other place, and we will oppose this Bill tonight on Third Reading.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Order. As Members will see, we have only a very short time before I put the Question, so could they please be very pithy and short in their contributions in order to get as many Members in as possible?
Dr Wollaston
The hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Rushanara Ali) spoke of health inequalities in her constituency. Perhaps she should look at the King’s Fund’s annual review of NHS performance between 1997 and 2010, which
“identified the lack of progress in reducing health inequalities as the most significant health policy failure of the last decade.”
Opposition Members should bear that in mind when they talk of a two-tier health service, because they fail to focus on outcomes and they fail to focus on inequalities.
I welcome the duty of the Secretary of State, the NHS commissioning board and clinical commissioning groups to have regard to reducing health inequalities. Let us see something done about that scandal. I also welcome the work of the NHS Future Forum in setting out the central dilemma surrounding the role of the Secretary of State. The NHS should be freed from day-to-day political interference, but it must also be clear that the Secretary of State retains ultimate responsibility.
Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)
Will the hon. Lady give way?
Dr Wollaston
I will not, because so many Members are waiting to speak.
There has been real scaremongering about, in particular, the difference between the duty to provide and the duty to secure provision, but I believe that the wording simply reflects the reality. The key issue is the line between the ability to step in if things go wrong, and the very real need for politicians to step back and let clinicians and patients take control.
I shall cut my speech short because I have been asked to be brief, but let me end by saying that, for three clear reasons, I would not be supporting the Bill if I thought that it would lead to the privatisation of the NHS. [Hon. Members: “Have you read it?”] I assure Members that I have read it in great detail.
Let me give those three clear reasons. First, clinicians will be in charge of commissioning. Secondly, the public will be able to see what clinicians are doing. Thirdly, neither clinicians nor the public will allow privatisation to happen. They do not want it to happen, and neither do Members of this House.
PCTs and foundation trusts did not meet in public, but they will do so in future, and it is the public and patients who will ensure that the NHS is safe in the hands of the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
That is the length of speech that we like.
Rosie Cooper
I fear that for all the listening, the work of the Future Forum, the concerns voiced by health professionals and our constituents who rely on the health service, and the two days of debate in this place, we have ended up on Third Reading with something that is not substantively different from the original idea. Although it is three times longer than the National Health Service 1946 Act, which created the NHS, the Bill before us leaves us with more questions than answers. I suspect that that will remain the case for some time, as the Government have indicated that more amendments will be tabled.
It is astonishing that we have progressed from a Bill that was never meant to be, because the Conservative party had promised no top-down changes to the NHS, to the Conservatives’ having a supposedly well-thought-out plan—which required a pause because of the sheer scale of the public’s and medical professions’ opposition—and then to the Bill that we have today, which needs more amendments. Sadly, the changes are not substantive enough. The Minister told us yesterday that 715 of the 1,000 amendments were intended merely to change the words “commissioning consortia” to “clinical commissioning groups”. I believe that the public, clinicians and those of us who could see right through the Bill were looking for something more substantive when the Government stopped to pause and promised to listen to people’s concerns.
The Health and Social Care Bill that we now have is still as confused and muddled as on the day it was first brought before the House. I expect that Ministers hoped to confuse and bore people into submission. Disgracefully, the Government began to change the NHS structures without the consent of the people even before they produced the Bill, and they continue to do so even though it has not passed through this House or proceeded to the other place—where it is to be hoped that it will receive the thorough and tough consideration that we should have had the time to give it here.
What we have is a Bill that is high on autonomy and low on accountability. It is supposed to be built on the principles of efficiency, reducing bureaucracy and cutting out waste, yet I do not believe it achieves any of them. In fact, in practice it does the opposite. The Bill will leave us with an organisational malaise, as the number of bodies and organisations significantly increases, with the relationship between them all being complex and incoherent and severely lacking in detail and accountability. The Bill leaves us with a financial challenge that has never been achieved in any health economy anywhere in the world at the same time as removing great swathes of the people with the experience and skills to deliver this outcome. The Secretary of State said that he admired NHS employees. If that is so, why have his policies led to so many of them losing their jobs?
The Bill will leave the NHS open to European competition regulation, all of which will be overseen by an economic regulator enforcing competition who appears to think the system can be based on an outdated and failing regulatory model like that of the utilities sector, and whose accountability to Parliament and the Secretary of State is unclear. Ultimately, I believe the Bill has been driven forward as an ideological exercise, rather than through a desire to improve the quality of health care available to the people of this country. The Government could have achieved the changes they said they wanted without all this structural mayhem, such as by reducing the number of primary care trusts, changing the make-up of the boards and putting clinicians firmly in the driving seat, but perhaps that was not macho enough.
This evening, the Government are in serious danger of consigning to the bin 13 years of progress, in which patients were being treated within four hours in accident and emergency and were guaranteed an operation with 18 weeks. Tonight, I genuinely fear that the Bill before us will be the equivalent not of throwing a grenade into the NHS, but of pushing the button on the nuclear option: a completely disproportionate response to the challenges facing the NHS.
In my speech on Report, I referred to the former NHS employee Roy Lilley and his blog. Today, he takes a quote from Mary Anne Evans, otherwise known as the novelist George Eliot:
“It is never too late to be who you might have been.”
I therefore urge the Liberal Democrat Members of this House to consider whether they genuinely believe this Bill will deliver a better, more caring and more patient-led NHS.
Earlier in the debate there were suggestions of scaremongering, so let me be clear: I am not scared; I am terrified—terrified that this Conservative Government will kill off the NHS, a system of health care that is envied throughout the world and that is being threatened for the sake of ideology. I am not scaremongering when I say that if this Government destroy the NHS, they will never be forgiven.
Nicky Morgan
In yesterday’s debate the right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) said of the NHS that he believed that in most parts of the country and most of the time it does a good job for people, but I want to see it doing an excellent job for people in all parts of the country all the time, and that is what this Bill will achieve. Having served on the Bill Committee, it is a great sadness to me that that message, and the fact that patients will be at the heart of the NHS, has been lost in the months of scaremongering—a word used by the last speaker—and wrangling by those who have campaigned against it and have obscured all such messages. That has been totally unfair to the patients who rely on the NHS.
I briefly want to make two points. First, Members who served on the Committee will know of my passion for getting the right treatment for mental health patients, and at a meeting of the all-party group on mental health yesterday the Bill was described by GPs as a great opportunity: an opportunity for the integration of primary and secondary care—something they have not had before, and that will now be achieved.
Secondly, as my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston) said, the Bill puts clinicians at the heart of commissioning. When the Bill was recommitted, my researcher said to me, “This Bill is a gift that keeps on giving.” Now it is time for this present to be handed over to the other place, but it needs to reach the statute book and we need to implement it on the ground. I have heard nothing from the Opposition in the past eight months to convince me that this Bill should not receive its Third Reading and get on to the statute book, and I urge all hon. Members to support it.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
I am grateful for that short speech. I ask for another short speech from Kevin Barron.
Mr Barron
I have been a Member of this House for 28 years and I have been active in different parts of health policy for many years, and I have never seen any Bill—not just any health Bill—come to this House so ill-prepared to be put on to the statute book. I served during the two stages of the Public Bill Committee. Largely, I asked questions where I wanted explanations, but I got very few answers. As was said earlier today, part 3 remains in this Bill and its 97 clauses bring in economic regulation. Only nine of those clauses have been amended since the Future Forum met and said that we were in deep trouble with this.
What did the Future Forum ask for? It recommended that Monitor’s powers should
“promote choice, collaboration and integration.”
Monitor’s powers have changed somewhat, but the major change that occurred during the second part of the Committee stage was that the Government took away Monitor’s power to promote competition and gave it a new power to prevent anti-competitive behaviour. Perhaps, at some stage, somebody will be able to tell me what that means. Perhaps somebody will also be able to tell me the answer to something I asked in the first sitting of the Public Bill Committee: what do the Competition Commission and the Office of Fair Trading have to do with the mergers of two NHS trusts? The relevant Minister said at the time that that was a good question, but I have not heard it answered since.
I must say, with all due respect, that no Labour Member argued that the NHS is perfect, nor would I do so. But this Bill is a dog’s dinner. The national health service and the nation do not deserve it, and I will vote against it tonight.
Mr Stephen Dorrell (Charnwood) (Con)
Like my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston), I would vote against the Bill if I thought that it was going to promote the privatisation of the NHS. One thing that this Bill has in common with every health Bill I have debated in 21 years is that its opponents claim that it is about privatisation, but it is about nothing of the kind.
As the Secretary of State made clear, this is a different Bill, in some important respects, from the Bill that was first presented. First, the Bill introduces a statutory duty to promote the integration of health and social care—Labour Ministers talked about that but never delivered it. Secondly, the Bill introduces new safeguards against cherry-picking by private sector providers—Labour Members say they were against cherry-picking but they never introduced such safeguards. Thirdly, the Bill introduces new safeguards in respect of the continuity of essential services provided by private providers, who were introduced by Labour into the delivery of health and social care—such safeguards were never provided by Labour. Fourthly, the Bill makes real a commitment to the introduction of the clinical leadership of commissioning—Labour talked about that in office but never in reality delivered it. So this is a Bill that has been changed and improved as it has gone through the parliamentary process.
Let us not belittle the extent to which the Bill actually builds upon the same policies that were pursued by Labour in government: a policy of the extension of commissioning to act on behalf of the patient and the taxpayer; a policy to promote the development of foundation trusts as the best way of delivering care. This Bill takes 20 years of consistent development of policy and converts the words of Labour Ministers into reality. That is why I support its Third Reading tonight.
Mr Michael Meacher (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab)
Extremely briefly, I want to put on record my view that the Government’s handling of this Bill has been a monumental abuse of the principles of accountability in this House. It was sprung on an unsuspecting nation after an election in which there was no mention whatsoever of these proposals, after an air-brushed Cameron advert said, “I will cut the deficit, not the NHS.” Despite those misleading signals, there has been no commission of inquiry to examine its philosophy or ideology, no proposal to pilot it—
Access to a Lawyer
(12 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Jonathan Djanogly)
I beg to move,
That this House takes note of European Union Document No. 11497/11 and Addenda 1 and 2 relating to the Draft Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on the right of access to a lawyer in criminal proceedings and on the right to communicate upon arrest; and supports the Government’s recommendation not to opt into the Directive in accordance with Protocol (No. 21) on the position of the United Kingdom and Ireland in respect of the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice to the Treaty on European Union and the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union.
I commend the European Scrutiny Committee for calling this debate. As set out in the coalition agreement, the Government approach criminal justice legislation case by case, with a view to maximising our country’s security, protecting Britain’s civil liberties and preserving the integrity of our criminal justice system. The Government recommend that the UK should not opt into this proposed measure at the start of negotiations, not because we do not think that minimum standards of defence rights, including access to a lawyer, and the right to communicate on arrest, including with consular authorities, are important—of course, we do—and not because we disagree in principle with the setting of common, minimum standards across the EU in respect of certain aspects of criminal proceedings. On the contrary, we see the benefit of appropriate minimum standards. For that reason, the UK opted into the first two measures on the procedural rights road map on interpretation and translation and the right to information in criminal proceedings. We are not making this recommendation because we fear that our law does not meet the minimum standards required by the European convention on human rights—it does.
The reason we do not propose to opt into this measure at the outset of negotiations is that we think that the directive as published by the Commission would have an adverse effect on our ability to investigate and prosecute offences effectively. It is important that action is taken to ensure that the standards of procedural rights across the EU are adequate. That is necessary for two reasons: first, to ensure that, as people travel through the EU, they can be confident that in the event that they are unfortunate enough to become subject to the criminal justice system of another member state, they will be dealt with fairly and in accordance with robust minimum standards; and, secondly, the EU has chosen to develop a series of mutual recognition measures designed to promote security by helping to combat crime and ensuring that suspected offenders cannot use European borders as a way to escape justice.
Mr William Cash (Stone) (Con)
The Minister has twice used the words, “at the outset of proceedings”. Being something of an old hand at this sort of thing, I wonder whether that means that he proposes to opt in later. Perhaps he will bear in mind the problem that some other member states have judicial systems that are, quite frankly, below par.
Mr Djanogly
Indeed they do have systems that are below par, which is why we are keen for the measure to proceed across the EU. We will decide at a later date whether Britain opts in, subject to the negotiations that will take place. If my hon. Friend listens to what I have to say a bit further, he will hear how we propose to look at that process.
This is a good, practical idea that has delivered some notable results, provided that it does not put suspects at risk of less-than-adequate criminal proceedings. Such instruments of mutual recognition were never intended to operate on their own. It was intended that they should be supported by a series of criminal procedural rights, enforceable at EU level, that would build on the rights already guaranteed by the ECHR and provide additional reassurance that the rights were being given practical effect in all member states. These standards will not only protect British nationals when they are arrested elsewhere in the EU but will provide greater trust and confidence among the courts of all EU states that judgments handed down, which they may be expected to recognise, have been made on the basis of sound procedural standards.
Standards of procedural rights are high in the UK. The right of access to a lawyer, both before and during police interview, has been provided in England and Wales and Northern Ireland since the mid 1980s. A similar right was provided for in Scotland last year. However, despite the fact that we see value in the Commission tabling such a measure, we have considerable concerns about the detail of the directive and the impact its drafting would have on the UK’s criminal justice systems.
The procedural rights directives are intended to draw on the jurisprudence of the ECHR and to flesh out what those rights mean in practice. Certain provisions of the Commission’s proposal, however, go far beyond the minimum standards that stem from the convention. While there is no problem in principle with going beyond the standards of the convention if there are good practical and policy reasons to do so, we do not see such reasons in this case. On the contrary, we think that there would be some quite adverse and costly impacts on the ability effectively to investigate and prosecute offenders were the Commission proposal to be adopted.
Examples of that include the fact that the directive as drafted by the Commission may require access to a lawyer to be provided in some stages in the investigatory process where currently a lawyer is not provided, such as at a police search of a property or where a person’s fingerprints are taken when they are booked into a custody suite. We do not consider it necessary or proportionate to provide a lawyer in those situations.
In addition, the directive requires that a person should always be able to meet his lawyer face to face, whereas we provide, in some minor cases, for telephone access, which detained persons often prefer as it can mean that they are held for a shorter period as it is not necessary to wait for a lawyer.
Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)
The Minister has covered the point that I want to make. We permit defendants to telephone for immediate advice from a lawyer. It is quick, cheap, easy and very accessible for defendants.
Mr Djanogly
The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. That is exactly the case, and if it is to be under threat we should be concerned.
The directive also requires absolute confidentiality of meetings and communications between a lawyer and a suspected or accused person. While confidentiality of such discussions is of course a fundamental principle, there are some limited circumstances in which confidentiality should not be guaranteed. The most obvious example is where the authorities have reason to believe that the meeting or correspondence is being abused to further criminal activity. In such circumstances, which are exceptional but none the less extremely serious, the communications ought not to be privileged and the authorities might need to monitor them.
We also believe that member states should be allowed to derogate from other rights set out in the directive, in certain exceptional circumstances. For example, it might not be appropriate to allow a person in custody to contact a particular individual if the police might have reason to believe that he will ask that person to conceal or destroy evidence. The ECHR case law has been clear that restrictions can be imposed on access to a lawyer for an accused person if there are compelling reasons to do so.
We do not think that the drafting allows enough discretion for judges to decide case by case whether evidence should be admissible if it has been obtained in breach of any of the rights set out in the directive.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
In some of the documentation and information that Members received before the debate, there seemed to be a question about whether citizens of the United Kingdom would be disadvantaged with regard to the high level of legal representation that they have compared with that in the other 26 EU countries, which seem to have agreed on a method and the way forward. As a Member of the House, I would have to ensure that my constituents had that high level of legal representation, such that it was equal to that in the rest of the EU and that we were in no way disadvantaged.
Mr Djanogly
The straightforward answer is that if the other states were to go ahead with the directive and we did not opt in, British subjects travelling abroad would, I suppose, have the advantage of the minimum standards whereas other EU citizens would not have the benefits in this country. However, that is not the basis on which we are negotiating, because it would not be a good position from which to negotiate. That is the technical position.
The changes that the directive in its current drafting would require us to make to our domestic law would not only be unnecessary, but would be highly resource- intensive. Our initial analysis suggests that the directive as drafted by the Commission could cost upwards of approximately £32 million to £34 million per year. I stress that the UK is not alone in having these concerns about the directive. The early negotiations made it clear that our concerns are shared by a good many other member states. The incumbent Polish presidency is taking a sensible and pragmatic approach to negotiations, and we can expect that the final product may be very different from the text we are looking at now and that many of the concerns that we have highlighted will be dealt with.
Because of that, and because of the value we attach to ensuring fair trial rights across the EU, we intend to work very closely with other EU partners to develop a text that takes greater account of the practical realities of investigation and prosecution and allows for greater flexibility in meeting the requirements of ECHR jurisprudence. Given the extent of our concerns with the current text, we cannot at this stage be entirely confident that all of them will be taken into account, and it is for that reason that we are seeking not to opt in at the outset. However—I say this to my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) in direct reply to his question—if our concerns are taken into account in the process of negotiation, we will be able to consider opting in at a later stage, as our protocol allows. Given the importance that we attach to this dossier, that is something to which we will give serious thought.
Mr James Clappison (Hertsmere) (Con)
My hon. Friend is setting out the situation with great care and extremely competently. If we were to take the decision to opt into the directive, would we then be subject to the European Court of Justice’s jurisdiction in respect of what he described as very wide ranging matters to which we had opted in?
Mr Djanogly
The European Court of Justice has jurisdiction in determining how European law is to be applied, but it is not an appeal court so it would not constitute any type of court of appeal.
I look forward to hearing the views of hon. Members on this recommendation and I commend the motion to the House.
Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)
As the Minister says, the directive forms part of a defence rights road map agreed by the European Council in 2009 that aims for greater harmonisation of fundamental tenets of the criminal law. We have opted in and supported the previous two limbs of that. The current proposals concern principally the right to access to a lawyer on arrest, the right to have someone notified on arrest, and the right to communicate with a third party on arrest. As such—I do not think the Minister resiled from this—it articulates what most British people would consider not only uncontroversial but essential civil liberties. Since 2009 the EC has sought to harmonise these rights across Europe. I think the Government welcome that.
Notwithstanding the points the Minister made, which I shall come to in a moment, it is difficult to see why the Government oppose the proposal as far as this country alone is concerned, at least for the present. If introduced, it would give us confidence that members of the British public would be subject to due process when overseas. According to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office website, more than 19 million British nationals travel to France every year, 13 million to Spain, 4 million to Italy and 2 million to Greece. Hundreds of them will, sadly, end up being arrested for a criminal offence. In Spain more than 2,000 Britons a year are arrested for criminal offences.
As the Minister said, Europe is not a homogenous legal environment and not all justice systems operate in the same way or to the same standards. I am grateful for the briefing that Fair Trials International provided for the debate. The organisation helps to ensure a fair trial for anyone facing charges in a country not their own. In its research it highlights some notable examples. I shall not spend a great deal of time on that, as it would take up the time of other Members who wish to speak.
Some of the cases are familiar, such as that of Garry Mann, a 51-year-old fireman and football fan who was arrested in Portugal, allowed to leave the country, subsequently arrested on an arrest warrant and imprisoned for two years. It was a case of mistaken identity and on arrest he did not have the benefit of a knowledge of Portuguese law, which would have allowed him a stay.
Another case is that of Edmond Arapi, who was convicted in absentia of committing a murder in Italy at a time when he was working in the UK. It got to the point where he was about to be extradited and imprisoned for a term of 16 years. Had legal advice been available to him at the time of his arrest, it would have become apparent much earlier that this was a clear case of mistaken identity.
Mr Cash
I am reasonably familiar with the Arapi case because it took place in Staffordshire, not far from my constituency. Of course, the real mischief was the arrest warrant itself. There was no reason whatsoever why that man was dealt with in that way. I think that it is absolutely futile to attempt to argue the case on access to lawyers on the basis of the complete failure of the arrest warrant system.
Mr Slaughter
The hon. Gentleman makes part of my point for me. There are concerns about the operation of the European arrest warrant, but that is one of the reasons we wish to see the provision of good-quality legal advice and access to lawyers throughout the European Union. He might have his own solution on our relations with Europe, probably a rather more fundamental one than mine or the Minister’s, but we are where we are and it is therefore important that these safeguards exist.
I was going to mention a third case, that of John Packwood. There are unfortunately a large number of such cases, but those are the three famous ones that have featured heavily in the UK press, particularly the Daily Mail, which has championed many of the cases in which the most perverse decisions have been made in foreign jurisdictions. For the people involved and their families, the experience was a nightmare. They were in a foreign country trying to communicate with officials who spoke an unfamiliar language and subject to procedures that were often summary and perverse, and yet they had no knowledge or advice with which to challenge them. It should be a matter of concern to the Government to protect our citizens overseas and ensure that they are given the same consideration as we would grant citizens of other countries visiting Britain, and that they are given the opportunity to do so and, at least for the present, decline.
We should not be slow to see the high standards of justice that British people expect of our criminal justice system applied to other countries. The directive would assist that process. After all, it was the previous Conservative Government who enacted the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, which provided a suspect in police custody with a statutory right to legal advice. Section 58 of the Act states that a person arrested and held in police custody is entitled to consult a solicitor privately at any time. The detention code provides that the consultation may be in person, in writing or by telephone and that free and independent legal advice is available. Therefore, the decision not to opt in to a directive that has the same intention as those provisions seems strange, and I will move on to what the Minister says are the differences.
First, the directive’s requirements are broadly in line with current UK legislation. Where there are divergences—the Minister mentioned one or two—they are negotiable. This is a process of ongoing negotiation, and in some cases they are subject to the requirements of national law. The example of searches, which the Minister gave, is one of those.
Secondly, the negotiations are continuing. As the Minister said, many other countries are concerned that there is inadequate room for derogation and are questioning aspects of the directive. It is therefore unlikely that it will remain in its current form. It seems pointless to send negotiating teams, as the Minister proposes, when we are the only country that intends to opt out at this stage, which fatally undermines the authority and leverage that this country will have. We appear to be throwing away an advantage to British citizens for reasons that are at best unconvincing and at worst spurious. Why have the Government taken this position? The Minister might have seen the briefing from JUSTICE, which takes the Government’s points of objection and states that they are either points that can be negotiated, or points that the Government have got wrong. It looks as though the Government are looking for reasons to opt out at this stage.
Tomorrow, the Minister and I will meet again for the next Committee sitting of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill, and I look forward to that in Committee Room 12 at 9 o’clock. One of the first clauses that we will consider is clause 12, which gives the new director of legal aid casework and, by extension, the Lord Chancellor the power to decide who does and who does not get access to a lawyer in a police station—and to do so on the basis of an interests of justice test.
There has already been an outcry throughout the criminal justice system at that attack on a basic right, which was introduced to avoid the risk of a miscarriage of justice. PACE itself was in part a response to the appalling miscarriages of justice of the 1970s, but, in answer to the criticism that the Minister is taking on a power that will allow the state to regulate who does and who does not get advice in a police station, he says that he has absolutely no intention of taking away legal help from police stations, so why is he then arrogating to himself the power to do so?
Taken together with the premature decision tonight to opt out of the directive while negotiations continue and before any decision needs to be taken, clause 12 of that Bill suggests that the lessons that led to PACE are being forgotten by this Government.
May I ask the Minister three questions, which, if he replies at the end of the debate, he may wish to answer? First, why are the Government not going to do what they did with the earlier stages of the road map and continue negotiations before making a decision on opting out? Secondly, why are they opting out now when there is further time to negotiate? And, thirdly, can the Minister confirm that the Government are committed to the current system of access to counsel in a police station and do not intend to erode that right, and if so explain why they are pursuing clause 12?
The objections that the Government have raised are nugatory and susceptible to change, if there is any merit in them, whereas the advantages to British citizens abroad are clear and substantial. It is not good enough for the Minister to say that we can get all the benefits of the directive if it is enacted in 26 other countries, but that we do not need to bother with it ourselves. That sounds like a clear Eurosceptic “have your cake and eat it” voice from the Minister, and I am not sure that that is what he is saying, but it is a—[Interruption.] I am not sure that Government Members think that that is what he is saying, either, but it is a knee-jerk reaction to opt out at this stage.
Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)
The hon. Gentleman has on a couple of occasions in the past couple of minutes referred to opting out of the directive, but we are not opting out, we are simply not opting in, and in fact there is a big difference, because if we opt in we will never be able to opt out.
Mr Slaughter
The hon. Gentleman makes my point for me. The Minister is at least open and clear about attempting to take the benefits. He wishes to do so, and in that I agree with him. Appalling miscarriages of justice occur regularly, and we want British citizens to be protected from that, but we cannot do so without engaging. We can negotiate what are for us as a country relatively minor changes, if changes at all are needed, but if we accept the experts who briefed Justice we find that the Government have misinterpreted those minor changes, to which the Minister alluded, in any event.
In the end, it comes down to this: do we wish seriously to see the proposals implemented, in which case we should be in the game and negotiating clearly, or do we wish to take the Government’s somewhat disingenuous position tonight? For that reason, and notwithstanding the Minister saying that he may change his mind in due course, we will oppose the Government this evening.
Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)
It is a pleasure and a relief to be called in the debate, partly because I gave relatively little notice of my intention to speak, and partly because I knew I would be coming immediately after the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr Slaughter). As other Members who serve on the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Public Bill Committee know, sometimes he gets carried away with his eloquence and might well have risked eating into the entire time allocated for this debate.
Obviously, I welcome the debate. As the Minister said, the new Commission proposal seeks to guarantee fair trial rights, providing access to a lawyer from the first stage of police questioning and throughout criminal proceedings by allowing adequate confidential meetings between the lawyer and the suspect; by allowing the lawyer to play an active role during interrogations and to check detention conditions by making sure that the suspect is able to communicate with at least one family member or employer; by allowing suspects abroad to contact their country’s embassy or consulate and receive visits; and by offering people subject to a European arrest warrant the possibility of legal advice in both the country where the arrest is carried out and the one where it is issued. The draft directive acknowledges that the right to a lawyer is not absolute and allows some derogation.
As the Minister said, the UK affords most of the protections offered in the new proposal in existing domestic law. However, as the hon. Member for Hammersmith pointed out, in many other EU countries there is clearly not such provision; he quoted from Fair Trials International, which listed the countries in which, unfortunately, many of the rights that we have here do not apply. That is clearly why it is arguing for the UK to opt in to the directive.
The Minister rightly set out the Government’s concerns about the provisions, some of which are not consistent with our national law or practice. Some of the proposals have financial implications for the UK, when, as we know from our debates on legal aid, there are real pressures on budgets. However, it is important to point out that other member states share many of our concerns about the practical implications of the proposal and the ability of their criminal justice authorities to investigate and prosecute crimes.
In his letter, the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice briefly set out the other issues about which the UK Government have concerns in respect of the impact on our legal system. I hope that the Government will pursue those matters because there can be no doubt that, as the Minister who is here today has acknowledged, the directive would benefit UK citizens abroad, many of whom have to put up with legal systems that are not comparable with ours. Equally, if the UK opted in, some aspects of the changes required might well be beneficial to other EU citizens who had to go through our own court system. I hope that there is an active engagement on these issues.
My final point is about whether the UK Government’s approach is one of going in to win the battles around the differences and perhaps secure the possibility of opting in later, or whether we are going in to battle for a draw—to try to make some changes, but without the expectation that they would be sufficient to allow the UK to opt in. I hope that the Minister will be able to answer that point.
Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)
I will not be long, Mr Deputy Speaker; I just want to put on the record my opposition to the motion. The Minister made great play of the fact that it does not contravene the European convention on human rights, and suggested that cost was a key consideration in not opting into the directive.
As I understand it from the legal opinion that I have heard, it is clear that the motion does conflict with article 6 of the convention and areas of PACE, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Mr Slaughter) has said. There have been a number of miscarriages of justice, such as the Garry Mann case; I understand that, because the directive was not in place, Mr Mann had only five minutes with his solicitor before he was convicted.
I turn briefly to the impact of cost. If cost came before the consideration of human rights we would be on a very slippery slope; that would not be a sign of a civilised society—the one that I recognise that we belong to. I have spoken tonight because I wanted to register my objection to the motion.
Mr William Cash (Stone) (Con)
The European Scrutiny Committee recommended this subject for a debate on the Floor of the House, in line with the written ministerial statement that all matters of this kind would be so debated when they
“have a substantial impact on the United Kingdom’s criminal or civil law”.—[Official Report, 20 January 2011; Vol. 521, c. 52WS.]
This is a very good starting point. However, I am somewhat disquieted by the extent to which the Minister has indicated—I hope that I am wrong, and that he will correct me if I am—that it is only a matter of time before, irrespective of the matters of principle that arise, we might end up opting in. I remind him that the whole process of the opting-in arrangements is based on a presumption against our opting in unless there are profoundly good reasons for doing so.
For the reasons that have already been touched on by the Minister and by the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr Slaughter), I believe that neither the difficulties that arise in relation to the application of arrest warrants nor the question of failures of justice in certain countries in the European Union may ever be sorted out. One need only look at a number of countries that came in by way of accession over the past few years. That went somewhat against the advice of the European Scrutiny Committee, and we had indicated beforehand that they had judicial systems that were so substantially below standard and riddled with corruption, with political judges and perverse procedures, that it was completely unacceptable that they should be allowed in. Access to a lawyer is obviously an important necessity, but whether one gets justice as a result of having such access when the courts themselves are corrupt is quite another story. That needs to be borne very much in mind.
We all believe that when citizens of the United Kingdom go abroad they should have access to a proper judicial system when they get there. Sometimes they are arrested, as in the case of some of the arrest warrants. We have heard reference to the Arapi case and one or two others. I have the greatest respect for Fair Trials International; its representatives have given evidence to the European Scrutiny Committee, and they have been very impressive. They have grave reservations about the arrest warrant and have said so. Where there is a serious problem in respect of the judicial system of a given member state, the fact that one has access to a lawyer may be only a minor mitigating factor.
Some time ago, before a lot of these laws were being put through, there was the case of the Greek plane spotters. Mr Arapi came from Staffordshire, and I noted what went on. My hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Karen Bradley) was instrumental in what happened. It was the subject of her first intervention in Prime Minister’s questions, and the Prime Minister immediately seized on it. I had a little word with her beforehand and suggested that it might be a good idea if she raised it with him, because I was convinced that he would immediately take the appropriate action, and he did. However, it took the intervention of the Prime Minister to sort this out, not access to a lawyer or to the judicial system where this poor man was convicted and sentenced to 16 years for an offence that he could not possibly have committed. The entire procedure that led to his conviction was utterly, completely and incontestably absurd, futile and dangerous.
My concern is less about access to a lawyer and more about whether people get justice even when they have a lawyer. That might seem rather strange, but it is exactly the problem. I do think that being able to contact consular authorities is incredibly important. I would certainly go along with that.
We have heard a number of points from the Minister, and I will briefly mention them, so as to put this on the record as Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee. The potential consequence of article 10.2 and 13.2—of fettering the ability of a trial judge to decide on a case-by-case basis whether evidence should be admissible if it is obtained in breach of the directive’s provisions—is one problem. The other, as the Minister has indicated, is the financial implications of article 4, about providing a face-to-face meeting with one’s lawyer. As the Minister said, it is suggested that the cost of providing that could be as much as £32 million to £34 million a year. Another problem is the precluding of the use of accredited representatives. Those are people who are trained to advise a suspect at a police station. Even though they are not qualified lawyers, they at least provide a degree of assistance.
There is also the issue of the European convention on human rights, about which it is well known that I am not wholly enthusiastic, to say the least. It would be far better if, having drafted the European convention on human rights, we had been aware that we are quite capable of passing legislation in our own country to protect people’s human rights. The idea that I am not in favour of human rights, which the Home Secretary put to me the other day, is positively absurd. Of course I am in favour of human rights; I just want them to be real ones.
I am afraid that quite often artificial constructions are placed on the European convention on human rights, which have been criticised by some distinguished judges. The Lord Chief Justice himself said that the first duty of judges is not to apply Strasbourg decisions in the UK courts, but to protect the common law. A tremendous industry has been created since the 1990s, and the extent of human rights law has now reached astronomical proportions. It provides lawyers with a useful source of income without giving a proportionate degree of protection to those who seek human rights. Human rights could be provided for in Westminster if we passed our own legislation.
Another question is what effect an EU proposal would have if it failed to improve fair trial standards in our own criminal law. Even if it attempted to improve trial standards in other countries, what effect would it have on our criminal law? If the EU proposal had no effect it would become a lot easier to support it, with all the reservations that I have already expressed.
This afternoon, the Lord Chancellor gave evidence to the European Scrutiny Committee on the accession of the EU to the European convention. I assure hon. Members that he made it clear that that is a very, very long-term proposal, with huge degrees of negotiation yet to happen. Apart from that, there must be unanimity all the way down the line. He even ventured to suggest that it might not happen in his lifetime, or at any rate in his political lifetime.
We have to bear in mind the complexities that are being developed. The European convention, as it relates to the citizens of this country and others abroad, interwoven with the charter of fundamental rights under the Lisbon treaty, which of course we voted against but which the Government are now implementing, produces the curious result of a multiplicity of complex procedures all overlapping with one another. It is important that we bear that in mind, because it would have a bearing on cases such as those that we are discussing.
As I have said, given that we have tried and tested procedures, my preferred option would be not to opt in. I have grave reservations about the tsunami of opt-ins that we have been seeing.
Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)
Is not the fundamental problem with EU opt-ins that if we opt in there is no way back, so if our negotiation is not successful we are stuck with whatever is decided, but if we choose to opt out we are not part of the negotiations? That means that if we opt in at a later stage we get the worst of both worlds. That is a fundamental flaw of the European Union and the opt-in system.
Mr Cash
I very much agree with my hon. Friend, who is also on the Committee and witnesses these things at first hand. The Committee recommended this debate, and I am glad that it is taking place. It is not a token exercise, and I trust that the Minister understands that there are serious reservations about how the judicial system operates in other countries. Although we certainly believe that access to a lawyer and to consular authorities is a good idea, we do not have to have the Lisbon treaty, the European Union or an opt-in procedure under those arrangements to provide for access to the courts or to secure protection for those who need it.
Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)
I add my thanks to the European Scrutiny Committee and my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) for ensuring that we are having another of our regular Wednesday evening debates on European matters. I am also pleased to say that for once I can support the Government’s present position on this issue, although I have to say that I am a little concerned that I might not be so readily able to support what might come in future.
When any of our constituents travel abroad, they do so in the full knowledge that they are entering a foreign country with foreign systems. It seems to me that the fact that there are inadequacies in some of the legal systems of other European Union member states is not a good reason to accept another dollop of European legislation.
I have heard no one suggest that our own procedures and legal systems in this country are not up to scratch. In fact, as far as I can see, it is a case of the rest of the Europe catching up with the systems and procedures that we already have in place. Of course, if we were ever to opt into the directive, we would have to change some of our existing procedures that have served us well. In my short time in the House, I have never had anybody complain to me about the procedures that we have in place in respect of access to a lawyer, the right to consult a lawyer when detained or any of our pre-charge procedures.
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
Whatever one’s view of the current procedures within the UK, surely it is for the House and the UK to decide whether there are to be changes, on the basis of the arguments, which should be fully explored and discussed beforehand, rather than changes coming about as the by-product of a European directive. That is the problem if there are to be changes in the UK system.
Mr Nuttall
The right hon. Gentleman makes an extremely valid point. I would have made the same point later, but I shall make it now. I have heard no complaints about our current procedures, but if there were a general acceptance that an aspect of them could be improved, it would be for the House to pass legislation to do so. We would then have the right to tinker with and change them as we wished. Indeed, we have done so. Only very recently, a Delegated Legislation Committee on which I sat altered the rules under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, because this House thought it appropriate to do so.
Mr James Clappison (Hertsmere) (Con)
My hon. Friend is making an important point in response to the one made by the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds). Has my hon. Friend turned his mind to the bigger picture? These opt-ins do not come before the House by accident or by way of judicious fine-tuning of our system. This measure is part of a political project that was put in place by the EU to create a European area of freedom, security and justice, whereby rules and laws on criminal procedures and other criminal matters will be made at the EU level rather than in this House, and whereby our law will be subject to that law.
Mr Nuttall
My hon. Friend makes another extremely valid point. Whenever I have discussions on European matters with constituents and other members of the public—not surprisingly, I have such discussions fairly frequently—time and again they refer to the fact that they are dissatisfied with our membership of the EU because they believed that the EU was to do with business and trade. They believe that the EU should have no part in justice or home affairs. When we entered the EU all those decades ago, it was never envisaged that the EU would play a part in justice and home affairs. That is one reason why I will continue to push for a referendum. Such things may have been in the minds of those who were pushing for the European project, but they were never in the minds of our electorate. They were never told about that and it was not part of their consideration when they went to vote back in the 1970s.
Mr Cash
May I remind my hon. Friend that the Conservative party, for the first time since 1972, was completely united in opposing the implementation of the Lisbon treaty? Only as a result of entering into the coalition agreement did we end up having to accede to many of the provisions that result from the introduction of a treaty that we were previously united in opposing.
Mr Nuttall
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. That is one reason why opposition to our membership of the EU is growing in this country. As I often say to people, in many ways every directive that passes is another nail in the argument of those who will one day argue in a referendum—I believe we will eventually have one—that we should stay in the EU. People are increasingly fed up with the ever-growing competences of the EU. It is all very well to argue that the European Union Act 2011 will put an end to all these things, but we can see—day by day, week by week, month by month—that slivers of competence are going to Europe, and this would be another of those slivers. If the directive were adopted, it would be a classic example of this country’s handing over a further tiny piece of its competence. It might be only a sliver, but this is still a matter of sovereignty. At present, we can decide what our rules are.
Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)
Is this not also a classic example of the European ratchet? First the European arrest warrant allows British subjects going about their lawful business in their own country to be arrested by foreign Governments; then it is decided that there must be basic standards to protect them from such action, because that is only fair and proper; and that then leads to the conclusion that there must be more harmonisation of the criminal law across Europe. In fact, what Her Majesty’s Government should be doing is not just not opting into this, but getting out of all the other measures to which they have agreed.
Mr Nuttall
My hon. Friend has made an excellent point, which I am sure would find widespread support outside the House. Far too much legislation from Europe is already foisted on our constituents, and we certainly do not need this as well. It is, in my view, an example of a solution looking for a problem. There is certainly no great clamour for it. When our constituents go abroad, they may well choose to go to Europe—there are, after all, another 26 countries in the European Union—but they may equally choose to visit any of the other 170-odd countries in the world, where none of this would apply. What do they do then?
We ought to consider speaking—quietly and diplomatically, of course—to plenty of other countries which have judicial systems that are far less helpful to the accused than any that might be found in the European Union. This is, I submit, a criminals’ charter. If it were to become law, the criminals and their lawyers would not only have to comply with the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, but would have recourse to this directive as well as the European Rights Act 1998 and the European convention on human rights. It would be yet another hurdle for our police to surmount in dealing with crime and disorder on our streets, and, in my opinion, a problem that we could well do without.
The other group of people who would profit from the directive are the lawyers, particularly legal aid lawyers. As has already been mentioned this evening, it has been suggested that advice be given face to face. I know from my own experience many years ago that when a suspect is arrested, advice is given quite adequately on the telephone, and I see no reason to change that arrangement. Again, there has been no clamour for it to be changed. I see no reason why this country should have to change its practices and procedures purely on the basis of this directive. It may well benefit other countries—indeed, it may well benefit some of our constituents when they travel abroad—but I feel strongly that there is no need for it to be adopted now or at any time in the future. I hope that even when the negotiations have been completed, this will be the last that we hear of it, and that we shall never see it back on the Floor of the House again.
Mr Djanogly
This has been a constructive debate, and it has provided a timely opportunity to place the Government’s position on the record. Let me reconfirm, not least for my hon. Friends the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) and for Bury North (Mr Nuttall), that we believe it is important that action is taken to ensure that the standards of criminal procedural rights across the EU are adequate—I stress the word “adequate”. That will help to ensure that British nationals in other member states receive the rights that underpin a fair trial. It will also help to provide the level of mutual trust necessary to support European legal instruments that require competent authorities to accept and act upon decisions or judgments given in other member states.
The Government see clear benefit in setting minimum standards across the EU in respect of certain aspects of criminal procedure. As many Members have noted, standards of criminal procedure in relation to access to a lawyer and the right to communicate upon arrest are high in the UK. We see benefit in an effective and workable directive which would raise standards in this area.
The Opposition spokesman, the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr Slaughter), asked a number of questions. He asked why the UK had opted in to the previous two directives on the procedural rights road map, but not this one. The Government believe it is important that action is taken to ensure that the standards of criminal procedural rights across the EU are adequate. The previous Government opted in to the directive on interpretation and translation in criminal proceedings, and this Government opted in to the victims directive. The hon. Gentleman asked why we opted in to that directive, but not this one as well. The Government have decided to opt in to the victims directive establishing minimum standards for the rights, support and protections of victims of crime because it meets the criteria set out in the coalition agreement with regard to EU justice and home affairs measures and is more in line with existing UK practice. I can confirm to the hon. Gentleman that we currently intend to retain free legal advice in police stations, as I have said publicly in the past, and he will hear more on that in Committee tomorrow.
The hon. Gentleman and my hon. Friend the Member for Stone mentioned individual examples of process, on which the Government cannot comment. However, I noted the disappointment of the hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) about the fact that we do not intend to opt in at the outset.
I also understand the disappointment of Members who have set out the difficulties faced by constituents who have faced trial in certain other EU member states. However, the directive as published by the Commission goes very much beyond what we see as the minimum standards of the European convention on human rights and would have an adverse and exceptionally costly impact on our ability to investigate and prosecute offences effectively. We do not think it would be sensible to opt in to the directive at this stage because it is not possible to be completely confident that all these difficulties could be mitigated through negotiation.
I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) for his supportive remarks, and I can confirm that we intend to negotiate and win on our positions. In order to do so, we intend to work very closely with our European partners—that work is already under way—to develop a text that takes greater account of the practical realities of criminal investigations and prosecutions. We are not alone in our concerns, and we are optimistic that the directive that is finally adopted might look rather different from that published by the Commission.
Our aim during negotiations will be to amend the text constructively, so that the UK might be in a position to contemplate participating in the final directive, and we have three months from the proposal in which to opt in. We can be part of the negotiations if we do not opt in, but we would not have a vote, so we intend to participate in, and influence, negotiations to make the directive better. We would opt in post-adoption only if our criteria were met, and following appropriate consultation in Parliament. I can confirm to my hon. Friend the Member for Stone that there is no inevitability to opting in, and I understand many of the concerns he raised. At the same time, I have to tell him that there is no presumption against opting in unless there are profound reasons for doing so, such as he suggested.
Mr Clappison
If the decision is taken to opt in—which I would regret, for reasons I have explained—I hope it will be made clear that our Government are opting in to a major piece of criminal justice legislation and choosing to hand over to the EU and the European Court of Justice jurisdiction over a wide swathe of our criminal procedure.
Mr Djanogly
We will still have jurisdiction over criminal procedure, and subsidiarity would apply as well, but my hon. Friend makes his point.
Any decision to opt in at a future date will be taken on the basis that the Government approach legislation in the area of criminal justice on a case-by-case basis, with a view to maximising our country’s security, protecting Britain’s civil liberties and preserving the integrity of our criminal justice system. Any decision to opt in at a future date would also be subject to scrutiny in Parliament.
Question put.
The Deputy Speaker’s opinion as to the decision of the Question being challenged, the Division was deferred until Wednesday 14 September (Standing Order No. 41A).
Business without Debate
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Delegated legislation
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Delegated legislation (committees)
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Leacroft Surgery (Crawley)
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Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)
I am very grateful to have the opportunity to present a petition on behalf of many of my constituents.
The petition states:
The Petition of residents of Crawley,
Declares that the Petitioners are concerned by the current proposals to close a general practitioner’s surgery in the Crawley Borough Ward of West Green.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to take all possible action to ensure that Leacroft surgery is able to maintain health service provision in the area.
And the Petitioners remain, etc.
[P000953]
Future of the BBC
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Mr David Amess (Southend West) (Con)
It was a childhood ambition of mine, at the age of 11, to become a Member of Parliament, and I was fortunate enough to be elected in 1983. I remember, as if it were yesterday, first arriving here and being told that this is the mother of Parliaments, that we are sovereign, that this is where laws are made and that Parliament existed to support parliamentarians with their duties. An enormous number of changes have taken place since I was first elected, and I have various question marks over the way in which this place is run these days. However, I am delighted to have the opportunity to raise an important issue that we take for granted—the British Broadcasting Corporation.
I am not using this Adjournment debate to attack the BBC—indeed, I have many friends and some relatives who work for it. However, as this place has been greatly diminished and we were under siege before the previous general election, I made a beeline for the BBC’s chairman and chief executive when we were invited to attend a reception held by the BBC after the election. I told them that I was very concerned about the way the BBC is run and about the salaries that both of those gentlemen are paid, and I will discuss that in due course.
The BBC is a blue-chip company of which we can be very proud. Its first transmission was from the roof of Selfridges in 1922. The first royal address was broadcast in 1924, and in 1932 we had the first Christmas address from His Majesty, the then King. I do not think that anyone in the Chamber remembers 1940, when Churchill made his rousing speeches, but the BBC also deserves credit for those. In 1945, there were the wonderful Dimbleby’s revelatory reports about the terrible happenings in Belsen concentration camp. We have the Olympics next year, and in 1948 the BBC broadcast the Olympic games. Then, 1960 saw the construction of Television Centre, the first purpose-built TV centre in the world. We then go on to 1982 and Brian Hanrahan’s unforgettable news reporting of the Falklands war. In 1990—it is ironic that the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Austin Mitchell) is in the Chamber, because he and I held different views—we saw our proceedings televised. I was dead against that and I voted against it, but, anyway, our proceedings are now televised. The BBC had an exceptional global reputation for being an excellent source of unbiased and impartial news. Indeed, it was groundbreaking and it was known for having remarkably high journalistic integrity in its reports.
The BBC is:
“Institutionally biased to the Left”
and that is a “mindset”. Those are not my words, but those of Peter Sissons in an article in one of our newspapers this year. He said that there were
“basic journalistic mistakes—wrong dates, times and numbers…and basic political or geographical facts”
were wrong. The BBC tends to run positive stories in favour of the UN and the European Union. When it comes to reports relating to Israel, it only ever half tells the story, favouring stories that show Israel in a poor light and failing to report the rest of the facts—I think in a highly disproportionate manner. For instance, there is an humanitarian disaster waiting to happen in Camp Ashraf, so why do we hear nothing about it? There is a terrible situation in Syria, but we do not hear from relatives of President Assad who do not think he is a terribly good leader.
More poignantly, the BBC is fervently anti-cuts and ensures that that message pervades every aspect of BBC programming. Since the general election, the BBC has embarked on a consistent policy of criticising Government actions, which is rather amusing given that the director-general declared that bias at the BBC—he said it, so he must recognise that there was bias—was a thing of the past.
Over the past few days, we have seen that the former Labour Prime Minister was very friendly with Mr Gaddafi in 2004. A book has now been published that shows that there were tensions at the highest echelons of the previous Labour Government. Given the BBC’s high expertise in investigative journalism, it is puzzling that none of those things was brought to the fore at the time. We need only to think of “The One Show”, which recently ran a segment in which a presenter asked the Prime Minister, “Are you too much of a toff?” Another asked him, “How do you sleep at night?”
The BBC uses the term “independence”—I am still citing Peter Sissons—to mask the fact that it positions itself to serve its own best interests. For example, preference was given to Tony Blair’s party conference speech in 1995. Alastair Campbell berated the BBC editor to give the story precedence above all others based on the speech’s proximity to the next general election. That was what happened.
The BBC consistently gives left-wing politicians and figures a platform to spout policy and denounce the Government. Examples include the differing treatment of guests from different ends of the political spectrum on shows such as the “Today” programme. How politicians allow themselves to be treated so badly on the “Newsnight” programme, and on “Question Time” and so on, I do not know.
One thing that is particularly unforgivable is the constant practice of presenting the opinion of BBC correspondents as fact, as summed up by Peter Sissons, the former long-time BBC news presenter, in an article earlier this year. He said that “the increasing tendency” at the BBC is
“to interview its own reporters on air…Instead of concentrating on interviewing the leading players in a story or spreading the net wide for a range of views…It is a format intended to help clarify the facts, but which often invites the expression of opinion. When that happens, instead of hearing both sides of a story, the audience at home gets what is, in effect, the BBC’s view presented as fact.”
I know that I am biased, but we are blessed with an absolutely splendid Home Secretary and a first-class Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport. I do not criticise them regarding the challenge that lies ahead. In the past, after each election, the new Home Secretary has invited colleagues to come and talk about licensing and whether we should do away with it, but that has not happened this time. One of the main reasons why the BBC is so financially stretched is the cost of digital-only stations such as BBC 3. This youth-orientated channel costs £119 million a year. Shows on it include “Snog, Marry, Avoid?”, “Total Wipeout”, “Young, Dumb and Living Off Mum”, “Don’t Tell the Bride”, “Underage and Pregnant” and “Jamelia: Shame About Single Mums”. However, I am delighted that Mr Gareth Gates, whom we were honoured to have in the Palace of Westminster today to address the all-party group on speech and language difficulties—he had a speech problem himself—will be appearing on BBC 3 in November on a programme about people with speech difficulties. BBC 4, the more high-brow channel, costs £74 million.
I want to focus on the salaries of executives, because I now realise, as a Member of Parliament, that it is not the workers who are at fault in so many sectors of life but the management. The salaries that the management of the BBC are paid are absolutely ludicrous. The director-general is paid £838,000—this is madness! Other directors’ pay, as of March 2011, are: £488,000; £517,000; £467,000; and £452,000—not to mention what the financial controller gets. At 31 March 2011, 13 executive directors had cost us, the British people, £4,792,000, but we Members of Parliament are castigated for what we earn, and the electorate can get rid of us through the ballot box.
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
Let me give my hon. Friend an opportunity to take a breath of air after pouring out all those huge figures. Does he agree that it would be totally grotesque if BBC local radio, which is in touch with local communities, had to suffer cuts while those huge salaries were being paid out? In my part of Yorkshire, BBC local radio not only reports local sport such as Huddersfield Giants rugby league and Huddersfield Town football club, but is a valuable service when there is heavy snow, because it lets people know whether the schools are open, which shops are open and which roads are open or closed. People who cannot get out and about love their BBC local radio, and it would be totally grotesque if those salaries were still being paid while BBC local radio was being cut.
Mr Amess
I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. One cannot watch TV while driving a car, but one can listen to the radio. I love radio—Essex Radio is fantastic. I absolutely agree. Frankly, these BBC radio stations have been starved of cash, as can be seen by looking at some of their software.
The director-general proposed that the executives could increase their annual pay by tens of thousands of pounds through a policy known as “earn back”. I must say that I have the highest regard for Lord Patten, the current chairman of the BBC. I once had the honour of being his Private Parliamentary Secretary for a week, not because I was useless but because my former colleague, Robert Key, had been appointed as a Minister and I stood in for a week. Lord Patten is going to be a wonderful chairman of the BBC. Under the director-general’s proposals, however, the seven members of the BBC’s executive board, as well as the corporation’s 540 senior managers, would have been able to earn an extra 10% on top of their salaries by beating performance targets. The proposal was accepted by the BBC’s executive remuneration committee, but I am delighted to say that the new chairman stepped in and dealt with the issue. It just shows how out of touch they are.
I now move on to the presenters. I do not know whether we have brilliant presenters. I would just say that I find it slightly annoying that when one or two female presenters—I do not know whether they have had too much Botox or something—are presenting the news on a very serious subject, they smile. But their salaries, which we are paying for, are worth looking at. The highest paid stars’ earnings from the BBC cost 1.55% of the £3.49 billion that the licence fee brings in. That is huge.
The seven high-profile presenters involved in this year’s coverage of the Glastonbury music festival for the BBC were not only paid lots of money for going, but given complimentary tickets. Why did the BBC send 400 journalists to the Glastonbury festival? All this goes unquestioned. We are concentrating now on phone hacking and so on. If Parliament was as it used to be, we could properly scrutinise these things.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
The hon. Gentleman has mentioned performance targets. Does he agree that if there have to be performance targets, they should be based on the satisfaction of the TV licence holders, and that plenty of them are dissatisfied?
Mr Amess
I am going to call the hon. Gentleman my hon. Friend. I absolutely agree with his point, and I hope that will be a subject for another debate.
To save money, headquarters are moving to Salford. Well, I am sorry: London is the capital city. Other TV channels have found that London is the best place for programmes to be based. Indeed, ITV moved “This Morning” to London because it could not get guests to travel to the studio in Liverpool. There are fears that the corporation’s move to the north could turn out to be an £877 million white elephant. It is understood that the BBC has had to offer incentives for people to move to Salford.
On sport, I am sure that many hon. Members used to love watching cricket on the BBC, and wall-to-wall coverage of Wimbledon and so on. “Test Match Special” was so special. Well, all that has gone and now constituents are contacting me about Formula 1. We even had all the anti stuff against Andy Murray. Okay, he is Scottish; let’s get over it. He is a fantastic tennis player.
I end with a thought about the licence fee. I am delighted that the Government have frozen it at £145.50 until April 2017. That amounts to 40p a day, which for lots of people actually mounts up to quite a lot. The completion of the digital switchover in 2012 would be a good time to think once again about how the BBC is funded. The British Broadcasting Corporation is a jewel in our crown, if it is well run and managed. It is pointless to have Adjournment debates unless hon. Members’ arguments are listened to. I hope that my words have been listened to and that there will be changes in the ridiculous high salaries that are being paid.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Order. I remind Members that the debate finishes at 8.47, and I am sure that we want to give the Minister time to respond.
Austin Mitchell (Great Grimsby) (Lab)
I am grateful for a little space from the Minister’s table to comment, because I will not follow the hon. Member for Southend West (Mr Amess) in his ludicrous accusations of bias in the BBC, about which he is as wrong as he was all those years ago about televising Parliament. However, he mentioned, in his back-handed way, quality in the BBC. We are about the get the document “Delivering Quality First” from the BBC, in which it will tell us how it will deliver a 20% reduction in spending and a 25% reduction in overheads. That is far more than can be gained by any reduction in fees paid to Jonathan Ross or “Paxperson”, or even in the director-general’s ludicrous salary.
This is a serious issue, because cuts cannot be made on that scale without damaging the BBC’s quality of production. This is a national jewel—a national asset—and we propose to inflict devastating cuts in production and staff, in the BBC’s scope and artistic integrity and, above all, in quality. Quality costs in television, and it must be financed.
Here we are damaging this precious asset as a result, it seems to me, of a dirty deal that was arrived at between the Conservative party and the Murdoch interests. In return for the Murdoch newspapers’ support, the Conservatives agreed in opposition to prune the BBC, as James Murdoch had asked for in his MacTaggart lecture, and to give them the ability to take over Sky. Part of that deal has now fallen through, but it is important—I wish the hon. Gentleman had mentioned this—to stop the decimation of services in the BBC. It must be stopped.
Far from using the licence fee as a stranglehold on the BBC to enforce reductions, we should pass at some stage a supplementary licence fee increase to save it from these cuts, which will be compounded by taking on the burden of the World Service. It is not now a matter of grumbling about bias at the BBC and making snide remarks about the salaries paid at the BBC. It is not now a matter of handwringing; it is a matter of fighting to save the BBC.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
I congratulate my hon. Friend and near neighbour the Member for Southend West (Mr Amess) on securing this important debate. I believe that I can set out the answer to the problems that he has talked about this evening. I have campaigned since becoming a parliamentarian for the democratisation of the BBC licence fee. I have presented a ten-minute rule Bill and tabled many motions and questions on the subject. I agree with him that the BBC is a jewel in the crown. I think of the quote from Shimon Peres, who said that the BBC makes
“dictatorship impossible, but democracy intolerable”.
I, like my hon. Friend, love Essex Radio and “Look East”. We know that they provide essential services for people in my community, but the problem is that we are compelled to pay for the BBC and have no say over its cost or programming. The BBC is monopolistic, with about a third of TV viewing and half of radio, but it does not need to make a commercial return, so other providers are crowded out. We have no recourse and no means of redress. I do not object to the licence fee; I would be happy to pay double.
Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)
My hon. Friend says that the BBC is a jewel in the crown, but what percentage of the British public does he think would purchase a licence if doing so were not compulsory?
Robert Halfon
If my hon. Friend waits, I will answer his question in a second. I would pay double for the licence, but the problem is that we have taxation without representation. We do not tolerate that in politics, and there is no reason why we should tolerate it in our public media.
Under my private Member’s Bill, which is due for consideration on 25 November, the BBC would have to set out an annual plan and licence fee payers would vote. It is quite astonishing that licence fee payers had no say over the appointment of Chris Patten, whatever his merits might be. To those who say that voting would mean a decline in quality, I say that that attitude is mixture of ignorance and snobbery—ignorance because there is a market for quality, as Classic FM and other quality media show, and snobbery because that is like saying that the public should not be free to choose for themselves.
Mine is not a radical proposal. Company shareholders have the right to hire and fire their boards. Residents have the right to elect their MPs and councillors. Given that we are supposed to be the BBC’s owners and are compelled to pay for it, we should democratise the licence fee immediately and give licence fee payers the vote.
David Morris (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Con)
I have been listening to the views expressed by hon. Members and I agree with quite a lot of what has been said, but the House should consider the fact that the fears and complaints expressed about monopolies in the media when News International attempted to take over Sky were taken on board by the Government, yet we hear no real complaint about the BBC’s monopoly, which reaches far more widely.
There is a lot of talk of cuts, but let us look at the quality of television programmes: as my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West (Mr Amess) said, we have all those reality programmes, such as “Snog, Marry, Avoid”, which are ridiculed by the public and in the media. Is that what we want to spend our money on? I do not think it is. The ratings are dropping off and have been doing so steadily since 2000, when the reality TV boom occurred. We are ploughing all that money into the BBC without getting back programmes of the right quality. Efficiency is what we are trying to achieve, not stifling the BBC with cuts. We are trying to get the right deal for the public.
It has to be borne in mind that the Government have spent a lot of time and energy on ensuring that local communities have greater influence over their local services, yet that has not been applied to the BBC. Are we aware that the BBC does not feel that it should be included in this and be subject to the public’s views? We have only to listen to local radio to hear that it is stifled in its approach to what it broadcasts.
As more of our local papers move to online versions, does the House share my fear that non-commercial BBC websites might put them out of business, cutting choice for local residents? The BBC is an institution that we should protect, but the charge of cuts that is being thrown at the Government is the wrong one to make. The issue is quality within the BBC. That is the point I wanted to put before the House.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Edward Vaizey)
We have had a good debate, long after the House concluded the rest of its business, and the fact that so many hon. Members wanted to participate shows that it could have gone on for much longer. I hope that the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Austin Mitchell) will tell his Front Benchers that they should initiate an Opposition day debate on the future of the BBC, because there is nothing that hon. Members enjoy more than having a good old debate about the good old BBC.
May I therefore congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West (Mr Amess) on introducing the debate and say how much I enjoyed his speech? I hope that I am not breaking a confidence if I say that before the debate he told me that he had a lot to get off his chest, and he certainly did. He started with praise for the BBC, and it is right and proper that we acknowledge that the BBC is one of the finest broadcasters not just in this country, but in the world. It sets a quality bar, which is why we have such high-quality television and radio in this country. At this point, it is traditional for a Member taking part in such a debate to praise his local radio station, so let me say that I think that BBC Radio Oxford is the finest local radio station in the country. That will now appear as a jingle this week on BBC Radio Oxford.
More seriously, may I also praise BBC Worldwide for its success, led by its extremely effective chief executive, John Smith? It makes a significant income for the BBC.
Many topics were covered in the debate, and I have four minutes in which to deal with them. First, I hear what my hon. Friend had to say about impartiality and the BBC. We all have views and might occasionally throw something at the television when we see an item that we think is unfair. The BBC, in the consultation document from the new chairman of the BBC Trust, has said that it is aware of those concerns and will now have annual impartiality reviews. It sounds rather Orwellian, but the BBC is going to have impartiality seminars for staff, where they will be re-educated away from their partial tendencies towards impartial tendencies.
I heard my hon. Friend speak of his concerns about BBC 3 and BBC 4. They are not watched by many, but they are loved by a few. Again, it is an indication of taste that in the litany of programmes of which he disapproved, one shone out—“Total Wipeout”—of which I have become a great fan, because I can watch it with my young children.
I share my hon. Friend’s concerns about the level of salaries at the BBC. I am not sure I agree with the assertion that the people who earn these salaries could earn significantly more in the outside world. If such people could triple their salaries there, one wonders why they are not going into the outside world. We have made progress in transparency, at least. I hear his concern about what talent is paid, particularly the talent who use their platform on the BBC to make significant outside earnings by speaking at corporate events, which are not declared by the BBC.
The new chairman of the BBC Trust, Chris Patten, is a welcome appointment. I am pleased that we have a licence fee freeze. That will be good for the licence fee payer. Although the hon. Member for Great Grimsby, Cassandra-like, predicts doom for the BBC under the licence fee freeze, my glass is half-full in that respect. What the BBC has, which other media companies do not have, is certainty of income for the next six years.
There will be a charter review. The new charter must be concluded by the end of 2016. It may be that we take into account the views of my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) who, since he entered the House, has made a fantastic impact. I wonder, though, whether his proposals might be somewhat expensive.
May I also praise my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (David Morris) for his contribution—I am told that he used to be in a band, but it is not in Vacher’s, so I would like to know which band it was—and my hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley (Jason McCartney), who highlighted the importance of local radio?
I conclude by saying that I thoroughly enjoyed the debate. If anyone wants to know about my own political obsessions, let me point out that my devotion to Parliament and to the BBC means that once I watched the Parliament channel where, in archive footage, I saw the hon. Member for Great Grimsby in his younger days debating the merits of televising Parliament.
Question put and agreed to.
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Westminster Hall
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Disabled Young People (Support)
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Stephen Lloyd (Eastbourne) (LD)
It is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I am delighted to have secured this debate on support for disabled young people. I have called for this debate today because I have had serious concerns for some time about the inadequate transitional arrangements for many disabled children, particularly those with learning disabilities in the key period from childhood to adulthood. Having spoken to a number of disability charities such as Mencap and the National Autistic Society, as well as others, it is clear that problems with transition, as many of us in the Chamber know, have been going on for many years. I wished to secure the debate so that the Minister could reassure me that the coalition Government understand that there is a problem with transition and can outline how they propose to tackle that problem.
I should like to outline the common challenges that many parents of disabled children, and the young men and women themselves, experience once they are over the age of 17 or, in some cases, 16. Preparation for adulthood is a time of challenge and celebration for all young people, but for disabled young people, more often than not, it is a time of particular challenges. The Transition Support Programme and the wider Aiming High for Disabled Children programme, 2008-2011, resulted in improved consistency of support to young people and families across the country, including greater expectations that disabled young people would achieve their goals for adult life, so I am disappointed that those programmes are no longer running and would welcome the Minister’s comments on what will replace them.
As many hon. Members know from their postbags, parents of disabled people have to deal with numerous statutory services, from local councils in relation to disability access and provision in the home, to social services with regard to helping them to manage and providing respite care. Parents often have a great deal of contact with the local hospital or NHS to help the family with whatever the disability may be, particularly if it is a profound disability. For each disabled child, there is supposed to be a social worker who helps to co-ordinate all the different services. However, that key worker service ceases once the child reaches adulthood—if they were fortunate enough to have had a key worker.
Tussie Myerson, who contacted my office to share her daughter’s story, told me about one such case. Her daughter Emmy is 20 and profoundly disabled. Incidentally, Emmy’s story was first told in Parliament eight years ago, when the right hon. Member for Witney (Mr Cameron) was her MP. Since then, regretfully, her story has not much improved. Emmy, and her mother and father, have not had contact with a social worker for six years and have never had any contact with a key worker or benefited from any transition arrangements.
In 2006, the National Autistic Society surveyed its members on their experience of transition. It found that only 53% of young people with statements received transition plans during the course of their education, with the figure falling to 34% of students in mainstream schools—and that is a legal obligation. Unsurprisingly, 45% of those who participated in transition planning were dissatisfied with the whole process. One issue has crept up again and again as I have delved into the provision of support for young disabled people: the lack of—forgive the cliché—joined up, co-ordinated provision and a failure to share best practice between different authorities, leaving many parents to feel that the transition is something of a postcode lottery.
Emmy also had the misfortune of moving from one local authority to another, which her mother deemed to be a fiasco, to put it mildly. Emmy is now in her eighth year of legal wrangling with the local authority. She receives legal aid. I dread to think what the total cost of her legal fees might be, not to mention those of the local authority, but I am certain that without legal aid Emmy and her parents would not have been able to fight her case.
That is just one example. There are plenty more like it. When we get it wrong, disabled people suffer, their families suffer and, sadly, it can and does often lead up to the break-up of families.
Mark Tami (Alyn and Deeside) (Lab)
I, too, have had parents of disabled children come to see me. It puts a terrible stress on them. Parents worry very much about the future. They do not know what the future holds for their child, particularly when they are no longer with us.
Stephen Lloyd
I agree. Sometimes the parents split due to the sheer strain—and not just of looking after a severely disabled child, which is a challenge, no matter how much the parents love them. The situation often leads to irrevocable strain between parents, which is one of the saddest things that I have seen. Like all hon. Members, I have seen a lot of desperate cases. Often, the reason why parents split up is because statutory authorities, though they often try to be helpful, are clunky, and lack consideration and co-ordination. That, as I will go on to explain, makes it much worse. It also costs a great deal of money for the family, local authorities and all the agencies. It is therefore imperative, particularly for disabled children going into transition, that we get it right first time. I am sure that the Minister and hon. Members can appreciate how complex and challenging such a scenario must be for both the disabled young adult and the parents.
I have been liaising for the debate with Mencap, which has been very helpful and supportive. It has put together a document that defines what a good transition must look like. In its view, which I share, it is defined by three stages: planning, process and destination. To be a successful transition, each stage must be followed effectively and, most importantly, tailored to the individual, but there are general principles that can be applied to each stage. It is recognised that all young people should be at the centre of their transition planning—that is incredibly obvious. That is important for parents, uncles and aunts, and children without disability, but is doubly important when working with a disabled young adult. For young people with a learning disability, a plan will be achieved only if it is timely, accessible and diverse. To be ready for the start of their transition, young people should be encouraged to think about their options in year 8, so that they are adequately prepared for their review in year 9. In the run-up to and following their review, young people should have access to appropriate information about their rights and their options regarding their future. Ideally, the options presented to young disabled adults should be limitless. For all of us and for all disabled children, transition should be an exciting time for exploration, not a restricted choice of a predefined future.
No particular Governments or Government are at fault here; this has been a challenge for a long time. Even well before I was elected, I had people in my constituency come to see me who were absolutely petrified because their child was getting to the end of teenagedom and going into young adulthood. They knew that the key worker was going and that the services that supposedly, and often do, come automatically with young disabled children would disappear. It is no exaggeration to say that they were petrified.
If choice is to be at the heart of young people’s transition, it is crucial that they be given the opportunity to explore their aspirations with the aim of reaching their potential. For young disabled people to have such aspirations, those around them must be aiming to achieve the highest quality of life for them. None of that is complicated or different—it is exactly the same for non-disabled young adults as for those who are disabled.
Throughout a young person’s transition, the process should be co-ordinated and resourced. Although young disabled adults must be the director of their transition journey, it is crucial that the services supporting them be aware of each other’s role in the process. The position of key worker for a young disabled adult is therefore vital, to keep all the professionals in the loop. Obviously, within that, it is about working very closely with the parents of someone who has a profound learning disability, because as well as the work done with the young disabled adult, the parents are best suited to help and guide the child to decide what is best. Often, profound learning disability is accompanied by communication challenges.
For each service to play its part, adequate resources must be provided, mainly that of time. Each professional involved must be prepared to work alongside the young person regularly, to offer support and advice. The transition process should, however, be as unobtrusive as possible, to allow the young disabled person to enjoy as best as possible an ordinary teenhood.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I am sure that the hon. Gentleman and many others in the House are aware of the good work of some voluntary organisations, such as the Prince’s Trust, which I have visited and where I have spoken to some of the young people. Clearly, organisations out there are giving of their effort, time and commitment to help young people. Does he feel that the work of the Prince’s Trust ought to be recognised and complimented in this Chamber today?
Stephen Lloyd
I agree totally. The Prince’s Trust does outstanding work in this area throughout the United Kingdom. I am delighted to add that compliment into Hansard. The Prince’s Trust does a fantastic job.
The final stage, which is the destination, is the most important. Young people’s quality of life, as does everyone’s, depends on satisfaction with their destination and opportunity to thrive in the future. The best outcome of a transition is for the young people to be living in a place that they have chosen and to be doing what they want to do, with the support that is right for them. If the transition planning and process are followed in the way that Mencap describes and that I have been delighted to outline, in our view the outcome can be expected to be positive.
On other challenges with older disabled children or young disabled adults, a report published by Ofsted last month has highlighted some significant failings in the system. Too many children in further education with disabilities are failing to gain the qualifications needed to get a job or to continue with their education. The report also highlights the reduced support available once such individuals reach 19, which means that they are often burdened with insufficient advice about personal budgets, the requirement to pay fees and uncertainty about benefits entitlement. In fact, a recent study reported that in 2009 an estimated 30% of young people who had a statement of special educational needs when they were in year 11 and 22% of young people with a declared disability were not in any form of education, employment or training when they reached the age of 18, compared with 13% of their peers. Current figures from the labour force survey for the first quarter of 2011 show that 41% of men and 43% of women designated longer-term disabled were economically inactive. Surely such a high figure historically shows that little progress has been made in recent years. It is time that we all do more to do better by our young disabled fellow citizens.
Although since 2008 local authorities have been required to carry out multi-agency assessments for pupils with statements of need or in receipt of support before their transition to a post-16 provider, inspectors found that those arrangements were not working effectively. Providers had received a completed learning difficulty assessment in only a third of the case studies in which one should have been made available.
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman secured this important debate. Does he agree that there also is a problem earlier in the process, in the through-planning as children move from primary to secondary school? The assessments often take place after the child has arrived in secondary school, rather than in advance to enable preparation to be made for it.
Stephen Lloyd
Yes, I agree. I will touch on what the Green Paper says about SEN, but the problem that the hon. Lady raises is clearly of long standing.
The learning difficulty assessments were found to be not always timely or adequately completed, and did not form a reliable basis on which to plan support or an appropriate programme of learning. The transition at age 19 from children’s to adult services, and from the Young People’s Learning Agency to the Skills Funding Agency, created barriers for learners when they encountered different criteria for funding. Learners and their parents or carers identified that they would have welcomed more advice and careers guidance when they received a personal budget for purchasing a learning programme, care and support.
I am conscious, as I am sure the Minister is, that I am covering a range of responsibilities which is perhaps broader than her remit, but that is the reality of disability, in particular in the transition for disabled children or young adults, because so many different areas of Government and statutory services are touched. As I was drafting my speech, I half envisaged five different Ministers from the different Departments attending today because the subject covers such a wide area, but somehow I knew, even with my delusions of grandeur, that that would be unlikely.
Too little is known about the destinations of learners once they leave post-16 provision. A more systematic national approach to the collection and analysis of data about learners’ destinations would help to ensure that limited public resources were deployed effectively to support learners in making a successful transition to adult life.
Finally, I come to the Government’s proposed welfare changes, such as the transfer from the disability living allowance to the personal independence payment and the reforms to housing benefit. I am a member of the Select Committee on Work and Pensions—I am delighted to see some colleagues are present—and I support the direction of travel of many of the changes being proposed by the Department for Work and Pensions, in particular the Work programme. We are discussing young adults and children, but about 2 million children today are growing up in households in which no one works. That is a national scandal which I hope that the Work programme will address rationally and productively—I think that it is doing so.
David Simpson (Upper Bann) (DUP)
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on obtaining the debate. Many of us in the Chamber have in our constituencies special needs schools and schools dealing with children who have disabilities and learning difficulties, and I agree entirely with what he said about the dearth of activity for young people with special needs post-16 and post-19. He mentioned multi-agency work to help those young people, but does he agree that the CBI, the Federation of Small Businesses and their like should be encouraging their members to employ young people who might have learning difficulties or some form of disability?
Stephen Lloyd
I thank the hon. Gentleman for making that important point, which I will discuss when I talk about the Work programme and the black box principle, which I am excited about. Having been in business for many years before coming into politics, I passionately support more businesses employing and recruiting disabled people, because more often than not they are very good employees, but I am conscious that because many small businesses lack understanding of disability, they often will not let disabled people through the door, irrespective of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995.
Mark Tami
The hon. Gentleman makes a crucial point. Many employees make assumptions that disabled young people are capable of doing only certain jobs. That is wrong, and is a particular problem when dealing with mental health issues. Many employers make assumptions and do not want to employ such people.
Stephen Lloyd
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. Again, he makes a good point about mental health, which still causes fear in people. As vice-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on mental health and having grown up with a mother who had bipolar disorder, I have experience of and am familiar with mental health issues. I know that they may be a real challenge, but I also know that anxiety, fear and lack of understanding on the part of many people stop many of their fellow citizens contributing very effectively in jobs. Most people with mental health incapacity manage their incapacity.
The challenge of persuading the Federation of Small Businesses, the CBI and so on to take on more disabled people needs a push, and it will be underpinned by the Work programme. Some specialist small charities and training companies understand mental health and learning disability, and part of the opportunity of the black box principle and the Work programme is that there should be enough money for those smaller organisations to engage with local employers to help to break down that barrier. I would like the major trade associations to take more responsibility and to step up to the plate. I would like them to make a commitment. I am a parliamentary champion of the FSB, and I have a meeting with it tomorrow when I shall remind it of that. I appreciate the hon. Gentleman’s intervention.
I have specific concerns about the welfare changes involving young adults and children, and the change from disability living allowance to personal independence payment. I shall be grateful if the Minister puts them to rest. The Government have stated clearly that they intend initially to migrate working-age people to the new PIP, which means that until all age groups are migrated on to PIP, there will be two very different benefit systems for disabled people. The Every Disabled Child Matters campaign group, with which I have worked closely, is calling for under-16s not to be brought on to the PIP system before full public consultation and analysis of how the new system works for over-16s has taken place.
Although I welcome the Government’s decision to have a different commencement date for children and working-age adults on PIP, I share with the Every Disabled Child Matters campaign group its concern about the impact that the two systems may have on disabled young people who turn 16 in 2013. We are both concerned that the migration to PIP may result in those disabled young people testing out the new system. The Minister has responded to such inquiries in the House, but to my knowledge she has yet to give a firm acknowledgement that young people turning 16 in 2013 will not be the first to go through the new assessment. I shall be grateful if she provides an update.
That brings me to the proposed benefit cap and changes to housing benefit. We all want an end to taxpayers having to foot the bill for some of the absurd and astronomical rents for some families living on housing benefit. I do not have a problem with the broad thrust of that narrative, but we must be careful about unintended, disproportionate and unfair changes to the circumstances of disabled people and their families. The changes to the shared-room rate and the implementation of an overall cap on housing benefit cause me concern in relation to young disabled adults. Let me explain why.
The Government propose to increase the age limit for the shared-room rate from 25 to 35, so single people without children aged up to 35 and claiming housing benefit will be restricted to the rate for a single room in a shared house, instead of the rate for a self-contained, one-bedroom property. I shall give an example of why that causes me concern from the disability perspective. The disability of someone with high-functioning Asperger's syndrome—autism—more often than not makes it very difficult for them to share with strangers. A constituent who is a tremendous volunteer, and who helped me during the election by delivering Lord knows how many leaflets, has high-functioning Asperger’s syndrome and finds it difficult to go into a room where there are people he does not know—let alone to share a house with people he does not know, which the benefit changes may lead to. He struggles to go into a room where there are people he does not know, and frankly he will not unless I am right next to him. The Government’s proposal is a real problem for those with some disabilities, and I ask the Minister to take that on board.
David Simpson
The hon. Gentleman said that there will be two systems for disabled young people or people with disabilities, but my understanding is that by 2013 there will be one universal benefit. Will he please clarify that?
Stephen Lloyd
I am seeking clarification from the Minister on that point, which I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising. On the one hand, we have been told that there will be one universal system from 2013, but on the other, the Minister has said in the House that she understands that there may be a problem, and my understanding is that she will return with clarification. I too am a little confused, but I am cunningly fleshing it out—at least, that is the plan.
I emphasise that the equality impact assessment of a benefit cap shows that approximately 50,000 households, approximately half of which have a disabled member, stand to receive lower benefit payments. The Minister knows that I have general concerns about some of the housing benefit changes, but today I am focusing on the disability perspective, because I believe that if the changes are handled incorrectly, they could be catastrophic for some young disabled adults and their families. Some 52% of families with a disabled child are at risk of experiencing poverty. With more than 40% of disabled people aged 16 to 24 already living in accommodation that does not meet their needs—there is a long history to the problem—we must be careful of any resettlement as a result of a cap on housing benefit and an overall cap on benefits that disproportionately affect young disabled adults.
The SEN and disability Green Paper has been heralded by many who are hopeful of developing a more transparent, less conflict-ridden and more family-friendly system of support that gives parents a greater say in decision-making processes. I am hopeful that the White Paper will set out detailed proposals for radical legislative and policy changes. I mention the Green Paper because I think it contains some good and progressive potential protocols. I urge the Minister to continue to work closely with my hon. Friend the Minister of State, Department for Education (Sarah Teather), who is leading on that Green Paper. Disability never affects one Department, but involves a range of statutory bodies.
The Government have taken some positive steps, which I applaud. I have already mentioned the Work programme and emphasise that I am keen on the funding model, with its inherent black box principle. Over the years, I have worked with many disabled people. I know that too many large companies do not really understand disability and that the best people to work with young disabled people and help them to get into jobs are often specific groups and organisations, such as the Prince’s Trust, that not only understand disability but have a passion to make things better. The principle behind the Work programme and its funding is that much of the money and many of the resources should be downstreamed from prime providers to subcontractors which have a greater understanding of disability. I am hopeful that that approach will work.
I remind the Minister of what I said at the start of my speech about the main thrust of my anxieties. The system for the transition from childhood to the cusp of young adulthood is inadequate and has been for many years; support for young people on that cusp is poor, lacks joined-up thinking and provision for teenagers. I am also concerned about possible unintended consequence of changes to the welfare programme disproportionately affecting young disabled people. I am grateful to the Minister for listening to my remarks. I am aware that her Department has to cover a wide range of issues, and I look forward to her response.
Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)
Three hon. Members are standing up—a wealth of talent before me. I want to begin the winding-up speeches no later than 10.40 am. Three people wish to speak, so you can work that out and will all get a reasonable amount of time if you are fair to one another.
Sheila Gilmore (Edinburgh East) (Lab)
I thank the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Stephen Lloyd) for securing this debate because the issue is important. I do not intend to speak at length, but I want to touch on some issues that have come to me as constituency problems. They concern individuals but show some areas of policy where the situation could be improved. One issue concerned a young disabled lad who had just left his special school. He had stayed in that school until he was nearly 20, but to be honest he would probably be described as a three-year-old in a 20-year-old’s body. In many ways he is very happy and friendly, but he has no language. He suffers from Down’s syndrome and is severely autistic so his capacity is obviously limited. I am not an expert, but on meeting him and his mother I could quickly tell that the likelihood of someone like him being able to consider any form of employment was no more probable than my three-year-old grandchild entering employment.
The specific issue raised was his mother’s great concern about what had happened as soon as her son left his special school. When I first saw her, she was in the midst of filling in a form for employment and support allowance—she had to fill that in because he clearly could not, and she found it quite difficult. She also made inquiries to the Department about the possibility of a face-to-face assessment she had been told about. When she made contact, she was told that there were no exceptions, that there would have to be a face-to-face assessment, and that she would have to bring in her son. She explained that one aspect of his condition means that he finds it difficult to go into strange places, to the extent that even with all her powers and being used to the situation, she sometimes cannot make him do it.
As it turned out, I am glad to say that, on the basis of the forms and medical report it received, the DWP decided to award employment and support allowance in the support group without a face-to-face assessment. However, the family—the mother in particular—suffered unnecessary stress because of information she had received previously when her son’s circumstances were not fully taken into account. It occurred to me that such cases could be dealt with more quickly and effectively, and with less stress, if the DWP undertook outreach work in schools where young people are about to leave that form of education. The Department could have carried out its assessment quickly and easily within the school setting because nobody, other than his mother, knew better of what that young man was capable than the school. A great deal of stress and time would have been saved, especially had other forms of appeal become necessary. That is a matter of process where, with a little thought, a more humane system could be adopted.
That young man currently receives DLA, but when we look at the transition that will be made from DLA to the personal independence payment, we must think about the processes involved and the fact that we do not necessarily need to put everybody through a complex process if it is manifestly unnecessary. However much the Minister may feel that it would be useful for many people to go through such a system, there will be some cases in which, on anybody’s analysis, that should not be required. I urge her to give that issue some special thought before we get embroiled in the system and people are given conflicting messages about what is likely to happen. Even at the point of applying for ESA, my constituent was given certain information over the phone by officers in the DWP that increased her stress levels considerably.
Another minor aspect that my constituent raised—I accept this is not new and has been in the system for some time—was the financial position in which the family found themselves. That is obviously an important issue when it comes to purchasing the additional help and assistance that is often necessary outwith the local authority care package. Because my constituent’s son has been placed in a support group, once the first 13 weeks are up, a non-dependant charge will be placed on his mother in respect of housing benefit. She is over 60 and retired, but I think that even in earlier years she found it difficult to remain in employment, given her son’s condition.
At the moment, her son is on the lower rate of ESA because it is still within the 13-week assessment period, although it has been agreed that he will move into the support group and receive the higher rate of ESA. At the end of that period, he will be regarded as a non-dependant, and his mother’s housing benefit and the finances available to the family will in effect be reduced. Since the higher rate of ESA is supposed to meet a family’s additional needs, it seems somewhat perverse to take that support away because the mother is over retirement age, even if she is not working. I accept that that situation is not new, but it is perhaps something we should look at if we seek to improve the situation for families.
The mother said something else that I felt was worth pursuing. She has done a little research on this issue and talked to other people. She felt that, when her son suddenly became an adult for the system, the attitudes towards him and her suddenly became more difficult. That was not just about the benefits issues. She gave me another example. He has been given a care package and a place at a day centre and she was trying to get him used to the idea of that. He had been at a very good special school in Edinburgh, but the day centre is obviously a completely different environment. He was to have transport to go there but, given his particular difficulties with strangers, she asked whether he would have an opportunity to meet beforehand the person who would be doing the transportation. She was told, “No, because he is now an adult.” When he was a child and his arrangements changed, that opportunity was always given, but now she was just told, “No. Under the adult system, we don’t do that sort of thing.”
Stephen Lloyd
I thank the hon. Lady for making an incredibly powerful point about disability. The system does not appreciate that, for many disabled people, the nature of their disability means that in terms of age they may be an adult, but in terms of intellectual capacity and their ability to manage things, they are not. The system cannot cope with that. It is a very strong point. Does she agree that more needs to be done and understood in that area?
Sheila Gilmore
I certainly do agree, which is why I was trying to bring out that point. Sometimes there are unintended consequences from the important breakthrough whereby a lot of people with disabilities started to be treated as people with the right to make their own decisions and as an adult, like any other adult. Many people had been campaigning for that for a long time, and for many disabled people it has been a huge breakthrough and beneficial, but there are some people—my constituent and others whom I have come into contact with would fall into this category—for whom it does not work. All it does as far as the family is concerned is make life slightly more difficult. They do not see any purpose in it. Sadly, the young man to whom I have been referring will never grow into adulthood in that sense. Nothing in the field of medicine is likely to change that, so his mother felt that that blinkered view—“This is what we do”—was not helpful. It probably originated from something that was intended to be good, but it has turned out to have a downside.
The mother’s suggestion, which I think we should consider, was that there could almost be a separate category when it comes to the way in which people are treated. Her contention was that in some countries that is what happens—there is more understanding of the different nuances of disability and someone like her son is not treated in exactly the same way as other adults. She was keen to say to me that she thought that local government at all levels should be considering that type of option and trying to improve its practice. I know that there will always be difficulties about definitions and about the point at which those distinctions are made, but if we could apply that perspective and it improved the experience of disabled people—in this case, young disabled people—and their families, it would be beneficial.
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to participate in the debate under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I am also pleased that the Minister responsible for disabled people will respond to it because, as was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Stephen Lloyd)—I have called him my hon. Friend because we are colleagues on the Select Committee on Work and Pensions and have discussed these matters in that Committee on many occasions—we are covering a very wide ambit of departmental responsibilities in the debate. It is good that the Minister who can draw all those together for us in government will respond to the debate. We are pleased that she is here this morning.
Like the hon. Member for Eastbourne, I want to focus on some of the transition issues. Of course, for disabled young people, transition is quite a protracted process. It begins when they are in their mid-teens and can stretch right through until they are in their mid-20s as they transfer from children’s services to adult services in terms of how the social care package and social support are provided. Like all young people, they may move on from school to a college or higher education setting and, in due course, to employment. During that period, they may also seek to leave the family home and set up on their own. It is important that we consider how we support young people through those transitions economically, as well as through the care packages that they receive.
I am fortunate to have had some extremely helpful briefing from Every Disabled Child Matters, as other hon. Members have, and from the transition support co-ordinator at my local authority. One message that comes through clearly is the need for a planned approach to the transition; it cannot be left to chance. In addition, it is important that that planning begins early and is done with the young person and his or her family. Underlying what I want to get across today is the need to support disabled young people in achieving their aspirations. Too often, our aspirations for those young people, employers’ aspirations for them or even the aspirations of colleges, schools and social services for them are too low.
First, however, I will talk about some of the financial issues and I would be grateful if the Minister addressed them. The hon. Member for Eastbourne has already alluded to the implications of the introduction of the personal independence payment in due course. The Minister was good enough to write to me before the summer recess about the arrangements that will be consulted on in relation to children and young people, who are not currently to migrate immediately on to PIP. I think that at that stage she was saying that no firm plans were in place and there would be wide consultation as plans were developed. I certainly welcome that, but she must understand that there is an awful lot of uncertainty and concern as a result of the process still not being firmly available to people so that they can understand what the Government might be contemplating, and for some young people—for example, a young man I met in my constituency who is on the autistic spectrum—uncertainty is a particular worry. We were told that he already, at the age of 17, was beginning to worry about what the transition would mean for him. I therefore hope that the Minister can give us more information about the process today.
If young people aged 16 to 18 are placed on a benefit, as I accept they are now with DLA, that is identical to what adults receive, how will that be designed appropriately to meet their needs? We are particularly concerned about that. We are also concerned—other hon. Members alluded to this—about the assessment process for young people. In his comments to me, the transition support co-ordinator in Trafford highlighted the fact that young people already go through multiple assessments for different packages of support and benefits. My hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh East (Sheila Gilmore) has highlighted one way in which we might ease the assessment process, by going to the individual rather than setting up a series of assessment hurdles that they have to come to and cross. It is a very imaginative idea, which I hope the Minister will explore.
I am concerned about another issue. The Minister has indicated in the past that it is not necessarily the case that young people as they turn 16 in 2013 will automatically be migrated on to PIP, but I would like to know what further thinking she has developed in relation to the transition period. Does she envisage a phased transfer of young people on to PIP from DLA? If so, what will the time scale be and who might go first?
The Minister will know that real concerns remain about the situation of children and young people if the extended qualifying period for PIP that is proposed for adults is also applied to them. Children’s conditions develop and change incredibly quickly in some cases. CLIC Sargent has estimated that, if the extended qualifying period for PIP were applied to children and young people, that could lead to nine out of 10 families, and 60% of all its clients, suffering financially.
Mark Tami
It is an important point that CLIC Sargent raises, because the onset of a cancer is very sudden and, although some children react very well to the treatment, some children do not and there is an up-and-down pattern, so it cannot be said that there is a consistent level of requirement for those children. It is therefore very important that the support is in place straight away and particularly when the parents have received that devastating news.
Kate Green
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. As I say, many children’s conditions vary, progress and retreat much more suddenly and rapidly than those of adults. Crucially, children’s educational and social development is also taking place as they grow into young adulthood. If there are concerns about the financial support for children with medical conditions, that will also have wider developmental implications for them.
There is continuing uncertainty about children and young people in residential settings. I am particularly interested in young adults, some of whom are quite likely to want to look at residential colleges for their further education. The Minister wants to remove any duplication in funding in relation to the mobility component that people receive as part of DLA. I would be grateful if she could tell us how she expects to assess whether there is actually any duplication, because I have so far been unable to uncover much evidence of it. What assessment has she made of the implications for young people over the age of 16 in residential colleges, and particularly for their ability to participate as fully as possible in not only educational life but wider social life?
I echo the comments of the hon. Member for Eastbourne on housing benefit. I also want to highlight the concern that constituents have raised with me about the substantial costs of adapting housing and about the implications for them if the housing benefit changes and the housing benefit cap force them to move. It seems quite ridiculous that, as a result of other policies, we should disrupt families who might have had to make substantial investments to adapt their home accommodation. I hope that the Minister will indicate that there will be flexibility in the system to ensure that families of young disabled people, in particular, are not subject to great instability and do not have to move as a result of housing benefit changes. That is particularly important for the young people we are talking about, because such instability disrupts not only their social and educational networks but their medical and care networks in many cases.
Jim Shannon
On that point, which the hon. Lady has clearly illustrated, does she feel that the Government need a concerted policy to address housing benefit for young disabled people, considering that 10% of them will be homeless in a short period?
Kate Green
Clearly, that is an incredibly serious concern, which the Minister will want to take seriously. Like the hon. Gentleman, I very much look forward to hearing her reply to his suggestion.
I want to say something about employment and education. I echo other hon. Members’ comments about the need to encourage employers to be more willing to take on disabled people and to recognise the extensive capacity that many of them can bring to the workplace. However, I want to raise a few points with the Minister about the education and training environment in which young people prepare for employment.
Following the loss of the education maintenance allowance, what assessment is being made of the extent to which young disabled people in financial need can access other sources of financial support, including those provided by colleges and schools to enable people to continue and complete their education? With the loss of Connexions next year, how will the new predominantly web-based information and advice service for careers be tailored and adapted to meet the needs of young disabled people? How will the structure of integrated budgets, which are meant for young people’s living needs, be protected, so that people are not forced to dip into them to pay for their education, including transport to educational settings, books and equipment? Like other hon. Members, I am interested to hear what further steps the Minister thinks she can take in government to encourage employers to become more willing to employ young disabled people.
I am pleased to have had the opportunity to contribute to the debate. There are many more issues that I would like to raise and which I am sure colleagues would like to raise. I am pleased that the Minister is here to listen to the debate, and I look forward to her response.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
I am pleased to be able to take part in the debate. I congratulate the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Stephen Lloyd) on securing it. We can never devote enough time to the subject in this place.
Like others, I want to begin by asking about the personal independence payment. I have to say that I like the concept of an independence payment, and it sounds attractive. Like others, however, I am not quite sure what it will mean in reality. I do not want to end up with a crude, Orwellian sleight of hand, whereby the word “independence” results in a set of arrangements that mean the exact opposite. I do not say that that is the intention of the Minister or the Government, but I hope she understands the concerns many Members and organisations representing disabled people have about how the provisions will work in practice. Like others, I hope that she will be able to give us a bit more information and that we will be able to secure a promise that she will provide more information to people across the country, because it is important that she does so.
It is important to recognise that having great support needs does not mean that dependence and exclusion are inevitable, but that depends very much on how we choose to approach people and on whether we give the right kind of support—support that facilitates independence and assists those who are trying to help them. In an intervention earlier we heard about the pressure that is sometimes put on parents. I read a recent study looking at young disabled people who seemed to have made quite a success of their lives, in that they had secured employment and found a place to live independently. They highlighted the fact that their parents had been critical in helping them through those different phases. As in many other areas of life, it is true that good parents—parents who provide the right support—are a great help. However, where we are talking about parents who are coping with children with disabilities—often quite severe disabilities—we should never underestimate the pressure they are under, and that was illustrated in the example given by the hon. Member for Eastbourne. We should never underestimate the pressure on parents, how easy it is for one final incident or episode to be the straw that breaks the camel’s back or how insensitive agencies can be at times to the pressures on parents.
I want briefly to mention two groups. The first is young soldiers. I obviously see a lot of young injured service personnel at the Queen Elizabeth hospital in Birmingham. The lives of these young people will be changed beyond all recognition from what they would have anticipated when they joined the services a few years ago. As we think about the support and provision that will be available in future, it is important that we do everything to assist the independence of these people, to whom we already owe an enormous debt, and who have every right to expect to lead a fulfilling and independent life. We can either assist or hinder that process by the way in which we shape the support and services we make available.
The other group is young people with terminal illnesses. In the past, they would tend to die at a relatively young age—perhaps before or in their early teens. Quite often, the support we provided was limited to a bit of hospice provision and a bit of social services or other independent agency provision at critical times in the illness. Nowadays, youngsters with terminal illnesses tend to live much longer, into their early 20s or early adulthood. Like every one else making that transition in life, they have all sorts of demands and expectations, and they want to go to college and have jobs. Quite often, they are capable of doing those things, but they need different kinds of support and services. We need to recognise that there will be an increasing demand for that in the years ahead, so the more we can shape and prepare services now, to cater for those young people, the more we will be able to help them, and the more we will get ahead of the game, rather than playing the traditional game of catch-up.
I want to mention two issues, the first of which is mobility. It seems to me that that is the key to any sense of independence. If someone cannot decide for themselves where to go, when to go there, and how to organise their life to achieve things, their independence is severely restricted. I hope that as the Government think about how to reshape support and benefits, they will think about mobility for young people, particularly those in residential establishments. It is not right, when they are trying to make the transition to adulthood, that they should be dependent on someone else deciding what time they will get to go out socially or visit the shops. They need some degree of independence.
To go back to the issue of parents, it is extraordinary how insensitive agencies can be to the needs of parents and disabled youngsters. Birmingham city council, which is trying to save a bit of money because of the budget predicament—and that is perfectly understandable—recently introduced a proposal to restrict school bus access for children going to special needs schools, subjecting them to the same arrangements as other children. I cannot remember the exact distance now, but I think that they must live further than something like a quarter of a mile away. Of course, the reality is that children going to special needs establishments have special needs. Some of them do not like massive changes and disruption; they need a predictable route. Some of them could not possibly travel by themselves on public transport. It would not be feasible for them to get taxis, because that would cost the local authority more than the existing transport provision. The parents found out about the change through a blanket letter from the council to all parents, informing them of the intention; so of course we had people phoning up in floods of tears, saying “What am I going to do next week?”
That is the kind of thing that came up in the exchange between my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh East (Sheila Gilmore) and the hon. Member for Eastbourne: far too often the agencies are inflexible with their rules. They are oblivious to the needs of the population they are trying to serve. I think that perhaps, without any more cost, a bit of Government guidance and direction about the way in which the agencies must perform, both in providing services and when there is any intention of changing them, could make a significant difference.
That brings me to the other issue I want to raise, which is schooling. I am dealing with a situation concerning a young woman in my constituency who is on the far end of the autism spectrum. She has a great deal of personal need. At times she self-harms. She is challenging at home and gets very frustrated; she often attacks her parents and the other children. She is a challenge. Her parents have coped with that for 14 years, as well as bringing up two other children. They have done a remarkable job. However, in the past year, the secondary school that she attends in Birmingham, which is not a special needs school, has decided that it cannot cope with her. It has come to the conclusion that it is not the right place for her.
I do not blame the school for that decision, which is possibly a quite professional one, if those concerned have genuinely looked at the situation and thought about it; but of course the parents need to know that now that that has happened the authorities will take a good, honest look at the situation and come up with a proposal that will serve the needs of that young girl. What they have done instead is to withhold the minutes of the initial meeting that took place; they appear to have edited them to exclude some of the things said at the meeting, and have now come up with a set of proposals insisting that she return to the school—which the school rejects. They are essentially making those decisions on cost grounds; there is no doubt about that. As a result, although other children are back at school this week for the start of the new term, the girl is at home with her mother, who is at the end of her tether. Of course, every time her father must take time off work to try to deal with the crisis, he loses money, which plunges the family further into financial difficulty.
That seems to me not only insensitive but a completely unprofessional, unacceptable and irresponsible way to deal with people. I am happy to discuss the personal details of the case with the Minister. If there is anything that she can do to help I would appreciate it; but generally I want to say that local authorities must be given clearer direction on such issues. I do not think that it is entirely a matter of money. I am aware of the budget pressures that face Birmingham and other authorities; if money is a consideration, so is the way in which people behave, and the way in which they treat those they are there to serve. I do not think that the state of affairs I have described is remotely acceptable.
I thank the hon. Member for Eastbourne for obtaining the debate. I hope that the Minister will respond to some of the issues raised, and that we shall have many more debates like this one, so that we can shape some provision in a way that genuinely reflects the needs of the people we hope to assist.
Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)
If the Front Bench speakers split their time, they have about 12 minutes each.
Margaret Curran (Glasgow East) (Lab)
I am grateful to be here today under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone, and I shall do my best to be equitable in the distribution of time.
I of course begin by congratulating the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Stephen Lloyd) on obtaining the debate. I call him an hon. Member as he sits on the Government Benches, but like my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) I regard him as a friend. I have got to know him well and he has this morning demonstrated his commitment to disability issues. His pursuance of those matters is well recognised in this Chamber and I hope to continue to work closely with him.
The debate has been very interesting, and hon. Members have spoken convincingly of the points that need to be addressed. I shall focus particularly on those that lie within my responsibility, but perhaps I will make one or two wider remarks. In an extremely moving speech, my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) dealt with the range of issues that must be grappled with, at the heart of which is the pressure on families. We should always be reminded of the daily grind that many families face. We can never have enough time to deal with those issues, and have just touched on them today. I hope we can continue to deal with them.
In my time working with this brief, I have met the Spink family and the Kennedy family. I do not know whether any hon. Members present have come across them, but I am sure that they are known to the Minister. They have spoken in shocking detail of their experience of services—their inflexibility—and the unwillingness, perhaps of us all, to fully appreciate the depth of the challenge that many families face. We say that we have made progress—I will defend the progress made by my party’s Government, and the Minister will defend hers—but there has never been enough progress to address the reality for those families.
My hon. Friend spoke very well, particularly about the last family he mentioned, and about veterans, as well as the amount of work we still have to do. Of course, the briefings that we received from the Children’s Society put it very well when speaking about the different culture and the different eligibility criteria that the hon. Member for Eastbourne drew to our attention, and the impact that that can have on the lives of young disabled people and their families. We must force ourselves to improve services.
I was tempted to talk about services, local authority funding and suchlike, but I do not want to go down that route because of the lack of time. I shall concentrate instead on welfare reform, which is clearly part of the Minister’s remit. The reforms relating to disability are perhaps some of the most controversial elements in the Government’s proposals in the Welfare Reform Bill. The Government will say that the Bill is the hallmark of their Administration and a flagship policy. I am grateful to have the opportunity this morning to interrogate the Government in more detail, but we will obviously continue to do so.
The hon. Member for Upper Bann (David Simpson) referred to universal credit; we have not focused enough on that, yet it is vital for disabled people. I also want to consider the personal independence payment, and I shall of course return to my hobby-horse, the disability living allowance mobility allowance, which has also been mentioned.
I start with DLA reform because of its importance to children, of which all who have seen the briefings will be aware. As has been mentioned, 1.8 million working adults will be migrated to the new benefit, and there are implications for those who turn 16 in 2013, but we do not know much about what will happen to the 300,000 children currently in receipt of DLA, other than the fact that their situation will be considered once the proposed reassessment of adults is under way. That is controversial in itself and is causing enormous alarm among charities, families and individuals.
It is vital that we deal with this quickly because clause 87 of the Welfare Reform Bill, which is making its way through Parliament, removes clauses 71 to 76 of the Social Security Contributions and Benefits Act 1992—the legislation that currently provides DLA to disabled children. Alternative arrangements clearly have to be put in place quickly and we need to know the details soon. The Minister will be aware that in Committee we asked what the proposals for children were likely to be, and my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston mentioned several times the need to consider the matter. A number of amendments were tabled—they were not successful—on reassessing the impact of the six months delay in receiving benefit and whether the ending of automatic entitlement would affect children. A number of substantial questions need to be dealt with in depth.
Disability premiums in universal credit are vital, and I ask the House to focus on them because charities are deeply concerned about the changes. Those on the middle and lower rates of DLA care who receive only the disability element receive £52, and those on the higher rate, who receive both the disability element and the enhanced element, receive £73. Under the new system of universal credit, the rates for children will be aligned with those for adults, so that there will be two rates of award: £25.95 and £74.50. That change means that people will now be eligible for either the lower or the upper rate of premium, rather than the combined amount. The important point is that those families on the higher rate will be slightly better off, receiving £74.50, an increase of £1.50; but those on the middle and lower rate will receive £25.95, a substantial reduction from £52. I ask the House to focus on that as the Welfare Reform Bill makes its way through Parliament—it is in the other place now. Support for disabled children on the middle and lower rate of DLA will be halved.
Charities estimate that about 100,000 families—including, for example, families with autistic children—will lose up to £1,366 a year, amounting to about £20,000 by the time a child reaches the age of 16. That is a substantial loss of benefit. As the hon. Member for Eastbourne pointed out, 52% of families with a disabled child are at risk of poverty. The benefit is means-tested, so the poorest families will suffer the greatest hit. That is a significant change. I note the hon. Gentleman’s gentle challenge to the Government to rethink some parts of the Bill, and I encourage him to take up that cause. Universal credit is seen as a panacea to the challenges of the current benefit system, but I caution Members not to rush to that conclusion, because many disabled children will lose out.
The DLA mobility component is one of the most highly publicised and controversial elements of the Government’s policy, and it applies to children as well as to adults. Specific reference has been made to children in residential schools and colleges who depend on mobility support. The briefing from Every Disabled Child Matters states that for all young people aged 16 to 25, the ability to get around independently is vital to allowing them to lead the ordinary lives of young people and for developing the life skills that will lead to independent living later in life. It would be devastating for these disabled young people to find that financial support for mobility was withdrawn just as their adult lives were beginning. The campaign to save the DLA mobility component is ongoing. I appreciate that the Government have announced a review, but some confusion remains about how the policy will work and what impact it will have. I ask the Minister to answer one simple question. Do any children in residential settings face the prospect of losing their mobility component? If so, I ask all Members to join me in saying that that should not happen. We should try to prevent that group of vulnerable people from losing such a critical benefit.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Maria Miller)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone, for what I think is the first time. You have presided over an extremely informed and useful debate. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Stephen Lloyd) for securing the debate. He and I have had a number of conversations about disability matters over the past 18 months, and he brings a great deal of expertise to the House.
The debate covered a broad range of issues and I hope to do justice to them in my response, but if I cannot answer them all in the time allowed, I will be happy to deal with them separately should Members wish me do so. First, I shall set out the Government’s approach to supporting disabled young people. I shall then answer some of the important questions raised today.
When I talk to disabled young people, as I did only last week and over the weekend in my constituency, I find them to be as ambitious as non-disabled people—no one in the Chamber today will find that surprising—and their hopes for the future are no different. They want a job in which they can excel, a home, a family and friends. They want to live independent lives, and those lives will be different for each of them.
The catch-all title of disabled can sometimes be unhelpful. As Minister with responsibility for disabled people, I have to deal with the wide range of conditions, illnesses and challenges that these people face. We heard today that it is only by joining together the work of social care, health, education and employment effectively that we can ensure adequate support for disabled young people. All of those elements have a part to play. Joining up those services to ensure that disabled young people live independent lives is at the heart of the Government’s work, but in doing so we must also ensure that we retain the ambition that every disabled young person and their family have for their lives, including the ability to take on the challenges of the future so that they can reach their true potential as an individual.
The hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Sheila Gilmore) rightly said that families have a critical role to play. Sometimes, though, it is important to separate an individual’s passions and desires for the future from the family. Although we need to ensure that families retain their vital role, we must at the same time recognise that it is the disabled young person and their individual needs that we must focus on first and foremost to ensure that they can enjoy an independent life, whatever that means for that individual. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) also made the point that by enabling disabled people to live independent lives, we can avoid many of the mental health problems that we all see in our own constituency surgeries. All too often such problems accompany disabilities.
Let me outline a few of the measures that the Government are taking. I pay testament to the work that my hon. Friend the Member for Brent Central (Sarah Teather) is doing in this area as a Minister in the Department for Education. It is under her stewardship that the special educational needs and disability Green Paper has been produced. I am thankful that she has agreed to work closely with me on that key reform affecting some of the transition problems that have been raised today. The single assessment that my hon. Friend sets out in the Green Paper will start to deal with some of the problems that the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) so eloquently articulated today. We are looking for local authorities to trailblaze the new approach, so that we can avoid some of the complications and hurdles that currently face disabled people and their families.
My hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne talked about the importance of effective support for transition. Again, the SEN Green Paper clearly sets out the importance the Government attach to dealing with the variable support that is sometimes provided for parents and disabled children after they turn 16. It is precisely to resolve the problems post-16 that we are considering testing the new approach of having a single assessment across the full zero-to-25 age range, as well as ensuring that it is portable. The Minister of State, Department of Health, my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Burstow), is also involved in that.
My hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne talked about key workers and how they support disabled people in transition. We are in full agreement that key workers can play a hugely important role in supporting families and young people to navigate through transition, which is why we commit in the Green Paper to invest in key worker training. We are in the process of appointing a voluntary, non-profit-making organisation to lead. Those are important and exciting developments that we can look forward to in the future.
[Mr Bone in the Chair]
Personal budgets are also pertinent. In our constituencies, we all see a great deal of money being invested in supporting individuals, but all too often it can feel that that money is not well co-ordinated. The Department for Health’s commitment to personal budgets and to allowing every disabled individual to access them is an important step forward and will help to ensure that all the available money is used to best effect. Last Thursday, I was fortunate enough to meet a wide range of individuals from disability organisations and a group of disabled people in Barnsley. I was told about the important benefits personal budgets gave in disabled people’s day-to day lives, including allowing them to lead the sort of independent lives they wanted. Barnsley is part of the right to control trailblazer initiative that was extremely well put together under the previous Administration. We are continuing the initiative because it gives more flexibility to disabled young people to start their lives in a strong and independent way.
The Government are also conducting an important review of employment support for disabled people. It is vital that we understand that the majority of disabled young people aspire to be in employment. All too often that aspiration does not come to fruition—perhaps through an inability to navigate the system or to get the right support in place at the time. Earlier this year, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions asked Liz Sayce to produce an independent review of employment support for disabled people. That review, which was published before the summer break, highlighted that disabled people want the same access to jobs as everybody else, and the best way to make that happen is to ensure that employment support is built around the individual. We are consulting on the proposals set out in the Sayce review and we will publish a response in due course. At the heart of Liz’s proposals is support for access to work, which, for young people in particular, can give the sort of personalised support that they need not just to get into work, but to stay in work and to give them the opportunity to live independent lives.
The hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak mentioned the importance of supporting disabled former members of the armed services. One of the recommendations from the Sayce review was to set up a cross-departmental group to consider the employment of disabled people, and I have done that straight away because I thought that it was a superb recommendation. One of my colleagues from the Ministry of Defence will be on that ministerial group for the very reason that the hon. Gentleman talked about. I hope that that reassures him that I understand his point. Many young people who have served our country have come out with severe disabilities and they require that support. The ministerial group will also include a Minister from the Department for Transport. As hon. Members recognised, transport is important in ensuring that disabled young people have independence and are able to get into the workplace.
Some of our work is about ensuring that the profile of disabled young people is positive. The Paralympics has an important role to play in that, but we are also investing heavily in user-led organisations to ensure that disabled young people have strong voices in the future. We also have a strong policy of ensuring that more disabled people have access to elected office, which is an important way to get one’s voice heard.
I will answer as many of the specific points made in the debate as I can now, but I will write to Members if I am not able to answer their questions in detail. “Aiming Higher” is a three-year programme set up by the previous Administration. It includes short breaks and transition support, both of which the present Government are continuing to fund. The fruitful work under “Aiming Higher” is therefore continuing.
To reassure Members who raised the implications of the personal independence payment, let me say that I recognise that the transition from DLA to PIP at 16 is an important and sensitive matter. I have already begun meeting organisations and representatives to ensure that they have clear input into our work. I recently met a number of organisations, including CLIC Sargent, to help to inform our thinking on the qualifying period. I am sure that the debate on the matter will continue in the Lords. I will be looking at the needs of individuals in residential colleges in the same way as the needs of other recipients of DLA. I understand the arguments that hon. Members have made today on that point. We have done some detailed work on the order of migration from DLA to PIP. We will make sure that it is a fair process and it will be considered as part of the equality impact assessment.
I apologise for not being able to cover all of points hon. Members raised today. Suffice it to say, the work that the Government are doing puts support for disabled young people very high on our priority list.
Judicial Scorecards
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bone; I thank Mr Speaker for granting me permission to hold this debate this morning; and I welcome the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr Blunt), to his seat, from which he will listen to and respond to this debate on an issue that I want to raise not only on my own behalf but most importantly on behalf of my constituents.
That issue is what I have called judicial scorecards. The idea is that each judge and magistrate should be presented with an annual report of those people who have appeared before them and who have been sentenced by them, including details of any reoffending that has taken place since sentencing. Every year, each judge and magistrate would be given a simple and straightforward report that would detail the names of the defendants who have appeared before them, the crimes of which those defendants were accused and the sentence that was imposed, compared with the sentence that could have been imposed under the maximum terms set out in the relevant legislation. The report would also include details of any subsequent reoffending, not only for the crime for which the defendants appeared before the judge or magistrate but for other crimes that the defendants may have committed.
There is a fundamental gap in our criminal justice system. Judges and magistrates do their best, but as far as I can tell they never actually know what happens to those defendants whom they sentence. Judges and magistrates arrive at their sentencing decision, having taken into account the guidelines produced by the Sentencing Council; using their best opinion, they arrive at a decision as to what is the most appropriate sentence and that sentence is then imposed; but they never know subsequently whether or not that sentence was effective.
The same is true for police officers. I declare an interest as a special constable with the British Transport police. I often talk to police officers about the arrests they have made and I ask, “Oh, what happened to Joe Smith, whom you arrested for fare evasion?”, or, “What happened to Joe Bloggs, whom you arrested for burglary?” The officer will reply, “Oh, I don’t know.” I ask, “Do you have any idea what sentence he was awarded?” They reply, “No, I don’t know. My job was done. I arrested the offender and he was presented before the courts, or otherwise.” It is a great shame that police officers do not know that information; they are not informed about what happens to the people they arrest. The same is true for the judiciary, regarding the people they sentence.
Our criminal justice system would be improved if judges and magistrates knew more about what happened to the people they sentence. At one level, that is a very human thing. We are dealing with individuals who have broken the law and the judges and magistrates are doing their best to impose the correct sentence, but unless they are updated on whether or not that sentence was effective there will continue to be a big gap in our criminal justice system.
Mr Bone, you will know that 10% of criminals commit 50% of the crime in this country. You, I, the Minister and everyone in this House, as well as all of our constituents, are really concerned about the high reoffending rates in this country. When I asked the Minister about reoffending on 11 January, he provided some very helpful statistics to the House. I asked him:
“What the reoffending rates were for those sentenced to jail terms of (a) one year, (b) five years and (c) 10 years in the latest period for which figures are available”.
He helpfully replied:
“In 2008, the rate of reconviction within one year for adults discharged from custody after a sentence of less than a year was 61.1%; it was 31.0% for those given sentences of one to five years; 17.5% for offenders given sentences of five to 10 years, and 6.4% for 10 years or more.”
I then asked:
“Does the Minister agree that…the longer prisoners spend in prison the greater the chance of ensuring their effective rehabilitation before being released?”
He replied:
“We have to ensure that longer sentences are given to recidivist offenders and that we effectively rehabilitate people and break the cycle of crime through the proposals that we have presented in the Green Paper to drive that number down.”—[Official Report, 11 January 2011; Vol. 521, c. 147.]
I absolutely agree with that—we have to get those reoffending rates down. The Minister and I are in complete agreement that when 10% of criminals are committing 50% of the crime, those recidivist offenders must receive longer sentences, and yet, as we all know, the problem, again and again, is that those recidivist offenders are not being given the stiff sentences early enough in their criminal careers to deter them from a life of crime. Part of the reason why I am so enthusiastic about the idea of judicial scorecards is that they would help to alert judges and magistrates at an early stage in a criminal’s career that the criminal was not being given a sentence that was stiff enough.
I raised the proposal for judicial scorecards on the Floor of the House with the Minister’s boss, the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, on 28 June. I asked him:
“If he will take steps to ensure that judges and magistrates are informed of incidents of reoffending of each offender they have sentenced”.
He replied:
“We have begun work to improve access to local criminal justice statistics. For example, criminal justice and sentencing statistics are now broken down to court level and are available online. In terms of individuals, pre-sentence reports provide the court with details of a defendant’s offending history and compliance with any previous sentences.”
I then said:
“Although it is important to have judicial independence, surely it is not beyond the wit of the Department that each judge and each magistrate should be given an annual report card on the effectiveness of their sentencing decisions. If they have given out a string of sentences and the convicts have reoffended regularly, that judge or magistrate will know that something is wrong with their approach.”
He replied:
“As I said, we have begun work, and that is certainly an interesting suggestion. A massive amount of data would be involved in providing every judge and magistrate with full information about everybody they had ever sentenced”. —[Official Report, 28 June 2011; Vol. 530, c. 738.]
I was pleased that the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice saw this idea of judicial scorecards as an “interesting” approach, but it sounds to me from his responses in June that the Ministry of Justice is already making some progress towards them. If statistics are being
“broken down to court level and are available online”,
we are going in the right direction, and I do not believe that it would necessarily involve a massive amount of data to tie up an offender’s criminal history with the judge or magistrate before whom they appeared. It would help to make the criminal justice system far more effective. At the end of the day, what my constituents want is judges and magistrates to award sentences that are effective in preventing reoffending. Introducing more transparency into the system to reveal whether judges and magistrates are awarding such sentences would assist the judges and magistrate themselves, and help to improve the effectiveness of our criminal justice system.
In the exchange on the Floor of the House that I mentioned earlier, another Member asked:
“There is considerable evidence that judges do not know enough about what happens once they sentence prisoners and those sentences have been disposed of. Will the Justice Secretary do what he can to increase the experience obtained by judges of those disposals and will he ask the Sentencing Council to advise, with a particular focus on what works in preventing offending and reoffending?”
The Justice Secretary replied:
“The Sentencing Council is already under a duty to provide information about the effectiveness of sentencing practice”.—[Official Report, 28 June 2011; Vol. 530, c. 738.]
It seems to me, however, that that duty to provide information about the effectiveness of sentencing practice is not specific enough to the individual judges and magistrates making the decisions. We do not have that far to go from the collection of statistics at a court level to doing it on an individual level for each judge and magistrate.
That is not to criticise judges and magistrates; it is to help them. We know that every time we stand up and speak in this place, and every time we vote, information is recorded for every member of the public to access online, to see whether we are turning up and representing constituents’ concerns. Every time a premier league footballer kicks a ball, the data are recorded and a scorecard is produced of his effectiveness throughout the season. I believe that the information is there in the court process, and it could be distilled in a simplified way in an annual report card, helping to inform judges and magistrates about whether they are making the right decisions.
Evidence about this sort of thing was presented to the Select Committee on Justice in 2009-10, and included in its January 2010 report entitled “Cutting crime: the case for justice reinvestment”. Michael Marcus, a circuit court judge from Portland, Oregon, presented evidence to the Committee about how this sort of approach can help the judicial system to be more effective because of the awarding of correct sentences. With yesterday’s welcome announcement from the Ministry of Justice about the introduction of television into courts, it seems that the Department is receptive to making our criminal justice system more transparent.
The Justice Minister will know, as will you, Mr Bone, that many of our constituents do not have the confidence they ought to have in our criminal justice system, because some of the sentencing decisions are not consistent. We have the recent example of the riots in London and other metropolitan areas in August, when the clerks to the magistrates seemed to be saying, “You don’t have to adhere to the guidelines that have been issued by the Sentencing Council; make the riots a special case.” My constituents would say, “The stiff sentences awarded to rioters should be the same as the stiff sentences awarded to everyone, not just in August 2011 but all the time.” There should be consistency in sentencing, and the judicial scorecard approach would help.
It comes down to the number of people we sentence to prison terms, and I think that my constituents’ view is that not enough criminals go to jail. There seems to be a myth in this country that we have too many people in prison, but I contest that that is absolutely not the case. If we look at the percentage of prisoners per 100,000 people, we are pretty near the global average, but if we look at the number of prisoners in relation to the number of crimes committed we do not have the highest prison population in the western world; we have the lowest. On that measure, compared with the United States, Canada, Australia and the EU as a whole, the UK has the lowest prison population of all. For every 1,000 crimes committed in the UK, we have about 13 prisoners, compared with about 15 in Canada and Australia, considerably more than 20 for the EU as a whole, and a whopping 166 in the United States. The country with the lowest prison rate—the UK—has the highest crime rate. Is that a coincidence? I do not think so.
We have more than 10,000 crimes for every 100,000 people. The country with the highest prison rate —the United States—has the lowest crime rate, with about 4,500 crimes for every 100,000 people. Canada, which is the country with the second lowest prison rate, has the second highest crime rate. The EU as a whole has the second highest prison rate and the second lowest crime rate. In my view, those are not coincidences.
The purpose of today’s debate is to be helpful to Her Majesty’s Government. I have come here with a constructive suggestion to make our judicial system more transparent. I thank judges and magistrates for the work that they do on behalf of us all, but they need assistance in the form of information about how effective their well-meaning sentencing decisions are. My constituents would like to see stiffer justice; they would like to see recidivist offenders put behind bars for longer, not only as a punishment but to aid their rehabilitation. I know that the Justice Minister is very sympathetic to that view because he has said so to the House. A judicial scorecard system need not be complex; it could be very simple and straightforward. Presenting each judge and each magistrate with an annual report about the effectiveness of their sentencing decisions would be a good thing for the criminal justice system in this country.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Crispin Blunt)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bone, and particularly to reply to your near neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone), whom I congratulate on securing the debate and bringing up the matter of judicial scorecards.
I have, of course, noted the question that my hon. Friend put to the Justice Secretary during oral questions about whether steps would be taken to ensure that judges and magistrates were informed of incidents of reoffending of every offender they had sentenced. As my hon. Friend has made clear, he is aiming for feedback and public transparency for individual sentencers on the effectiveness of their sentencing practices, so that they are able to identify where something is wrong with their individual approach. I have listened to my hon. Friend very carefully, with my usual level of interest, and I concur with the Justice Secretary that his suggestion is interesting.
My hon. Friend knows from previous debates we have had on foreign national prisoners that I very much welcome his interest, and his providing a spur to the system to ensure that we are kept up to the mark in areas of public interest. However, I am going to have to be reasonably plain with him here: yes, the topic is interesting, but I am unsympathetic with the particular matter of individual judicial accountability by way of scorecards for judges.
Let me explain why. We need to acknowledge that this topic raises issues of significant constitutional importance, and I want to touch on those before I address some of the other matters that my hon. Friend mentioned. We might not have quite enough time for a full debate on the whole of penal policy, the issue that he raised at the end of his remarks, but if I end up having enough time, I will cheerfully move into that area.
The rule of law is, of course, the foundation of our democracy. For that tenet to be real, it is imperative that the independence of the judiciary is maintained. As my hon. Friend will recognise, that is particularly relevant in respect of sentencing decisions. Parliament has established the offence and sentencing framework that the judiciary apply in individual cases, and the courts have a duty to follow sentencing guidelines, which are issued by the independent Sentencing Council to promote greater consistency in sentencing while maintaining judicial independence. If courts depart from those guidelines in the interest of justice, they must explain in open court why they are doing so.
Although the sentencing decisions of the judiciary are rightly independent, they do not operate in an accountability vacuum. Checks and balances within the current system, such as the right of appeal, operate within the public domain. If certain sentences are seen as too lenient, the Attorney-General can appeal them. Equally, if it is felt that the final sentence is too harsh relative to the circumstances of the case, the defendant has the right to appeal. Like the hearings at which offenders are sentenced, such appeals are heard in public. The Sentencing Council has a duty to monitor the operation of its sentencing guidelines. Part of that involves considering the frequency and extent to which those handing down sentences depart from the guidelines, the factors that influence sentences imposed by courts and the effect of guidelines on consistency in sentencing and on public confidence in the criminal justice system.
More generally, the judiciary support efforts towards greater transparency that allow the public improved access to sentencing outcomes for individual crimes in their local area while bearing in mind any reporting restrictions. However, it would not be right to draw inferences about the performance of an individual judge— or, for that matter, anyone involved in bringing a case to court—based simply on whether the defendant goes on to commit further crimes. There is a risk that, if we introduced scorecards linking sentencing to reoffending outcomes, individual sentencing decisions would be criticised because the offender went on to reoffend. The sentence handed down is only one of many factors that affect reoffending.
Towards the end of his remarks, my hon. Friend used the phrase “simple and straightforward”. I must tell him that dealing with the rehabilitation of offenders—trying to act on all the levers that affect an individual, determining how easy it will be to rehabilitate him and considering all the desistance factors from crime—is far from simple and straightforward, and it does not simply involve the sentencing decision. The judiciary work in an environment where no two cases are alike and each sentence reflects individual circumstances unique to the offence, the defendant and the impact on the victim. Examining sentences in isolation from the particular circumstances of the case and the defendant’s mitigating or aggravating factors is almost certain to confuse those who were not present in the courtroom about why the final sentence was imposed. Many factors affect the effectiveness of a specific sentence in preventing reoffending. Some are unique to the individual; some are socio-economic. Given the unique nature of each case, it would be impossible for the effectiveness of sentences on reoffending to be deduced in a meaningful way. Any suggestion that such information could be provided would be misleading to the public.
My hon. Friend knows that tackling reoffending is a major priority for this Government. We are considering innovative ways to decrease reoffending rates. The Green Paper “Breaking the Cycle” set out a different approach to rehabilitation based on paying only for what works to deliver reduced levels of crime. Although I am sure that judges would welcome being informed of what happens to each defendant sentenced, if such a practice became regulated in the form that my hon. Friend suggests, it would be prohibitively expensive to administer and might well take resource away from the front line, particularly the probation service.
That said, judges and magistrates take a close interest in the outcome of the sentences that they pass and whether defendants go on to commit further offences. I suspect that, like me and no doubt you, Mr Bone, my hon. Friend welcomed the statements made by the recorder of Manchester during the recent trial of Regina v. Carter, when he was sentencing one of the earliest people to be brought to justice for the riots. In the robust terms of his sentence, the recorder made it clear in what peril people placed themselves by their outrageous behaviour in those circumstances. If my hon. Friend has had the chance to read it, he will have noted that, at the end of the judgment against one defendant in the trial, who was sentenced to oversight in the community, the recorder of Manchester reserved to himself the right to deal with breaches of that community supervision. He took the opportunity judicially to take a keen interest in how that defendant, who will be supervised by the probation service, got on.
That can happen in our system. It happens in the west London drugs court, for example, where repeat offenders who entered the system because of their addiction are brought back month by month to the same judge, as part of their sentence oversight, to see how they are getting on. It is possible within our system for judges to continue to exercise supervision of and interest in the people who come before them. Probation officers, also, often provide the courts with general information about outcomes, especially in relation to community orders, so that any judge or bench can make informed decisions about the suitability of a particular sentence for the offender before them.
In May this year, my Department published details of the relative effectiveness of different sentences in reducing reoffending. One can interpret such data in different ways, but those data showed that, after controlling for differences between offenders, those receiving community orders and suspended sentence orders have a significantly lower reoffending rate—8% and 9% lower respectively—than similar offenders who receive a short custodial sentence. My hon. Friend may say, “Indeed; then they should get a longer prison sentence rather than a short prison sentence or a community sentence”, but we must have some regard to the circumstances of the offence. He seems to be driving at the idea that first-time offenders should receive an exemplary sentence in order to get them into prison so that they can be rehabilitated. I am not sure that I am in precisely the same place as him on that matter. Overall, most people entering the justice system for the first time and receiving community sentences will have a significantly lower reoffending rate than other repeat offenders. We must find proper strategies, including prison at one level but also proper supervision between prisons, the probation service and the police, as is delivered through integrated offender management, in order to find a more effective route to desistance for such people. We are experimenting with a bunch of different pilots to see where to place the responsibility in order to deliver rehabilitation.
I think that my hon. Friend will welcome the fact that the Government also have a significant transparency agenda, which will go some way towards meeting the concerns that underlie his case. We are committed to increasing transparency in public services in order better to hold public services to account, increase trust in services through greater openness and encourage engagement between citizens and local services. The criminal justice system is no exception. Criminal cases are almost always held in public, and a great deal of information on court proceedings is already placed in the public domain.
However, we recognise that not everyone goes to their local court on a daily basis, so we are planning a significant release of individual court performance data in January that will enable local communities to find out how their local court is performing on a range of measures. The data will include, among other things, information on case timeliness in criminal and civil courts and the proportion of cracked and ineffective trials at the Crown court. That represents a significant step towards keeping the public informed of how the courts are operating in their area. When looking at the data, it will be important to bear in mind that courts’ performance is not a matter for the judiciary or court staff alone, but depends on all the elements of the criminal justice system.
Yesterday, the Justice Secretary announced his intention to legislate to remove the ban on cameras in courts. I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s welcome of that announcement. It is a cautious but important step that, taken with the data commitments, will open up the courts more widely. In addition to the data that we plan to publish on court performance, we have taken several other notable steps to provide the public with information on how the criminal justice system works locally. In October last year, we released court-level sentencing data for each court for 2009, and in May this year, we released data covering 2005 to 2010. In January this year, street-level crime information was made available to the public via the Police.uk website. It has been very popular, with 430 million hits on the site since the launch. In November, we will publish individual offender-level sentencing data by court, so that the public will be able—
Mr Peter Bone (in the Chair)
Order. I am sorry to interrupt the Minister. It has been a splendid debate.
Coeliac Disease
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Gordon Banks (Ochil and South Perthshire) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr McCrea, on an issue that is close to my heart or, perhaps I should say, to my small intestine, because I suffer from coeliac disease. I am also a member of Coeliac UK.
Coeliac disease causes damage, through gluten, to the surface of the small intestine and results in a reduced ability to digest and absorb food. This causes malabsorption of essential nutrients such as iron, folic acid and calcium. In infants and children this can result in health problems such as faltering growth, unexplained anaemia, chronic diarrhoea and abdominal distension. In childhood, the presenting features are often relatively subtle and it is much easier to diagnose if coeliac disease is on the radar with a GP at an early stage. For adults, coeliac disease often presents with symptoms of tiredness, reduced appetite, weight loss, mouth ulcers, abdominal bloating, diarrhoea and anaemia.
Many people with coeliac disease present with apparently mild or non-specific complaints, but from their perspective these complaints are anything but trivial. The type and degree of symptoms with which an individual presents are not always directly related to the gut damage that has been done. It can therefore be difficult to secure a diagnosis, and patients may present to primary care on a number of occasions with a large range of symptoms before any diagnosis is made.
Health risks linked to untreated coeliac disease include poor growth in childhood, osteopenia, osteoporosis, infertility, and an increased risk of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, Hodgkin’s lymphoma and intestinal malignancy. Other auto-immune conditions are also associated with coeliac disease. The prevalence of auto-immune thyroid disease in people with coeliac disease is up to 7%, and the prevalence of type 1 diabetes is between 2% and 10%. With all these complications, it is hard to understand why coeliac disease is not routinely checked for.
People can endure long periods of suffering before they are diagnosed, and the most recent research shows the time from the onset of symptoms to diagnosis as a lengthy 13 years, during which people are at risk of contracting a wealth of other conditions. One in 100 people in the UK have coeliac disease, but only 10% to 15% of them are clinically diagnosed. An estimated half a million people in the UK are living with the condition but do not know it. That is too many people whose quality of life is being diminished by years of ill health. Many people are living with a misdiagnosis of irritable bowel syndrome or other gut conditions, and receiving treatment for those conditions that is not effective. That costs the NHS money, which we are told it does not have, and which is wasted because of the lack of a quick and accurate diagnosis of the gut condition.
Dame Anne Begg (Aberdeen South) (Lab)
Does my hon. Friend agree that it is possible to diagnose or find out whether someone has a gluten intolerance through a relatively simple blood test? Kits can be bought at a pharmacy, so there should be no excuse for failing to pick up coeliac disease earlier in many patients.
Gordon Banks
My hon. Friend is perfectly correct. The diagnosis for coeliac disease, or certainly the first part of the diagnosis, is extremely simple—it requires a simple blood test. In fact, as a coeliac sufferer, I never received a gut biopsy test, because my blood test was so overwhelmingly positive. It is relatively easy and the implementation of, or access to, these new tests, which are available in chemists, is a step in the right direction.
Simple though that may be, too many GPs do not recognise coeliac disease, never mind test for it, which is something that we urgently need to address. As I have indicated, it is first tested for via a simple blood test, followed by a gut biopsy. The blood test in itself is inexpensive. My hon. Friend has mentioned a test that the public can buy for only £20 in pharmacies. Within the health service, there is obviously an economy of scale.
I would like to describe some of the disease’s impacts in more detail, because it would be better for the Minister to hear it from the horse’s mouth rather than read about it on pieces of paper. When gluten is present in our diet, it destroys the villi in the small intestine. They are eroded so that the small intestine becomes basically like a garden hose. In good Scottish parlance, Dr McCrea, your food just scoots through it. As I have said, that prevents the absorption of nutrients, and the knock-on effects that that can have on young children and the elderly mean that this in itself—the pure lack of nutrients—can be life-threatening.
Gluten is a protein found in wheat, barley and rye. Although some might think that it is easy to avoid consuming such products, I would challenge them to try to do so for the rest of their lives. A gluten-free diet may sound like the latest Hollywood fad, designed to make a sylph-like body, but if that was the case I would want my money back, because it has not done that for me. The point that I am trying to make is that, while continuing to take gluten when diagnosed with coeliac disease has serious consequences for one’s health, diagnosis also comes with serious lifestyle trade-offs.
Imagine a busy day at work where all one wants to do is grab a quick sandwich from the cafeteria. I am sure that the Minister has eaten a sandwich at his desk many times. It cannot be done. Imagine the end of a long day at work when one would rather grab a take-away than cook dinner at home. That cannot be done either. Imagine an invitation from friends to go for a meal at an Italian restaurant. Although the pizza and pasta look nice, they just cannot be eaten. One may want to go to the pub and have a bottle of beer with friends, but that cannot be done either. One becomes an expert at reading the label on every piece of food that is bought, from crisps, sweets to soups—literally everything. Even Marks and Spencer’s diet coke has gluten in it.
I do not want to say much more about food lines at this point, but I want the Minister to think about the price of a loaf of bread. Tesco’s website states that an 800-gram loaf of white sliced bread can be bought for 47p, which is 6p per 100 grams. What does a loaf of gluten-free bread cost? It costs £2 for 400 grams, which is 50p per 100 grams—833% more. I will leave the Minister with that thought and return to it later.
Dame Anne Begg
I am glad that my hon. Friend has picked up the issue of gluten-free food, because I am also on a gluten-free diet, which is why—surprise, surprise—I am present at this debate. It is very expensive for people on gluten-free diets, but will my hon. Friend acknowledge that access to gluten-free products has improved immensely? Almost every supermarket now has some gluten-free shelves. I have seen a remarkable difference in the availability of gluten-free food during the four years in which I have been on a gluten-free diet. However, part of the problem is that the ready-meal versions of foods to which one would not add gluten if they were being cooked at home often include gluten, which makes it difficult for those who lead busy lives and do not have time to cook.
Gordon Banks
My hon. Friend is right. The range has improved, as indeed has the quality of food. In some ways, perhaps I was fortunate to be diagnosed in the past 10, 12 or 13 years. I am glad that I was not diagnosed 25 years ago, because I did not have to eat the rubbish that one had to eat 20 or 25 years ago to try to survive on a gluten-free diet. There is more choice. That is another issue about which we have concerns following the introduction of new regulations. We are worried about how supermarkets will react, because everything that they do is driven by the desire and the need to make profit at the end of the day.
I want to talk about my own experiences without being too graphic. In the early 1990s, feeling unwell I went to my GP, who eventually referred me to a specialist. After having cameras inserted everywhere, I was diagnosed with duodenal ulcers and put on medication. Unsurprisingly, that did not help much. I was then diagnosed with the catch-all complaint of irritable bowel syndrome. I endured a number of years where my routine comprised of largely being locked in the toilet until about 11 o’clock in the morning, and I had a rash on my face that looked like I had exfoliated with 80-grit sandpaper. I returned to my GP after a number of years and he referred me to another specialist who, simply on reading my notes, said, “I think I know what’s wrong with you. I think you have coeliac disease,” and he was right. If my memory serves me right, his name was Dr Wright and he turned out to be a bit of a wizard in the diagnosis of coeliac disease in the Forth valley and Scotland. I and others will be eternally grateful to him for that.
Hon. Members might be wondering why there has been a personal lesson from me and whether it is designed to foster sympathy. No, it is not. It is designed to highlight the fact that, as I have said, the average time for diagnosis in the UK is 13 years. That is sometimes 13 years of not being able to work; 13 years of worry about dying; 13 years of someone worrying that their wife thinks they are dying; and 13 years when the only people who are happy are the manufacturers of toilet roll. Part of the purpose of today’s debate is simply to stress that that is not good enough. Much more needs to be done to recognise coeliac disease and the array of symptoms in people presenting to a GP. They should not be told what my GP said to me when I returned to him after being diagnosed: “Oh coeliac disease. I never think of that. That’s two I have missed this month.” That is not good enough.
Why is it important to improve diagnosis times? It saves being given expensive drugs for other complaints that are totally unnecessary and, as I said, it saves a sufferer from not being able to lead anything like a normal life in all areas of work, rest and play. Early diagnosis reduces the risk of intestinal cancer, bowel cancer and osteoporosis among other things. In effect, early diagnosis saves not only lives, but money.
There is no cure for coeliac disease, which leaves the NHS with the task of managing sufferers’ condition. For me, diagnosis happened in my early 40s. However, that is not good enough and there remains a lack of guidance in the area. In 2009, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence published guideline 86 on the recognition and assessment of coeliac disease. That short clinical guideline offers best-practice advice on the recognition and assessment of coeliac disease and the care of those undergoing diagnosis. Although that guideline was a great result for people with coeliac disease, it is not mandatory to follow it and more needs to be done.
Coeliac UK—the national charity for people with coeliac disease—has worked with NICE on that guideline, forming part of the guideline development group. It is anxious to take the matter further for very good reasons. Gastrointestinal disorders account for about 10% of NHS clinical work, and there is evidence that they are not always well managed in general practice. Few quality criteria are available to guide the management of such disorders. The treatment of coeliac disease requires support, with a gluten-free diet, the monitoring and management of symptoms and the screening and management of complications and other associated conditions for the rest of the patient’s life. There has been huge oversight on the part of the Department of Health, as GPs are struggling to meet targets for diagnosing conditions on the quality and outcomes framework and, with no points for gastroenterological conditions, there is an enormous gap.
The QOF is a key way to ensure that GPs are incentivised and is a means by which we could start to see an improved and accelerated rate of diagnosis and find the 500,000 people who are living with the condition but who do not know it. Sadly, a number of applications to QOF have been unsuccessful, which is not good news for people with coeliac disease.
Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)
There is also some evidence that the condition is hereditary, so testing family members of a diagnosed coeliac is an obvious way to identify such individuals. If doctors diagnose somebody as coeliac, would my hon. Friend suggest that other family members should also be tested?
Gordon Banks
I do and I will. I shall come on to that later. My hon. Friend is perfectly right.
Moving back to the QOF, approaches for groupings of gastroenterological conditions are being made. Those are important because coeliac disease is four times more prevalent among patients with clinical presentation of IBS, as in my case, than among the non-IBS population. There is also a NICE guideline that recommends the screening of patients with type 1 diabetes, but we do not know whether that screening is taking place. Without more stringent ways to incentivise and measure, we will not know.
As my hon. Friend says, screening family members when coeliac disease is present in the family is also a key concern. He might be interested to know that prevalence rates increase from one in 100 to one in 10 when a first degree relative has the condition. GPs should be screening, but we know that that is not happening routinely. I know full well is has not happened in my family, but it should. Coeliac disease is also more prevalent in people with other auto-immune conditions such as type 1 diabetes, as I have mentioned, and auto-immune thyroid disease. Hence, antibody testing for family members where coeliac disease has been diagnosed and for patients with autoimmune conditions is recommended by the NICE coeliac recognition and assessment guideline.
The Minister will be glad to hear that improving diagnosis is only one part of the answer; we also need improvement in the management of the condition after diagnosis. There are established clinical guidelines from, among others, the British Society of Gastroenterology, the British Society of Paediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition and the Primary Care Society for Gastroenterology, which recommend an annual review for patients with coeliac disease and, indeed, dermatitis herpetiformis. Although that has traditionally been undertaken in specialist clinics in secondary care—or, indeed, not undertaken at all—it is an activity increasingly seen as suitable for primary care. We know of locally enhanced services where practices provide a structured annual review, but there are not enough of them. We would like annual reviews to be put more firmly into place to ensure that patients are complying with the gluten-free diets and safeguarding against potential associated conditions.
The improving management in gastroenterology—IMAGE—project provides a model for the development of quality markers for chronic disease management including coeliac disease. The project has developed patient-centred quality criteria based on current guidelines and has already been a source of a range of published papers, but health inequality is also a key concern in this area. Research has shown that coeliac disease is twice as likely to be diagnosed for the least deprived quintile of socio-economic groups than for the most deprived; it is usually the other way around. There is more work to be done to understand those results, but the working hypothesis is that the disease is under-recognised in the most deprived socio-economic groupings as a result of the wide-ranging nature of symptoms and, indeed, access to health care.
Where do we go from here? The NICE guidelines on recognition and assessment of coeliac disease showed that the “no diagnosis” strategy is the least effective strategy because of the low quality of life of patients and the costs resulting from undiagnosed coeliac disease. In applying accepted NICE thresholds, any testing strategy was shown to be more cost-effective than no testing strategy, despite the costs of the tests. Work also indicates that serological testing for coeliac disease in patients with symptoms such as irritable bowel syndrome, as I mentioned earlier, is, indeed, cost-effective.
The new NHS reforms may provide some opportunities for people with coeliac disease and provide different ways for them to be catered for within the new framework. Perhaps the Minister can say whether coeliac will be considered for one of the 150 quality standards soon to be rolled out, so that we can see diagnosis rates start to improve.
As I have said, once diagnosed, the only way forward is to manage the condition through a gluten-free diet. Many people do that through relying on prescriptions as the foundation of their condition management. On prescriptions, as the NHS looks to drive costs down during the past 12 months, a number of PCTs have placed strict limits on what can be prescribed for patients with coeliac disease. Those cuts, which include a blanket removal of almost 200 products prescribed to patients in Surrey, East Sussex and Kent, appear to be a knee-jerk reaction to costs linked to gluten-free foods on prescription. At the same time, they potentially threaten the long-term health of people with coeliac disease.
Hon. Members may have seen that, in July, a story broke in the national press that gluten-free bread on prescription was costing the NHS in Wales £35 a loaf. The story came from misinterpreted data following a question posed in the Welsh Assembly. Similar anecdotal figures had been used earlier in the year by medicine management teams linked to the south-east strategic health authority. Although the figures given in the national media were incorrect, sadly the story missed the real point about some high administrative charges added to a very small number of products, which appear to be unjustified.
Dame Anne Begg
People with coeliac disease rely on a gluten-free diet, and the fact they can only get gluten free through a prescription suggests that management of the condition is seen very much as a medical model rather than a disability model, which is what normally happens when someone has a chronic condition and they have learned to live with it. Instead of providing gluten-free food through a prescription, might not the Government consider making it one of the criteria that would allow people to get the lower care rate of disability living allowance? That would give people the money in their hand and give them the choice to buy off the shelf, particularly now that most supermarkets have a range of gluten-free goods available. It is more expensive, so it would be an extra cost of their disability, but that might be a cheaper and better solution for the Government. I wonder whether Coeliac UK, or anyone else, has thought of that.
Gordon Banks
In fact, Coeliac UK, myself and, I think, my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham met Ministers in the previous Government to discuss that very issue. It does not seem to be something that Governments want to embrace, but my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg) is right—there are other ways to skin the cat. I will discuss those when I talk about the method of prescribing.
Overcharging or excessive charges within the NHS prescription process need to be investigated at national level to hold NHS suppliers to account. It is crucial to patients and to the taxpayer that we implement a cost-effective service that gives the NHS real savings and enhances provision to patients.
As I have said, people with coeliac disease must avoid all foods that contain gluten, a protein found in wheat, rye and barley. Wheat is the most widely consumed cereal in the UK, so a gluten-free diet requires the elimination of staple foods including bread, flour, pasta and biscuits. Gluten is also found in cakes, pastries and in foods that one might not expect, such as many sauces, soups, soy sauce, ready meals and some cooked meats and sausages. Removing wheat, barley and rye-containing ingredients from the diet can therefore result in a restricted and potentially unbalanced nutritional intake. People with coeliac disease may obtain gluten-free specialist foods from a wide variety of sources including supermarkets, health food shops, mail order and, as we have mentioned, on prescription, but some of the gluten-free brands that are available on prescription are not available from other outlets. It is extremely important that health care professionals provide advice, support and information to ensure that people with coeliac disease have a nutritionally balanced and varied gluten-free diet. Diagnosis should not lead the patient down the path to other unnecessary problems.
Coeliac UK, the Primary Care Society for Gastroenterology and the British Dietetic Association have written guidelines to help health care professionals in prescribing gluten-free foods. The guidelines define different categories—children, male adults, pregnant women and the ages of patients—allocating each a number of units per month per group to maintain adequate nutrition. Each gluten-free product is assigned a number of units: for example, a 400-gram loaf of gluten-free bread is one unit and a 800-gram packet of gluten-free spaghetti is two units. The recommended amount of gluten-free staple food, in units, is based on the total carbohydrate intake providing approximately 50% of the energy intake, with gluten-free foods on prescription making up 15% of that total.
As I have said, coeliac disease is unique in that a specific and effective treatment is available in the form of a lifelong exclusion of gluten from the diet. Those who adhere strictly to a gluten-free diet can lead full, active lives—they can even become Members of Parliament—and are protected from the development of health risks associated with the untreated condition. Research by Hall and Rubin in 2009 shows that among adult patients with coeliac disease, adherence to a strict gluten-free diet is variable, with compliance ranging from 36% to 96%. The evidence also shows that following a gluten-free diet is particularly difficult for those patients with no obvious symptoms. Medical experts and research agree that access to a range of gluten-free food on prescription is important to support people with coeliac disease and to help them to maintain their nutritional needs.
Research undertaken by Coeliac UK, among the charity’s membership in 2006, suggests that access to gluten-free food on prescription is regarded as the most important factor for people with coeliac disease in terms of adherence to a gluten-free diet: nearly 87% cited it as an important factor in maintaining a gluten-free diet and 47% cited it as the single most important factor. A further survey on gluten-free prescribing undertaken by the charity in 2011 among 400 people with the condition showed that 60% of respondents rated gluten-free food on prescription as the most important way of obtaining gluten-free foods for their diet. Although people with coeliac disease have varying requirements for gluten-free foods, depending on their age, gender, occupation and lifestyle, having a wide range of specially formulated gluten-free products available on prescription and easily accessible is vital to promote strict dietary compliance.
On the cost of the gluten-free diet to the patient, having the disease does not entitle people to be exempt from prescription charges. People with coeliac disease in England are charged £7.10 per order unless they have a medical exemption due to different health conditions, age or financial circumstance—although they can use a pre-payment certificate, of course. Research from King’s College London earlier this year found that there is limited availability of gluten-free foods in different stores and that they are more expensive than their counterparts—I refer the Minister to my Tesco bread comparison. That finding has been supported anecdotally by stories from Coeliac UK members, who often report having to travel to more than one supermarket to complete a shopping trip owing to the limited range of foods in their local stores. The problem is noticeably worse for people living in rural communities, so it is not solely about price; access is also a factor. If one cannot travel to a range of supermarkets for shopping, the lack of a bus service may impact on health.
In the past three years, Coeliac UK has undertaken research into cost comparisons between gluten-free and gluten-containing foods on the high street. On average, gluten-free foods have been found to cost three to four times more than their gluten-containing equivalents. Some foods, such as gluten-free pitta bread, cost seven times more. Again, I refer the Minister to the Tesco bread comparison, to which we will keep coming back. For the average shopper, that can mean a difference of approximately £400 a year for staple foods such as bread, flour and pasta alone. Evidence suggests that people on lower incomes, or families with multiple members with coeliac disease, already struggle to maintain a gluten-free diet and that without access to gluten-free prescriptions their long-term health could be put at real risk.
I understand that there is a number of reasons for the higher cost of specialist gluten-free foods; they include the expense of buying alternative grains to replace wheat, product development, nutritional composition by fortifying with other items such as calcium and the considerable need for food science. However, that does not change the impact on the individual. It is therefore vital that gluten-free foods remain on prescription, as they have done for the past 40 years.
The Advisory Committee on Borderline Substances approves a number of products, such as foods and supplements, that can be available to patients on prescription. When a manufacturer applies to have its product available on prescription, it needs to have it approved by the ACBS. The ACBS will look at the type of product, its nutritional value, cost, and even its wrapping and the words written on the wrapping. The cost covers the cost of the product, plus postage and packaging. That cost should be the total cost to get it from the factory to the pharmacy. Slightly fewer than 200 products are currently approved by the ACBS for people with coeliac disease. They include a range of staple products, as outlined earlier, some ethnic foods and products such as biscuits, if they are necessary for an elderly person’s diet or someone who needs a high sugar intake.
Following an internal review earlier this year, the ACBS has agreed that in future it will consider only products that are considered to be dietary staples, including plain breakfast cereals, breads and rolls, crackers and crispbreads, flours and bread mixes, pastry mixes, pasta, pizza bases and xanthan gum. That list will become a very firm base to be adhered to. It is, however, worth spending a moment or two on the supply chain for these prescriptions, because that is where I will bring the Minister back to the cost implications that I spoke about earlier.
The supply chain is made up of a web of individual contractual agreements between manufacturers, wholesalers and other distributors and pharmacists. Those individual contracts are not regulated by the NHS. The end price to the NHS is agreed with the manufacturer by the ACBS, and that is the so-called drug tariff price. The end price should include any related transport costs—a point reinforced by the ACBS earlier this year. The costs associated with gluten-free prescriptions hit the NHS when the pharmacist reclaims them, and there are two potential components: the drug tariff price agreed by the ACBS and what are called out-of-pocket expenses, which are very interesting.
The headline costs to the NHS of gluten-free products arise largely from the impact of those out-of-pocket expenses claimed by pharmacists as a result of additional charges invoked by wholesalers and distributors for what is called non-standard supply. For example, the product might not be stocked as a standard item by the wholesalers, it might require ordering from an intermediary, or it might be treated as special because it has a short shelf-life, such as a fresh product has. Those additional costs remain relatively uncontrolled, however, because there is no specific agreement on how much may be charged by the wholesaler. The pharmacists will need to reclaim those out-of-pocket expenses if they are not to be disadvantaged.
The application of such costs varies considerably and depends on the individual contracts up and down the supply chain. It might be difficult for a manufacturer to control the addition of such costs further down the supply chain, just as it might be difficult for pharmacists to control such costs when they are tied to a particular wholesaler. Such practices may be seen in relation to other products supplied to the NHS, and might be increasing as the NHS strikes harder bargains on the supply of high-value contracts for more common treatments. The impact of such practices is not currently understood, so it would be useful if the Minister today commits to a robust assessment of the real costs to the NHS of additional charges associated with the supply of products—not only gluten-free ones—and to instructing relevant bodies to enter negotiations with the supply chain to explore the possibility of reducing costs overall. That might even involve looking at the drug tariff price.
We all recognise the financial constraints currently faced by PCTs and health boards throughout the UK, but responding to those constraints by eliminating access to gluten-free foods is potentially damaging to overall patient health, while there are more proven effective ways of managing the costs of gluten-free prescribing. The NHS should not be subject to excessive charging, but nor should patients be left unnecessarily paying the price of additional costs; instead, we need to be smarter.
We can be smarter by using local enhanced service contracts. Pharmacy-led prescribing schemes allow gluten-free foods to be supplied directly from community pharmacies, thus bypassing the GP. They allow commissioners to standardise prescribing habits, which would address NHS concerns about excessive and off-tariff prescribing. Furthermore, they might help to tackle handling charges by placing limits on what charges may be reclaimed by pharmacists without compromising patient satisfaction.
Looking for ways to streamline the system is not new. In 2001, the Cabinet Office regulatory impact unit published a report on reducing GP paperwork. It recommended that GPs should no longer need to issue prescriptions for gluten-free foods; instead, patients with coeliac disease should be able to obtain supplies from a pharmacy. The proposal was supported by the Royal College of General Practitioners, Coeliac UK and the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee. The National Pharmacy Association has developed a toolkit for NHS commissioners outlining the business case for an alternative supply route for gluten-free foods on prescription. That is due to be launched this month and is supported by the Primary Care Society for Gastroenterology and the Dispensing Doctors’ Association. The toolkit is being promoted to all PCTs, health boards and GP commissioning groups, which are urged to implement the pharmacy-led schemes as soon as possible—but why?
The potential benefits of a pharmacy-led prescribing scheme are many and include: improved dietary compliance and health outcomes, as good dietary adherence is aided by the ease with which patients can obtain appropriate amounts of gluten-free products on prescription; and a reduction in the annual cost per patient for the supply of gluten-free foods. According to surveys of costs from Northamptonshire and Cumbria, savings of between 20% and 40% are possible in the ingredient cost of gluten-free foods. Members might be interested to note that the annual ingredient cost in England for the provision of ACBS-approved gluten-free foods in 2010 was approximately £28.6 million, yet gluten-free foods comprised only 0.32% of the total net ingredient costs of all prescribed products. However, the introduction of a pharmacy-led scheme in England for gluten-free products alone would be expected to produce savings of between £5 million and £11 million in the first year.
Another benefit would be the release of clinical time. In 2002, the Royal College of General Practitioners estimated that the initiative, had it been implemented at that time, would have saved 209,000 appointments or more than 20,000 GP hours of clinical time. In a survey undertaken by Coeliac UK, GPs have confirmed that a change to pharmacy supply eases demands on their time. Also, overprescribing could be prevented by application of national guidelines, as all pharmacy-led schemes are based on the 2004 prescribing guidelines. By following a set monthly allowance, it is possible to prevent individual or nutritionally unsuitable prescribing—that benefit was identified in the roll-out of the Cumbria PCT pilot scheme.
Better cost control could be another benefit, as the pharmacy-led schemes provide better individual patient cost control because the pharmacy supply schemes are based on a system of units of gluten-free foods linked to the patient’s dietary needs, rather than on patient-led prescribing by GPs using form FP10. There is a need for better cost control as more people with coeliac disease are diagnosed, in accordance with NICE recommendations. More diagnosis will itself bring a subsequent risk to GP prescribing costs and time, both of which could be better managed in pharmacy-led prescribing.
A pharmacy-led scheme would also be in line with the 2008 White Paper, “Pharmacy in England: Building on strengths—delivering the future”, in that it would reduce the time-consuming administration of repeat prescriptions in GP surgeries; contribute to the range of clinical services offered by pharmacies, in particular to those with a long-term condition; expand patients’ access to treatment, making better use of pharmacists’ skills; and improve the patient experience, giving more rapid access to gluten-free foods by eliminating the need for GP signature of repeat prescriptions, and allowing more flexibility as products are launched or removed from the market.
Feedback from GP, pharmacy and patient stakeholders in Cumbria and Northamptonshire has been overwhelmingly positive. Cumbria, a county I know well, having lived there as a child, has been at the forefront of GP commissioning and, as such, has been able to assess pharmacy-led prescribing from two different perspectives: that of a GP in a clinical practice and that of a commissioning GP with budgetary responsibility. Dr Fayyaz Chaudhri, a GP in Maryport, said:
“I have been involved with this scheme in Cumbria for a number of years and have first-hand experience of the benefits to both patient and GP. There is a real issue to address in ensuring the supply of gluten-free foods. It is cost-effective for NHS, patient and taxpayer, and I believe that this toolkit needs to be rolled out across the country.”
To sum up on prescriptions, I would like the Minister to take note of the price of the Tesco bread I referred to earlier—he wrote it down, I think. Many people cannot afford to pay 800% more for a loaf of bread, more than 100% more for spaghetti, or five times as much for a bag of flour. Prescriptions are important to maintain the health of coeliac sufferers. Evidence from Coeliac UK already suggests that those disadvantaged by such costs will find maintaining a gluten-free diet a real challenge and their heath might suffer in consequence. Experts in gastroenterology have confirmed that access to gluten-free food is an essential part of the treatment for sufferers of coeliac disease. I urge the Minister to look at smarter ways of achieving it and I condemn rash reactions such as withdrawing prescribing, as we have seen in some places.
Le me say a word or two about eating out, to reinforce what I touched on earlier. I know that it is not the Minister’s direct responsibility, but he will no doubt feed it back to the appropriate Minister—though he looks puzzled. Currently, eating out is a lottery for people with coeliac disease. The gluten-free diet is not well provided for in the catering industry and dealing with the issue would have significant impact on the quality of life of people with coeliac disease. Although the industry is responding to some degree to the needs of people on a gluten-free diet, provision is not uniform.
Those who eat out often have to draw attention to themselves, asking to see the chef or the list of the ingredients that make up the meal. Often, they are faced with a member of the front-of-house team who has no idea what they are talking about, or they are passed to the chef, who might have a better understanding of their diet, but not necessarily. Catering for a gluten-free diet is not uniformly included in training for chefs and front-of-house staff, and including such training would better equip staff as they move forward in their careers.
Many people with the condition feel that eating establishments lack knowledge and understanding when it comes to offering safe, gluten-free food, so they stay in, keeping their health and money safe at home. We have not discussed cross-contamination, but it is a serious concern, and the nature of the catering industry, with its high staff turnover, can make trusting others with one’s diet difficult. As I said, many people therefore take the easy way out and stay at home.
People with coeliac disease represent 1% of the population, or 600,000 people, but the loss to the catering industry is greater, because coeliacs drive the venue decisions of the people they eat with. Research among more than 3,000 people with coeliac disease found that those who eat out do so with a minimum of two to three other people. With an average spend of between £10 and £20 per head, each coeliac meal is technically worth £60.
As I said, however, fears about finding safe, gluten-free options keep thousands of people at home. Some 62% of people suffering from coeliac disease eat out once a month or less, while only 38% eat out once every two weeks or more. When people were asked how often they would eat out if more safe, gluten-free options were available, the figures nearly reverse, with 74% saying they would eat out once or more every two weeks, and only 26% saying they would eat out once a month or less.
In these difficult times for the UK economy, harnessing that untapped market has obvious potential financial benefits for the catering sector. More than 40 pubs and restaurants nationally close every week, and coeliacs represent a huge market, which the hospitality sector cannot afford to miss. People with coeliac disease want to eat out more often, and they would be ready and willing to spend their money, if only they felt confident about gluten-free provision. The catering industry needs to help, and with new EU regulations coming into force next year requiring a reduction to 20 parts per million of gluten for food to qualify as gluten free, it needs to do more to convince coeliacs that it is aware of the law and working within it.
Being elected to this place in 2005 was a challenge to me in more ways than one, given that I was diagnosed with osteoporosis during the election campaign and that I came down here not knowing whether I would be able to eat between Monday and Thursday because of my coeliac disease. However, as a result of contact with Coeliac UK, and with the help of others, such as Lord Bilston and my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham, it was possible to constitute the all-party group. That was done not only to help coeliacs in Parliament, but to allow parliamentarians to use their personal experiences of, or interest in coeliac disease to help to raise the issue directly with the Government, and I am happy that we have been able to do that further today.
I am glad to see both my hon. Friends in their places, and I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham will not mind me outing him as a fellow diagnosed coeliac. However, there is a serious point here. As I said, one in 100 people in the UK suffer from coeliac disease, but about 500,000 of them have yet to be diagnosed. While some of us in the Room share the unenviable label of being among the few MPs to have been diagnosed with coeliac disease, there is a good chance that other Members also have it—they just have not heard the good news yet.
We last debated issues related to coeliac disease in February 2007, so today’s debate is long overdue. I am grateful to have this opportunity to lay my thoughts and hopes before the Minister, and I look forward to hearing his comments in a minute.
Dame Anne Begg
Before my hon. Friend finishes, I should pay tribute to the work that he has done to make sure that the catering outlets in the House of Commons offer a gluten-free alternative on every menu. That has made life a lot easier for those of us who are trying to follow a gluten-free diet. More restaurants are following that example, but he is right that eating out, which is often part and parcel of an MP’s job, is difficult. However, the House authorities should be congratulated.
Gordon Banks
They should, and I thank my hon. Friend for her comments. We are just waiting for one of us to be elevated to the House of Lords, because there are some difficulties over there.
I might be pushing my luck, but I would like to invite the Minister and his officials to come to a future meeting of the all-party group to talk a little more about what the Government are doing and to hear first hand from non-parliamentary coeliacs, because many of the issues that were relevant to the February 2007 debate are still relevant four years later.
I have talked about the challenges created by eating out. Research from Coeliac UK has shown that almost seven out of 10 people with coeliac disease prefer to eat at home, rather than to go out for a meal. I happen to be making one of my irregular sorties to a restaurant on Friday night, so I hope that the staff at Aldo’s in Alloa can cope with me. However, this is not just a social problem. Members of the all-party group will be aware of cases that have been brought to us in which sufferers of coeliac disease have been prevented from joining the police or the Army because of their condition.
Sufferers are looking not for sympathy, but for action, understanding and knowledge. Too often, that knowledge is missing, even among the professionals. I therefore return to some of the points I made earlier. We need to ensure that there is much wider knowledge and understanding of coeliac disease among the public and, perhaps more importantly, among the medical and catering communities. We need that knowledge not only among catering or hospitality staff in local restaurants or hotels; staff in hospitals need a greater understanding of the illness, too.
Let me give an example. A friend of mine who is a social worker told me about an elderly woman from his care home who had been hospitalised. Despite staff from the care home advising the hospital of her need for a gluten-free diet and of her coeliac condition, her social worker walked into the hospital one day and found her sitting up in bed eating toast. If we cannot get this right in hospitals, what chance do we have in the wider community?
We have talked about the economic impact on the hospitality sector, but there is a wider economic issue. For example, children who are off school unnecessarily may face educational challenges that impact on not only their schooling but their employability in later life. Similarly, having part of the work force stuck in the toilet rather than sitting at their desks is clearly something that the country needs to avoid. We all know that a healthier country is a more productive country. Indeed, figures obtained by Coeliac UK show that pre-diagnosis coeliac sufferers took an average of 21 sick days off per year, whereas those who had been diagnosed took an average of only three days off per year.
Work carried out by Coeliac UK suggests that the average age for diagnosis is 41, and the average time taken for diagnosis is 13 years. A great deal of work is therefore required to reduce those unnecessary years of suffering and the worry that accompanies them. There are a number of key messages I want the Minister to take away from the debate—I am sure he already knows them, but I would like to reinforce them. First, early diagnosis is vital. The later the diagnosis, the worse the condition and the worse the implications for other conditions that are likely to be inherited as a result of coeliac disease. Secondly, better management of the condition is possible and will save money.
I have moaned a lot this afternoon about the many problems facing those suffering with coeliac disease, and it would be wrong of me to create the impression that improvements have not been made. Indeed, my hon. Friends have mentioned some of them. Just to take Parliament as an example, the cafeteria was a risk too far for me when I came here in 2005, and my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South alluded to that. Now we have better labelling and greater understanding among the staff, so it is much easier to eat in Parliament, and the staff deserve a big thank you for that. As my hon. Friend mentioned, however, that progress needs to be replicated in work canteens, restaurants, bars and shops across the UK. The products have also got better, even though that is reflected in their cost. It is important to accept that the food must be edible, not repulsive, as it was a number of years ago.
Before I wind up, I want to return to the issue of awareness and to say a few thanks. I never thought I would say this in my parliamentary career, but I would like first to thank the world’s No. 1 tennis player, Novak Djokovic, who has been following a gluten-free diet for the past year. That coincides with his rise to the top of the world rankings. It is difficult for me to admit this, but he may serve as a better ambassador for the health benefits of a gluten-free diet than me or any of my hon. Friends here today.
I also thank Phil Vickery, the well known chef, who has focused on gluten-free food and how it can be accommodated in the catering industry, and who is a Coeliac UK food ambassador, and Dr Chris Steele, the well known TV doctor, and another coeliac ambassador, who was fairly recently diagnosed with the condition. The biggest thanks must go to Coeliac UK, where Sarah Sleet and her staff, including Jo Archer, are committed to tackling all the matters that I have raised in a determined and professional way. They represent coeliac sufferers splendidly, and long may they continue to do so.
To sum up, coeliacs want and need better awareness of their condition among the medical profession, an informed approach from the catering and hospitality industry, and an understanding from the Minister that prescriptions are vital but that we may be able to do things better.
Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Ochil and South Perthshire (Gordon Banks) on securing the debate. I also thank Coeliac UK for its work in campaigning and research, and the information that it gives to many thousands of individuals who are diagnosed with coeliac disease.
I have two interests to declare. I am the chair of the all-party coeliac disease group and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Ochil and South Perthshire said, I was diagnosed with coeliac disease nearly 10 years ago. I want to reiterate a point that my hon. Friend made, which is that what we are discussing is not the latest fashionable diet, or a lifestyle choice: it is a medical condition. Sometimes it seems from media coverage, and media understanding of the gluten-free diet, that people have a choice whether to eat foodstuffs containing gluten. We do not have that choice, because of the serious health conditions that my hon. Friend has already mentioned. It is important to ensure awareness and wider understanding, including among GPs.
It is worth reflecting on how people are diagnosed. I was diagnosed 10 years ago, at the age of 37. Did I know I was intolerant to gluten? No, I did not. It was only following a serious stomach operation that the consultant who treated me did tests and biopsies, and said, “You do realise that you are suffering from coeliac disease.” Had I heard of coeliac disease? No, I had not. As with all such things, people learn quickly. I have heard stories from talking to many members of Coeliac UK regional groups—and I thank the volunteers who run local groups for providing information. More often than not, the people I have talked to received mistaken diagnoses. Awareness among consultants, as well as GPs, is an issue.
One may ask what the average age of a coeliac is, but there is not one. I have met parents whose children became ill soon after they began eating food, by two and three years old. My 71-year-old mother was diagnosed only last year, and that was only because I asked her to insist that her doctor tested her for it. Interestingly, many of the complaints and health issues that she has had over many years were explained by coeliac disease, and the diagnosis has changed the way she feels. Awareness is important, therefore, not just in the wider population, but among GPs, to ensure that they ask the questions to find out whether a patient’s symptoms are down to coeliac disease—and the symptoms can be quite varied, as my hon. Friend the Member for Ochil and South Perthshire said.
I do not think that matters have been helped in the past few months by press coverage of prescription charges. Some of the debate is ill-informed. Earlier in the year a headline in The Sun ran: “NHS pays £32.27 for a loaf of bread”. As my hon. Friend has mentioned, if the story had been looked into, it would have been found that the sum was paid not for one loaf of bread, but for a number of products. However, there are underlying issues, which can be remedied by some of my hon. Friend’s suggestions. Nevertheless, the entire tenor of the article was that people are somehow getting free food on the NHS—not just loaves of bread but biscuits, cakes and things like that, which is not the case. Gluten-free products are a very expensive part of the household budget, certainly for families with more than one person affected. I do not get products on prescription, but purchase them. My hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg) is right; the range of products available now is far wider than when I was diagnosed. As for the idea that people are getting foods free, as has been said, they are not: if they receive them on prescription they will pay for that anyway. Many people do not choose to take anything in that way.
The reaction to the publicity, and the pressure on NHS budgets to secure value for money, which we would all support, has been a knee-jerk reaction to go the other way and reduce the number of products that people can get. That is not acceptable for low-income families and those who rely on gluten-free products on prescription. My hon. Friend the Member for Ochil and South Perthshire talked about a cost of about £400 a year, but in some cases it could be more, depending on how many affected people there are in a family. It has been recognised that the condition is not a fad or lifestyle choice, but a disease that needs treatment; and proper management can save the NHS money. People will not present at GPs’ surgeries with undiagnosed conditions. They can live perfectly well with the condition if it is properly managed; and my hon. Friend might agree that in some cases that improves health, because the diet is quite healthy—including, in my case, not being able to drink beer.
There has been a knee-jerk reaction from some PCTs. Is it acceptable that arrangements with suppliers are costing the NHS money? No—and I think that the Cumbrian and Northamptonshire examples are a way forward. If we encourage PCTs to adopt the approach of having prescriptions managed by the pharmacist, not only will the NHS save a lot of money, but that will be better for people who suffer from coeliac disease than going to the doctor for a prescription. I have talked to my GP about it, and doctors do not really review what is on the prescription. They just keep signing it. At least if the process happens in the pharmacy, the pharmacist, who knows the people involved, may review the quantity or type of products that the individual wants. I think that it would reduce the possibility of people getting the same prescription repeatedly, whether they need it or not. The pharmacist would be able to manage things. If someone has a prescription for eight loaves, but does not need them, why keep paying for them?
The examples and pilots in Cumbria and Northamptonshire show that not only can costs be driven down, but the service to the patient can be improved. There is an easy win there, and Coeliac UK and pharmacists are quite keen on the idea, and so are GPs, because it would cut the person hours taken up in writing the prescriptions. The pilots provide good instances of how GPs’ time is freed up. I urge the Government to look seriously at that, and consider how such best practice can be moved across. Quite rightly, when there are lurid headlines about people paying £32 for gluten-free bread, on top of the actual costs, that is not acceptable. If we can do something to reduce that problem, it would be good. We need to see more positive and constructive articles. To be fair, the Daily Mail in its health section has carried quite a few good articles about coeliac disease, explaining its symptoms, and promoting the suitable food that is available.
Some quick wins are available for the Government and the NHS, if they are allowed to take them on board. As chair of the all-party group, I would like the Minister to attend a meeting if that could be fitted into his diary commitments, and to meet the members of the group and others from around the country.
The Minister of State, Department of Health (Mr Simon Burns)
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, and it would be extremely useful to attend such a meeting. However, he may wish to invite the Minister of State, Department of Health, my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Burstow), who is the lead Minister on this medical condition.
Mr Jones
I am disappointed about that, because I was looking forward to the right hon. Gentleman’s attendance. He is a good friend, but I will obviously leave it to the Department to decide who is the best person to come, and we will certainly issue that invitation in the next few days.
I want to pick up some of the issues that my hon. Friend the Member for Ochil and South Perthshire raised, including the products that are available. My hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South was right when she said that products have changed remarkably in the last 10 years from bread like cardboard that was hardly edible without a pint of water to some very good products on the market now. It is interesting that on the commercial side, large bread manufacturers such as Warburtons are producing gluten-free bread, so it obviously sees a market. I have tried its bread, and it is very good. Likewise, the invention of products such as Genius bread has completely changed the type of bread that is available, and the technology for producing it.
The supermarkets have also changed. Asda, Tesco and Sainsbury’s in particular have done two things. First, they have shelving dedicated to gluten-free products, which is important. Secondly, labelling has changed, which is important for people who suffer from coeliac disease, because it is amazing how many products contain gluten. Some flavours of crisps contain gluten, but others from the same producer do not. Correct labelling is important for all products so that people may buy with confidence, and see that the products that they are buying are gluten-free. It is important that the supermarkets recognise that there is a large and growing market for such products, so anything we can do to encourage better labelling of food content is important.
My hon. Friend referred to eating out, which can be difficult, although some restaurants recognise the problem of gluten in certain foods. However, the bane of my life is organisations that provide food on airlines and National Express, on which I sometimes travel. The people serving the food have no understanding of what a gluten-free diet is, and offer everything from sandwiches to sausages. When asked whether those foods contain gluten, they look blank.
The other reaction, which one gets from British Airways and which is amazing, is that whenever one asks for a gluten-free meal it thinks that that means vegetarian. I am not sure why, but it seems to think that one can eat what everyone else eats, but without the sauce. It seems to think that coeliacs are vegetarians, and my usual response is to ask whether I look like a vegetarian. There should be a campaign to persuade airlines and train companies that provide meals to ensure that their staff know what a gluten-free diet is. They could also be more imaginative about what they provide, because it is often inedible.
Dame Anne Begg
My hon. Friend may agree that if one tells an organisation that is providing a sandwich lunch that one wants a gluten-free sandwich, it always seems to provide the worst possible gluten-free bread, without the same filling as everyone else. One is given processed cheese or a bit of cold ham, and looks lovingly at the filling in everyone else’s sandwiches. Not only does one get the worst bread in the world, one gets the worst filling in the world, when it would have been easier to take out the original filling and put it on a plate to make quite a good salad.
Dr William McCrea (in the Chair)
Order. Time is passing, and the Opposition Front Bench spokesman and the Minister must make their winding-up speeches, so perhaps the hon. Gentleman will draw his comments to a close.
Mr Jones
I agree with my hon. Friend. When I was a Minister, it took at least six months to convince those in my private office at the Ministry of Defence that I did not want a salad whenever I went anywhere.
I congratulate the House authorities on the steps that they have taken in the House of Commons to provide gluten-free products, including meals, and to put the crossed grain logo on menus and so on to inform people. I hope that the House of Lords will eventually follow the same principle. That shows that it is possible for catering establishments to provide for people who need a gluten-free diet, and the House of Commons should be congratulated. There are some important issues to consider, and I hope that today’s debate has raised awareness about people who suffer coeliac disease, and provided some practical suggestions, which I hope the Minister will consider.
Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)
I apologise for being a few minutes late for the debate. I was speaking in the debate on Health and Social Care (Re-committed) Bill that is taking place in another part of the building.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Ochil and South Perthshire (Gordon Banks) on securing this important debate. It is always important when hon. Members with personal experience of an issue or condition take the opportunity to make the rest of us aware of that experience, as he has done.
As we have heard, Coeliac UK is doing excellent work, and one of the concerns that it has raised with parliamentarians is the challenge that people with coeliac disease face when eating in hospital. It says that hospital food is often restricted, and even unsafe. It receives many calls from members who have been in hospital, and have returned home malnourished and having suffered considerable weight loss. Sometimes friends and family have to provide gluten-free food. I hope that the Minister will tell us what action his Department is taking to ensure the availability of gluten-free food in hospitals throughout England and Wales.
Hon. Members will be aware that as well as securing today’s debate, my hon. Friend tabled an early-day motion in June 2010 to raise the issue of diagnosis rates. He has spoken very well on the matter this afternoon. In a parliamentary question, my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) asked what information the NHS provides to people who are diagnosed with coeliac disease on managing their condition. The departmental response referred to a website with detailed information. The site also has information on how to ensure a gluten-free diet, with helpful examples of food to avoid. However, in the light of the large number of undiagnosed cases that we have heard about, I wonder whether the Minister has recently discussed the diagnosis and management of coeliac disease with representatives of the Royal colleges and other bodies representing medical professions.
My hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg) tabled an early-day motion early this year on issues relating to the hospitality industry, which we have heard more about this afternoon. What discussions, if any, has the Department held with the hospitability industry?
Outside Parliament a wide range of organisations, including Coeliac UK and the British Society of Gastroenterology, carry out excellent work on the condition. In particular, the British Society of Gastroenterology feels that an active case-finding strategy will increase the number of patients detected with coeliac disease. Does the Department have such a strategy at present?
Last year the British Society of Gastroenterology published its “Guidelines for the management of patients with coeliac disease”, in which it made a number of recommendations on what testing for coeliac disease should incorporate and how to best manage patients. Has the Department looked at those recommendations, and does it have a position on the management of patients with coeliac disease?
We have already touched on the excellent work of Coeliac UK and its ongoing campaigns such as the “Eating Out” campaign, which focuses on the food service sector, or the “Product” campaign mentioned earlier, which is about having a greater availability of gluten-free foods in supermarkets and on prescription. Of course, Coeliac UK is concerned that the medical profession has under-recognised coeliac disease so far. It is not routinely tested for, and Coeliac UK is campaigning to change that. We must build on the successes achieved, and I would be interested to hear how the Department plans to support the ongoing campaigns and the further work of Coeliac UK.
We have already heard about diagnosis, and the Minister will know that Coeliac UK has petitioned the Government to improve the rate of diagnosis of coeliac disease by including a target for GPs in the quality and outcomes framework. If a target on coeliac disease were to be included into that framework, GPs would have to deliver a better rate of diagnosis of the condition. That campaign has attracted nearly 9,000 signatures, and Coeliac UK is continuing with that and has made a new submission to the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence for such a target to be included. It would be helpful if the Minister updated us on the Government’s position on the issues raised in that petition.
Apart from early diagnosis and the management of coeliac disease, my hon. Friend the Member for Ochil and South Perthshire called this debate to discuss community-led pharmacy prescriptions. He has spoken effectively on that matter.
Moving on to the socio-economic impact of coeliac disease, we know that it is difficult to assess the overall burden of the disease owing to the absence of recorded information on diagnosis rates. There is a need for a central register of patients with coeliac disease, and I wonder whether the Minister will comment on that. We know that coeliac disease has an impact on both the individual and the community because of its high prevalence and the long-term complications arising from late diagnosis. The development of osteoporosis or bowel cancer has an impact not only on the individual affected but on the community and the health service. Even in the short term, the absence of diagnosis has a socio-economic impact. My hon. Friend said how shocked he was when his GP said, almost lightly, that he had missed two other cases of the disease that month. According to an independent study commissioned by Coeliac UK in 2006, just under half of people with coeliac disease who had been wrongly diagnosed believed that their job or career had suffered due to the condition prior to diagnosis.
As we have heard, Coeliac UK wants to see greater understanding and familiarity with the disease among GPs, and higher levels of referral to dieticians. A survey of registered dieticians conducted by Coeliac UK showed a wide variation nationally in the provision of dietetic expertise for patients with coeliac disease. Current provision is around one third of what it would be were we to provide diagnosed coeliacs in the UK with basic support and an annual review.
I will conclude my remarks by saying to the Minister that there is a continued cost to the health service due to repeat visits to GPs by people with undiagnosed coeliac disease—my hon. Friend referred to that in his personal case. Furthermore, left untreated or undiagnosed, coeliac disease can lead to more serious complications such as bowel cancer, which puts an even bigger drain on health service resources. Coeliac UK recognises the competing demands on health service resources and budgets, but coeliac disease is easily controllable once diagnosed—we can see that by looking at my two hon. Friends the Members for Ochil and South Perthshire and for North Durham (Mr Jones), who are able to be excellent and inspirational Members of Parliament because their coeliac disease is so well managed. It is a disease that can be self-managed if diagnosed early enough in life.
Government policy needs to acknowledge the scale of the impact of coeliac disease across a large segment of the population. Policy must also take into account the potentially serious nature of the disease, the cost in financial terms, and the suffering of the undiagnosed. In particular, measures should be taken to address the lack of awareness about the disease and provide a framework to ensure that GPs receive appropriate training and resources. Ongoing training should be provided to enable GPs to give better care in the community.
Once again, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Ochil and South Perthshire on securing this debate, and my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham on chairing the all-party group on coeliac disease and dermatitis herpetiformis. A number of colleagues from all sides of the House take a keen interest in this issue and wish to commend the work of the all-party group in promoting awareness about the disease. I look forward to the Minister’s response.
The Minister of State, Department of Health (Mr Simon Burns)
May I say what a pleasure it is to serve under your chairmanship again, Dr McCrea? I will begin with some congratulations and an apology. The congratulations go to the hon. Member for Ochil and South Perthshire (Gordon Banks) on securing this debate and on raising the issues faced by people living with coeliac disease. It was genuinely fascinating to listen to him speak about a long-term condition that, as was mentioned by other hon. Members, is unknown to a vast majority of people in this country. To hear at first hand about the day-to-day living of someone with that long-term condition was extremely interesting and illuminating.
The question of illumination is where I get to my apology. I must apologise to the hon. Gentleman because I am afraid he got the monkey rather than the organ grinder this afternoon. As he will know, the Minister of State, Department of Health, my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Burstow), is the lead Minister in the Department for issues such as coeliac disease and other long-term conditions. As the hon. Gentleman will understand, deliberations on the Health and Social Care Bill are reaching their concluding hours on the Floor of the House of Commons as the legislation approaches Report and Third Reading. The Minister of State’s debate on Report clashed with this debate in Westminster Hall, so I am an inadequate stand-in for him. I assure hon. Members, however, that I will draw his attention to a number of points that have been raised this afternoon, and I know that he will be interested to read the debate tomorrow. If there are other issues that he needs to answer, I will make sure that he does so. In the time available, I will try to respond to as many points raised by hon. Members as I can. If time does not allow all those points to be answered, I will ensure that they receive a letter to clarify any outstanding issues.
For those hon. Members who are not aware of coeliac disease—I know that there are none in the Chamber today, but I am sure that there will be some MPs who follow health issues assiduously in Hansard but who are not as knowledgeable as those present in the debate—let me say that the disease is a common condition that affects approximately one in every 100 people in the UK. Rather surprisingly, women are two to three times more likely to develop the condition than men, although there seems to be no apparent reason for why that should be the case. Cases of coeliac disease have been diagnosed in people of all ages, as the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) mentioned when illustrating one of his points. It is therefore crucial that information, education and support are available for individuals as well as the other people involved in their lives, such as parents, teachers, carers, employers and others.
There is only one clear path to get properly diagnosed—again, early diagnosis was another theme that was echoed by all three hon. Members who took part in the debate. That is an extremely important issue. The points that hon. Members raised in making the case for early diagnosis are unanswerable. It is crucial. However, as they will know, getting a proper diagnosis requires a blood test and endoscopy with biopsy. We of course welcome any new tools that can help to get more people diagnosed. However, it must be recognised that pinprick self-testing kits do not replace a medical diagnosis. Indeed, for a definitive diagnosis, it is important that people have not already taken gluten out of their diet as a result of self-diagnosis, because that can lead to the diagnostic tests being inconclusive, with all the unfortunate results that that has.
Anyone experiencing symptoms of coeliac disease should seek the advice of their doctor to get a proper diagnosis and professional dietary advice on how to manage their condition. We must ensure that people living with coeliac disease get the best clinical advice and support available, that they are involved in decisions about their care and that they are fully supported to make informed choices.
The hon. Member for Ochil and South Perthshire said, “Why not use the QOF?” With regard to the testing of people and of members of their family to see whether they may have the disease, we believe that it is up to people to raise any concerns that they have as a result of a family member having the disease, and that is likely to result in a test for coeliac disease for those people.
I think that the hon. Gentleman specifically asked—I hope that I have got this right—when or if there would be NICE guidelines. On that issue, I have what I hope is some rather good news for him. There are already NICE guidelines on diagnosis and recognition. They were published on 27 May 2009. The reason that the guidelines were drawn up is that they were part of a determined campaign in the NHS and, to be fair, by the Government of the day to improve recognition of the disease and to increase the number of people diagnosed with it.
Gordon Banks
I am well aware of what the Minister is referring to; indeed, I alluded to it in my contribution. What I am saying is that there is now an opportunity through the QOF framework to make coeliac disease one of the 150 measurable outcomes for GPs to be measured against.
Mr Burns
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. He makes a perfectly reasonable point. I will certainly ensure that his comments are drawn to the attention of NICE, because of course it will be NICE, working with the Department of Health, that draws up the list of conditions. That is apart from the standards that it is already working on. As the hon. Gentleman said, between 150 and 180 are being considered. I will ensure that his comments are drawn to NICE’s attention.
Gordon Banks
With regard to the points that the Minister has made, which I did allude to, those are not mandatory, enforceable measurements. That is why we need something more.
Mr Burns
I am grateful and I will ensure that the hon. Gentleman’s recommendation and the points associated with that are drawn to the attention of the relevant bodies, so that they can be considered as NICE considers its programme for the standards.
The question of managing coeliac disease in the NHS featured in a number of contributions today. The NHS is best placed to determine and manage its services locally, supported by clinical guidelines and close community and partnership working. The NICE guidelines on recognition and diagnosis of the condition are supported by prescribing guidelines for professionals on prescribing gluten-free foods, developed in association with the British Dietetic Association, the Primary Care Society for Gastroenterology and Coeliac UK.
The NHS also has to ensure that the resources that it has available are used to greatest effect. That is another theme that I think was developed by all three hon. Members who took part in the debate. Some of the comments concentrated on the question of prescriptions. One area in which spending needs to be more effective in order to meet rising demand for services is prescribing, as hon. Members said. A range of programmes is in place to try to reduce the money spent on prescribing drugs, and the review of gluten-free food prescribing is part of that process.
Discussions are taking place throughout the country on that matter. In the south-east—the hon. Member for Ochil and South Perthshire referred to this—a review was conducted of gluten-free prescribing policies across the region. That was led by medicines management leads, who are pharmacists, from the different counties. They made recommendations that caused concern to some patients. However, as a result of their subsequent discussions with patients and, indeed, the role played by Coeliac UK, a number of changes are to be made to their original proposals. I will add that GPs are not prevented from such prescribing if specific patients are considered to have a special clinical need. I hope that that reassures the hon. Gentleman.
It is a matter for doctors’ clinical judgment which products they prescribe for their individual patients. They are not prevented from such prescribing if patients are considered to have a special clinical need. We fully expect GPs and other health professionals who prescribe gluten-free products to assess the dietary requirements of individual patients, taking into account not only their nutritional requirements but their lifestyle and other needs. We expect the provision of food items to be based on individual needs, not on a preconceived idea of what someone ought to receive.
We believe that patients stand to benefit from the modernisation of commissioning, as that will enable GPs to focus resources to meet the local needs of their population and enable local people to be involved in shaping services that are crucial to them. It will be for consortia to determine how they organise themselves to commission services for patients affected by coeliac disease. The new arrangements in the NHS are designed to ensure that GPs are in the driving seat on commissioning services for their local population.
Gordon Banks
In my contribution, I spent a considerable amount of time talking about pharmacy-led prescribing. The Minister has gone around the houses on that; he has not really addressed it directly. In the last two and a half minutes of the debate, could he deal with it in a little more detail?
Mr Burns
I am planning to come to that, but first I want to deal with another issue that the hon. Gentleman raised—food labelling. I will then move on to prescribing. If I run out of time, I will ensure, as I promised, that I write to him.
Food labelling is crucial to patients’ quality of life, and improvements have needed to be made. The coalition Government want to see health and social care provided in a way that achieves better outcomes and delivers personalised services, focused around individuals, not organisations, and ending up with care and support that is of a higher quality and safer than ever before.
For people living with coeliac disease, having the right information about the gluten content of food is crucial. That has certainly emerged in the course of this debate. Prescribed foods represent a small proportion of an individual’s diet. People with coeliac disease buy most of their food from high street shops, like everyone else. It is therefore important that food labelling is comprehensive and reliable. It has got better in recent years, particularly in supermarkets, which the hon. Member for North Durham mentioned, and in some restaurants—although there is a long way to go—as more and more people become aware of the condition. Indeed, a wide selection of gluten-free foods is now available at supermarkets. That was not the case 10 years ago.
New labelling requirements introduced in January 2009 for full implementation on 1 January next year are designed to reduce confusion and to help people with coeliac disease to make safer choices about the food that they eat. The legislation sets out new low limits for gluten in foods making “gluten-free” and “very low gluten” claims, so that consumers can understand how much gluten there is in the foods that they buy. The Government are working with industry, health professionals and Coeliac UK to provide advice for consumers on what the new legislation means for them.
As I am running out of time and sadly have not been able to cover all the points, I give hon. Members a categorical assurance that they will receive a letter answering in detail the outstanding points that they have validly raised during an extremely interesting and high-quality debate.
Wind Farm Development (Sedgefield)
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Phil Wilson (Sedgefield) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to speak under your chairmanship, Dr McCrea.
Whenever we have a debate about wind farm development and the instigator of the debate opposes a planned wind farm, there are cries of nimbyism or of the Member being at the climate-change-denial end of the spectrum. I am the instigator of this debate, but I am not a nimbyist or a climate-change denier. Nevertheless, I am opposed to E.ON’s proposal to build a wind farm in my constituency of up to 45 wind turbines, each four times the height of the Angel of the North. It will cover 7½ square miles of my constituency, or 5% of its geographic area—equivalent to the size of Newton Aycliffe just to the west of the proposed site, which has a population of about 30,000.
If E.ON’s proposal was for the only wind farm in County Durham, I could stand accused of nimbyism, but it is not. There are already 16 in the county, and another has received planning consent but has yet to be built. The site in the Sedgefield county ward where E.ON proposes to build has a cluster of 17 wind turbines, 10 of which are run by E.ON and seven by Wind Prospect. If the E.ON proposal goes ahead, there could be as many as 62 turbines in one ward, and that does not include a further application for three turbines at Foxton lane, which is south of Sedgefield village and in the same ward. However, those are not the only developments that are being proposed or granted. It seems as if there is a steady stream of developers coming to my door proclaiming the merits of their schemes. In isolation, one scheme may have a lot going for it, but as one of many they have a cumulative impact, and the landscape’s capacity to take more turbines is questionable.
Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire) (Con)
I thank the hon. Gentleman for allowing me to intervene. I wish to express sympathy with his cause. We have exactly the same problem in my constituency, with a huge number of wind farms coming along that will completely destroy the area. The hon. Gentleman should know that he is not alone; others feel the same. Virtually every resident of Montgomeryshire will sympathise with him.
Phil Wilson
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. There is a lot of discontent in certain parts of the country, because the matter is pertinent to parts of Wales and Scotland, as well as to County Durham and to one or two other parts of the country. A case can be made for wind farms, but when there are dozens in one area it has an impact on the local landscape.
Pat Glass (North West Durham) (Lab)
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way. His is a neighbouring constituency.
County Durham was the first county to reach its 2010 target, and it is well on its way to reaching its 2020 target for renewable energy. Like my hon. Friend, I have many wind farms in my constituency, which is largely rural and has two areas of outstanding natural beauty. Energy providers now acknowledge that the cumulative effect of ever more developers rushing to build wind farms is reaching saturation point in the county.
Phil Wilson
I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. In a moment, I shall be pointing out how much of a role County Durham and Sedgefield residents are playing in combating climate change.
It is the job of each developer to promote their schemes, but because the planning system is run on a first-come, first-served basis there is a rush to the planning authorities, and local people are left feeling under siege and helpless. I shall give an example by detailing the level of interest in and around my constituency by developers. I say “in and around the constituency”, because when my constituents look out of the windows they do not see the boundaries between constituencies; they see pleasant countryside. Indeed, from certain parts of the constituency they can see magnificent views of the North Yorkshire moors and Cleveland hills.
This is the state of play. As I said, 16 wind farms are up and running in County Durham, and another has been permitted but has not yet been built; 67 turbines are generating 126 MW. A further five wind farms are in planning, with a further 10 turbines; and three are in pre-planning with 18 turbines. That is a total of 95 turbines. Then there is the mother of all wind farms, the Isles wind farm proposed by E.ON, which will raise the number of turbines, operational and proposed, to as many as 140.
Within hundreds of metres of the Durham county council border at Sedgefield, three turbines are operational near Elwick. Just to the south, along the A1, a further six have been granted at Red Gap farm. Three turbines have received planning consent at Lambs hill near Stockton, and they directly affect my constituency because of their proximity. In the borough of Darlington, an area that I share with my hon. Friend the Member for Darlington (Mrs Chapman), three are proposed at East and West Newbiggin. Banks Renewables has gone to appeal on a wind farm of 10 turbines at Moor House farm, just to the south of E.ON’s large proposal. The list goes on.
Local people feel inundated and helpless. I am sorry to say that they are resentful of a planning regime that does not seem to listen to them. I accept that not all the proposed wind farms will go ahead. However, the Minister cannot deny that they will have a cumulative impact in County Durham and the Tees valley plain. When I say no to the Isles wind farm, I do so because I know that my constituents in County Durham are doing their bit. Even the developers are starting to concede that point. A representative of Banks Renewables, wind farm developers that have sites in the county, was interviewed by the Teesdale Mercury on 24 August 2011. He said:
“An unfortunate repercussion of County Durham being forward thinking in its approach to renewable energy development is the potential for cumulative impact to occur...The pursuit of several wind farms within the county by competing developers has potential to cause an unacceptable impact upon the landscape.”
He is absolutely right; in my view we are already at that stage.
County Durham’s record on renewable energy is another reason why I believe that we are not being nimbyist in our approach. The county council was the first local authority in England to have a renewable energy strategy; it dates back to 1994. The renewable electricity target for County Durham in the regional spatial strategy—I realise that it does not apply any more—was 82 MW installed capacity by 2010. Since then, about 165 MW of installed capacity of renewable energy development has been permitted in the county. Only 11 MW of that was permitted on appeal—the majority, 154MW, was granted by the council.
A capacity of 165 MW will meet about 55% of County Durham’s household electricity consumption, or 22% of the county’s overall electricity consumption. That is a fantastic record, and one of the best in England. I am sure that the Minister will agree that County Durham is doing its bit, and I hope that he will pay tribute to the county’s record.
County Durham’s 2010 target has been met and exceeded by a substantial margin. The aspiration to double that target by 2020 has already been achieved, and progress is being made towards the more recent national target of 30% by 2020. That has been achieved through a planned approach based on the north-east region’s renewable energy strategy and development capacity studies commissioned and endorsed by local authorities in the region.
The Tees plain was identified as a broad area of least constraint for wind energy development. Its capacity was identified as being between 20 and 25 turbines. It is covered by four local planning authorities—Durham county council, and Stockton, Hartlepool and Darlington borough councils. A development capacity study was carried out by consultants Arup in 2008, when there were a total of 20 operational or permitted turbines in three wind farms. It concluded that there was potential to exceed the level of development anticipated, and that two additional wind farms totalling between nine and 15 turbines might be acceptable.
Since then, two additional wind farms totalling nine turbines have been permitted. The area is therefore at or approaching the capacity identified in the Arup report. Currently, there are planning applications for three additional wind farms and a single turbine development in the area, totalling 13 turbines; and one planning application for 10 turbines is in abeyance. Those applications will be determined against the development plans of the relevant planning authorities, having regard to both the Arup capacity study and the evolving cumulative impact picture as they progress through the system. According to impact assessment studies, the area chosen by E.ON at the Isles—the company has built many wind farms in the area—can cope with only four to six turbines, but E.ON plans between 25 and 45. Durham can meet its targets because we have proved willing to embrace other renewable technologies in the same area. In Chilton, which is in my constituency and north of the Isles, Dalkia has just opened a biomass facility, producing 15 to 17 MW of electricity. Some 24.4 MW of electricity is generated from biomass in the county, 12.7 MW from landfill and 2.1 MW from hydro. County Durham is playing its part. Everyone wants to share the benefits of renewable energy, but we also need to share the burden.
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
I hope my hon. Friend and my neighbouring MP will forgive me if I go off on a slight tangent. Does he agree that while our constituents are getting the pain of wind farms, they are not getting the benefits? That was perhaps best illustrated this week when EDF awarded all its contracts for a massive wind farm off the Teesside coast to companies abroad, instead of creating jobs in our constituencies for our people who have the skills and facilities with which to build that farm.
Phil Wilson
My hon. Friend makes a very important point. Although the landscape in the area has begun to be reindustrialised, we are not getting any of the benefits.
We are getting energy from other renewable sources such as hydro, landfill, and biomass, and now our constituents are beginning to wonder whether we are all in this together. They look at Hampshire, which is using three times as much energy as Durham but taking only about 4% of it from renewables. Moreover, there is not one on-shore wind farm in the area, despite the fact that it is the county in which the Secretary of State for the Department of Energy and Climate Change has his constituency.
Only five members of the Cabinet have wind farms in their constituency. Some have a lot. The Chief Secretary to the Treasury has 259 in his constituency of Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey, but his constituency covers l,911 square miles—almost as many as there are amendments to the Health and Social Care Bill. The Scottish Secretary has 226 turbines in a constituency covering almost 1,500 square miles. The Foreign Secretary, whose constituency is adjacent to mine, has 24 turbines in an area covering 739 square miles. Sedgefield covers 151 square miles. If the developers get their way and all 87 turbines get the go-ahead, we could see one turbine for every 1.7 square miles. Does the Minister not agree that the planning system for such huge structures is chaotic?
Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)
Is my hon. Friend aware of the concerns of Newcastle airport about the concentration of wind farms and of the Ministry of Defence over the effects that such a concentration will have on using parts of the north-east for low flying?
Phil Wilson
That is an important point. Durham and Tees Valley airport, which is in my constituency, occasionally raises important issues about radar. I have seen the wind farms on its radar scopes. Pilots have to navigate their way round the wind farms to avoid hitting them. Moreover smaller aircraft have to cope with the turbulence that these turbines generate.
What we are facing in County Durham is the reindustrialisation of the landscape, but without the jobs. Durham county council has done tremendous work over the past 30 or 40 years in reclaiming the pit heaps that scarred the landscape for generations. At the height of the coal mining era, thousands of jobs were created in the area. Wind turbines are not bringing that kind of benefit to the region. Reindustrialisation with jobs is one thing; without jobs, both the land and the people are being taken for granted. Their good nature is being abused and that is simply not good enough.
According to the Renewable Energy Foundation, if the Isles wind farm goes ahead with 45 turbines, E.ON will see a revenue stream of more than £570 million over 25 years, some 54% of which is subsidised through our utility bills. E.ON has said that the Isles wind farm could generate enough electricity for 53,000 households. The subsidy would equate to £235 per household per year. The community benefit that it proposes is £460,000 a year or £8.60 per household. The company is taking with one hand and giving us back peanuts with the other. What plans do the Government have to reform or review the subsidy system for wind farms and for renewable energy in the round?
Only a handful of landowners on the Isles will benefit from the rental income from the turbines on their land. One developer said that the income from each turbine is, on average, between £10,000 and £15,000. I do not know the rental figure for the Isles, but even at £10,000, 45 turbines will bring in some £450,000 income for a handful of landlords—the equivalent in community gain for a population in the area of between 40,000 and 50,000.
The Government are looking at the business rates that would be generated if the wind turbines stayed with the local authority. According to the House of Commons Library, business rates income from the Isles would be less than £1 million. That may seem a lot of money, but it is not when we consider the plans of the Department for Communities and Local Government for business rates retention, which could see tens of millions of pounds removed from Durham county council’s budget. Again, this is about taking with one hand and giving back peanuts with the other.
The designs for the Isles place the turbines on either side of the A1 and the east coast main line—the main transport arteries through the north-east. If someone enters County Durham by road or rail from the south, they have to go through my constituency. I do not want the first thing that they see to be a massive wind farm of between 25 and 45 wind turbines, each four times the height of the Angel of the North, each a clone of its neighbour and each working only intermittently. Durham county council has informed me that the average capacity factor for a wind turbine nationally between 2004 and 2008 was 27%. Recently, the average for wind turbines in County Durham has been almost 20%. That belies the claim of many developers, especially E.ON, who say that the Tees valley plain is appropriate for wind farm development. They would not develop wind farms if it were not for the subsidy. Does the Minister not agree that it is time for that process to be reviewed and changed?
E.ON’s imposition on the landscape will affect tourism and the willingness of housing developers to build in the area. I want to see new industry come into the area, Hitachi is to build a train factory at Newton Aycliffe and I want that to be followed by more industry, which means that we need further housing in the area—not just affordable but executive as well—and leisure facilities. This massive wind farm could have a negative impact on such developments.
The Duke of Northumberland has said he will not allow wind farm development on his land. In The Daily Telegraph, he said:
“I have come to the personal conclusion that wind farms divide communities, ruin landscapes, affect tourism, and make minimal contribution to our energy needs and a negligible contribution towards reducing C02 emissions. The landowner and developer are enriched while the consumer is impoverished by higher energy costs. Turbines are ugly, noisy and completely out of place in our beautiful, historic landscape.”
Will the Minister look closely at wind farm development in County Durham, as it has caused a great deal of anxiety in the community? I believe he will see that the cumulative impact is not just a threat but is already with us. He will find that developers are targeting the county because of the good nature of its people. Low incomes will provide the incentive for local people to accept the small amount of money from community gain and ensure that they will find it difficult to raise sufficient funds to campaign against the wind farms.
Local people feel as if they are involved in a David versus Goliath contest in taking on E.ON. Campaigners against the Isles have come together. The following towns and parish councils are against the development: Bradbury, Brafferton, Bishop Middleham, Bishopton, Bolam, Chilton, Coatham Mundeville, Elstob, Ferryhill, Fishburn, Foxton, Great Stainston, Little Stainton, Mordon, Newton Aycliffe, Nunstainston, Preston Le Skerne, Rushyford, Sedgefield, Trimdon, Windlestone and Woodham. The campaign group against the E.ON wind farm can be found on the web at www. theislescommunities.com.
It is now time to look at a planning system and an energy policy that fight climate change by taking people with them, rather than taking them for granted or making them feel helpless. We need a strategic view that ensures that all parts of the country share the burden as well as the benefit of renewable energy. My constituents are united in opposition to the massive imposition of the E.ON wind farm for the Isles. Durham County is known as the land of the prince bishops. I will not stand by to watch County Durham become the land of the wind turbine.
The Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change (Charles Hendry)
Thank you very much, Dr McCrea, for calling me to respond to the debate. I thank the hon. Member for Sedgefield (Phil Wilson) for securing the debate and introducing it in a very thoughtful and considered way. I understand that the subject is very emotional and emotive, and I am grateful to him for the points that he made. We have heard many of the points that he and his hon. Friends made before, but that does not reduce in any way the strength of the argument behind them. I hope to address as many as I can in the time available to me.
I hope that the hon. Gentleman understands that I cannot comment on particular applications, because their nature is such that they may well come to a Minister for final determination and I cannot say anything to prejudge that. However, it is important to say on the record that the E.ON process is currently a consultation. I think that he would wish his speech today to be considered as part of that process, and that the company will be keen to know the views of the local community and local business people on what they consider to be the right way forward on the application.
All applications for major energy infrastructure are dealt with on a case-by-case basis, taking into account the views of local people. To the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones), I say that it is entirely proper that the views of the airport and the Ministry of Defence should also be taken into account in that process. That will continue to be the case under the national policy statements as they become part of planning policy. In addition, the decision maker has a duty to make a decision only after full consideration of the balance of the proposed development’s benefits and negative impacts; that includes consideration of the environmental impacts, which he and others might feel should be taken into account.
I think that the hon. Member for Sedgefield and I agree on the two most critical points: that renewable energy is necessary for energy security and environmental reasons, and that local communities should be given a say in shaping the environment in which they live. Consequently, in the few minutes that I have today I will seek to explain how I see those two aims coming together and set out the steps we are taking to ensure that they do. I also want to address the democratic deficit and show that wind farms can bring real benefits to communities, as long as they are situated in the right place and they have democratic approval.
Our challenge is to build an economy that cuts our carbon emissions to tackle the threat of climate change, that makes our energy secure in a volatile world and that creates sustainable green jobs to help to bring back economic prosperity. As one of the most cost-effective and mature large-scale renewable technologies, the appropriate deployment of onshore wind will play a key role in meeting that challenge. We want Britain to be a global leader in the transition to a low-carbon economy. We are committed to producing 15% of our energy from renewable sources by 2020 and to reducing our carbon emissions by 80% by 2050. In July, we published the renewable energy road map, which sets out our approach to unlocking our renewable potential. It includes a comprehensive suite of targeted, practical actions to accelerate the development of renewable energy in this country.
Charles Hendry
Given that I only have 10 minutes to respond to the whole debate, I hope that the hon. Gentleman will allow me to try to respond to as many of the points made as possible.
Our analysis suggests that approximately 90% of the generation needed to meet that target can be delivered from a subset of eight technologies and that onshore wind has the potential to contribute perhaps 10% to 14% of overall generation. Currently, there is 4.2 GW of operational onshore wind capacity in the UK; in capacity terms, it is the single most deployed renewable electricity technology.
As the hon. Gentleman said, the Government support the deployment of renewable energy through the renewables obligation which, by supporting generation rather than capacity, is structured in a way to incentivise the best use of the available resources and to maximise efficiencies. If an application has a very low load—I would consider 20% to be a low load—it will receive little benefit through the renewables obligation. The higher the load factor, the greater the support that an application will receive through the renewables obligation. However, we have recognised that it is time to review that approach; the review was scheduled for next year, but we have brought it forward because we think that it is right that communities and developers have early clarity about the thinking.
I was not entirely clear about the thinking behind the points the hon. Gentleman made about Cabinet members’ constituencies and how that factor plays in. Most of the applications that we have seen were made well before they were actually in the Cabinet and it was a different set of Cabinet Ministers who were responsible for the policy. Indeed, much of the policy was developed under the leadership of the previous MP for Sedgefield when he was Prime Minister. I am not quite sure where the hon. Gentleman was seeking to go in that part of his contribution.
None the less, I acknowledge the important role that the north-east is playing in the transition to a low-carbon economy. I pay specific tribute to what is being done in Durham already. All of us who know the county know that it is an incredibly beautiful county—a very special part of the country—so we understand the competitive pressures already present there. We recognise the contribution that the county is making.
As a whole, the region has 150 MW of operational onshore wind capacity, which is 3.5% of the total UK deployed resource. Those onshore wind projects have also helped to deliver real economic growth and benefit to the local community, such as the work being done by the National Renewable Energy Centre to develop the region’s old manufacturing heritage, to help to pull the region out of recession and into recovery with new industries for the future.
I understand the concerns expressed today about the impacts that such a level of deployment might have. As the market brings forward applications for wind farms, we need to ensure that they are in suitable locations, taking account of viability and the concerns of local communities. Part of the renewables obligation certificate review is designed to ensure that wind turbines go where the resource is best, not anywhere in the country. The Government are keen to avoid a one-size-fits-all approach and we consider that planning applications for wind farms are best assessed on a case-by-case basis. The national policy statements and the national planning framework set out a clear and simplified framework to do that, but it is a requirement of a planning regime that cumulative impacts, for example those in locations such as Durham, are considered in the total. We would expect the local planning authority to set out important local issues in its local impact report, just as we want host communities for the installations to reap the benefits of taking the assets into their communities.
I am pleased to say that through the Localism Bill we are proposing changes aimed at addressing some of the concerns that have been raised in this debate. They include abolishing regional spatial strategies and their top-down regional energy targets to move towards a localism-driven approach, so that more control is given to local authorities, as the hon. Gentleman wants; introducing provisions for projects submitted to local planning authorities, so that developers will have to show how they have worked with communities in developing their planning applications; closing the Infrastructure Planning Commission and merging its functions with a more efficient and effective Planning Inspectorate, which means that the ultimate responsibility for making decisions on nationally significant infrastructure, such as the application that the hon. Gentleman raised today, will return to democratically elected Ministers; and ensuring that energy decisions on major infrastructure projects are made by the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change based upon recommendations from the new expert unit within the Planning Inspectorate. All decisions will be made in accordance with our recently designated national policy statements and important local considerations.
Our aim is to support appropriate renewable energy development, which the country needs, while maintaining environmental safeguards and, through local and neighbourhood plans, giving local authorities and communities a much greater say in how development is delivered. More broadly, if it is agreed, the framework will also enable local communities to set their own growth agenda according to local needs, and to plan and manage development to deliver that agenda.
As well as ensuring that local people have a real say in what happens in areas near to them, it is right that communities hosting renewable energy projects are rewarded for the contribution they are making to the wider society. As the hon. Gentleman pointed out, there is a concentration of renewable energy resources in different parts of the country and all of us are benefiting from the actions of the communities that decide to host those facilities.
As part of achieving that, we announced that local authorities in England, on behalf of individual communities, will be able to retain the business rates generated by renewable energy deployments, not just for one year, but on a continuing basis. I am pleased that, in parallel, the wind energy industry has published agreed minimum standards for the contributions that wind farm developers will make to community development in England, as part of an ongoing commitment to close consultation with communities. Financial contributions might include, for example, building new community assets, or investment in energy efficiency measures to reduce electricity bills. That would be on top of any direct benefits for those living in the area, such as economic activity, jobs or rent paid to landowners. Of course, the most powerful reward for a community is to have a direct stake in a project and we want to encourage that.
There are real economic benefits that can be delivered by these projects. The hon. Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) talked about that and we want to prioritise it much further to ensure that where major applications happen, we see more jobs coming to the UK.
In these few minutes, I hope that I have been able to show that we very much understand the points that the hon. Member for Sedgefield made in his expertly argued speech—I am very grateful to him for making those points—and, that the Government are using our review of the renewables obligation and the wider policy framework to ensure that we respond appropriately.
European Institutions
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Priti Patel (Witham) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr McCrea. I am grateful to the Speaker for granting me the opportunity to have this debate because, as the Minister for Europe already knows, one of my biggest complaints has been that we do not have enough time in Parliament to debate the EU and its institutions.
I want to cover a wide range of matters specific to various European institutions, those of both the European Union and the Strasbourg-based Council of Europe, because I fundamentally feel that these institutions have grown in power and that, if they are left unchecked, without action by the Government, they will become more and more powerful, with potentially serious consequences for our country. I would like to stress to the Minister the importance of there being more debate on European affairs in the House of Commons, not just on the matters that I will touch on today, but on the broader issues right now within the eurozone, which is the first topic that I want to mention.
There has, of course, been continued speculation about the eurozone, and we have heard a great deal from France and Germany about proposed financial transaction taxes, which, in my view, would have disastrous consequences for the City and its position as a world leader in financial services. There is a clear determination across the eurozone to prop up the euro, irrespective, as we have seen with the Greek bail-outs, of the wider concerns about the ability of other eurozone countries to pay their way. I take the view that we have seen some politically questionable arrangements in relation to bail-outs, regardless of the overall economic consequences, and I am concerned about the exposure of the British taxpayer, which is also somewhat questionable. It is not that surprising that we are now hearing alarm bells in relation to wider talk and discussion of fiscal union: a single regime of taxation and treasury, and unified public borrowing. That is not the solution to the continual problem, and it will, if nothing else, result in the further haemorrhaging of taxpayers’ money to Europe and the further surrender of powers.
What I would really like is for the Minister and the Government to clarify their position on fiscal union, as that could involve a new constitutional settlement with Brussels and could impact on British national sovereignty. British taxpayers must be protected further from any moves towards integration. If any change should come about, we should consider a referendum—we have heard a bit about that topic in the news today—because the British public must have a final say on the course of action that they ultimately look to the Government to take. I would welcome from the Minister a view on the current debate and discussions, and on the proposals that might be emerging in Europe right now. I would like to hear what position the Government might find acceptable or unacceptable, and on what it is that they are prepared to firmly stand up to Europe and question the future direction of travel. It is clear that the European institutions are very focused on closer European union. They are, in my view, using the current eurozone crisis as an opportunity to go for further integration.
Regarding EU directives and their regulatory impact on British business—on businesses in my constituency in particular—the businesses all recognise that we are dealing with the uncompetitive aspect of the EU, which has become a drag upon our economy and upon them individually. I refer specifically to the raft of gold-plated directives that keep coming out of Europe and have a disproportional effect on and an ultimate cost to British businesses, not only affecting jobs in this country but having an overall impact on economic growth. I urge the Minister and the Government to use every opportunity to renegotiate and to repatriate powers to the UK and, where possible, to axe the costly red tape and regulations that are coming out from Europe and affecting, and strangling, British business.
I also look at the advancement of the Europe 2020 strategy and the possible further threats in the form of Europe’s influence on economic, employment and social policies. I again urge the Government and their Ministers to resist all attempts at further competence creep in that area. Both business and the public have become fed up and feel isolated, because of Europe controlling more and more aspects of our lives and our country. Having been denied a referendum on the Lisbon treaty under the previous Government, there is an understandable degree of cynicism and distrust towards the Government—any Government—on this matter.
My views on all matters Europe are well known. If the Government have a sense of conviction and determination to bring an era of transparency and accountability to Europe—we see that more in our domestic policies, and there is a greater case to be made to use Britain’s role to urge Europe to do more of it—we can effectively find ways for the British public to bring powers back to Britain and at the same time engage the British public in the wider debate on matters such as transparency and accountability. If that does not happen, the Government will continue to face this wall of pressure, both from the public and parliamentarians, including me, to hold a referendum on the future of Europe, and on withdrawal from the EU as well. In the years ahead, the Government must pursue the virtues of less Europe and more Britain.
In addition to repatriating powers to Britain, we need an assertive approach to challenging the EU on its budget. The British Government must stand firm in this area, because culturally and institutionally the EU is wedded to an unreformed culture of high budgets. The European Council press release in July said that the EU budget for 2012 was to be trimmed in recognition of the difficult economic circumstances—somewhat an understatement—in many EU countries. What did the so-called trimming result in? It led to an approved increase in the EU budget of more than 2%. The public want the Government to stand up for hard-pressed British taxpayers. How can it be right that we are all financially squeezed here at home while we are bankrolling increased expenditure abroad and footing the bill for what I see as EU propaganda programmes—vanity projects such as EU citizenship programmes?
As part of budget negotiations, I also urge the Government to take a tough stance on defending the UK’s rebate, which is worth £65 billion to British taxpayers, and in particular to stand up against continued attempts by Europe to take what is left of that rebate. The Office for Budget Responsibility has already stated that the UK’s net contribution to the EU will increase to somewhere in the region of £8 billion to £9 billion per year during this Parliament alone. British taxpayers need a commitment from the Government that they will take all necessary action to block any future increases in the budget and to ensure that our rebate is safe.
Another subject that I want to touch on briefly is EU immigration. With the EU set to expand to include Croatia and other Balkan countries, we need stringent immigration controls. I look to the Minister for some assurances, primarily because we have suffered from uncontrolled levels of immigration following the expansion of the EU into eastern Europe. At a time when we need to get Britain working again, we cannot afford to lose more UK jobs to the next generation of European workers.
It is time for Britain to take robust action on the Strasbourg-based Council of Europe and its associated institutions, which include the European Court of Human Rights. From November, the UK will hold the chairmanship of the Council of Europe and in advance of that it is essential that this Parliament gets to debate the UK’s priority. The opportunity for reform must be grasped, as there are plenty of areas in which the UK should focus its attention to protect British sovereignty and the sovereignty of our Parliament, specifically in relation to human rights. Currently the Committee of Ministers, the Commissioner for Human Rights and other officials pass a lot of diktats and impose burdens upon countries, and we have heard a lot about some of the burdens that they would like to impose upon us. Those diktats are used by the European Court of Human Rights to influence judgments but we do not get the debates—they are agreed but the British public do not get to have a say on them.
One issue on which that has effectively happened this year is prisoner votes. The European institutions are thoroughly unaccountable to the British public, yet they exert an outrageous degree of control over this country. While the Government are seeking further delays in introducing legislation on prisoner votes because another test case is being considered by the Court, there is a chance to send a clear message to Europe that this country will not be bullied any more into changing its laws. This Parliament has spoken on prisoner votes, and our view should remain as it was in the debate in February. By doing so, the Government could set a precedent, demonstrate a clear commitment to defending British interests from power-hungry European institutions and provide the effective check on their undemocratic and unaccountable ways for which this country is crying out.
I make a final plea. Ministers must not miss this opportunity to pursue transparency and accountability and to tell Europe to bring its powers back into the hands of the British people, where they belong.
The Minister for Europe (Mr David Lidington)
This is the second day in succession that I have had the pleasure of serving under your chairmanship, Dr McCrea. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Witham (Priti Patel) on securing this debate. I am certainly aware of her long-standing interest in the European Union and European institutions. As she rightly said, it would be good to have more opportunities to discuss such issues, and I would welcome the prospect of many more Members taking part in those debates. It is a pity that, often, only a number of committed aficionados attend European debates. I would like the issues to be debated more generally. As she rightly said, the decisions that British Ministers negotiate at European level have a direct and, in many cases, significant impact on the lives of the people whom we represent.
I listened carefully to the points that my hon. Friend raised and I agree that the European institutions that she mentioned have many shortcomings that, coupled with the previous Government’s reluctance to involve the people in important decisions about the European Union, have led to a growing sense of disconnection between the British electorate and the European institutions. I assure her that this Government are committed to addressing that disconnection and the issues underlying it.
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)
In that case, can the Minister assure us that any new European Union treaties will be put to a referendum of the people, as will any new measures, particularly fiscal ones?
Mr Lidington
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising a subject to which I was planning to come in the next stage of my remarks. The Government are intent on working hard within Europe to deliver the kind of Europe that suits British interests and the British people, in the knowledge that we now have, for the first time, a proper guarantee that, if it is ever proposed to pass new competencies or powers from this country to Brussels, the British people will get a vote in a referendum. That guarantee is provided by the European Union Act 2011, which recently came into force. For the first time, British voters will have their rightful say over any further expansion of EU powers. I believe that that will put our participation in the EU on a sturdier and more democratic footing. If a new treaty amendment or a brand-new treaty were to be introduced that involved the transfer of further competencies or powers from this country to the European Union, that treaty or amendment would be caught by our new Act of Parliament, and a referendum would be required subsequent to primary legislation here so that the British people would have the final say over whether those powers were transferred to Brussels.
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
That is all very well, and it is welcome as far as the future is concerned, but is not the problem that, under the Lisbon treaty and other measures, far too much power has already been ceded to Brussels? What we need is to get some of it back. Should it not be the Government’s priority to use the current situation in Europe to negotiate the repatriation of powers to the British people? That is the key issue as we move forward.
Mr Lidington
As the right hon. Gentleman says, the Act is not a panacea, and I have never claimed that it would be. It does not address the repatriation of powers. That was not its purpose. Under the coalition agreement, the Government are committed to examining the existing balance of competencies and what they mean for Britain, and we continue to consider that issue. I appreciate that both he and my hon. Friend the Member for Witham would have liked the coalition agreement to commit us to returning important powers from the EU to the United Kingdom. During the 2010 general election, I stood on and campaigned for exactly the same manifesto as my hon. Friend did. I do not resile from anything to which I committed myself then, but we must abide by the political reality of the outcome of that election, which the British people delivered. The coalition agreement forms the basis for this Government’s policy.
My hon. Friend argued that ongoing negotiations on EU reform could be an opportunity to deliver a new EU agenda. The current problems in the eurozone were predictable—and, indeed, predicted, not least by British Conservatives—but that does not change the fact that, although we seek to expand British trade with the world’s emerging powers, 40% of it is still with the countries of the eurozone, so it is in our national interests that the eurozone countries prosper and find a way through their difficulties.
The economic logic of a monetary union, as British Conservatives have argued frequently, is greater fiscal and economic union, and we see some signs that the eurozone countries are moving in that direction. If they wish to do so, we should not stand in the way of their progress. If, at some stage in the future, moves towards greater fiscal union among the eurozone countries lead to a treaty, there will be an opportunity for the United Kingdom to ask, “What is in our national interest?” That is the approach that we took on the treaty change to establish a European stability mechanism for eurozone members. As the Prime Minister said, Britain would benefit from taking some powers back from Brussels. However, I caution my hon. Friend that although events are fast-moving and predictions risky, there is no sign of an immediate move towards such a treaty change. Treaty change is neither easy nor straightforward, and the eurozone countries know that, whatever the position in the United Kingdom, several countries, including the Netherlands, Denmark and Slovakia, have provision in their constitutional arrangements for referendums in some circumstances, so it would be a complicated matter. For that reason, I do not think that there is pressure at the moment to go down that road.
My hon. Friend raised more general points about the future of the eurozone. Although the Franco-German proposals appear to be a step in the right direction, we must consider the detail carefully. She is absolutely right that we should not let ourselves be sucked into the deeper fiscal integration on which the eurozone appears to be embarking. That is important to the Government.
On financial transaction taxes, clearly, unless such taxes applied to all financial centres globally, we would see a relocation of trading from centres where taxes apply to centres where they do not. Therefore, a financial transaction tax that applied only to European Union countries would be extraordinarily damaging for every financial centre in the EU, including the City of London. The Government are taking an active role in international discussions exploring financial sector taxation. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has made it clear on many occasions that he thinks that the idea of an EU-only financial transaction tax would be profoundly counter-productive and unwelcome.
My hon. Friend mentioned budgetary discipline and financial efficiency in Europe. Both are cornerstones of the Government’s policy towards the European Union. We want all institutions to ensure that their spending and activity produce genuine benefits for our citizens. We are taking firm action on the 2012 EU budget. Of course, the annual budgets of the European Union are ultimately determined by qualified majority voting. We do not have a right of veto. Although the current proposal for an increase of about 2% is greater than the British Government would have wished, it is still roughly equivalent to a real-terms freeze in that budget, and it is significantly less than the Commission’s original proposal of 4.9%. I also note that it is almost €8 billion less than the budget ceiling for 2011, which was agreed by the previous Labour Government in 2005. We will continue to work with other like-minded countries to get the very best deal possible for the taxpayer. I shall embark on a further stage of that work when I go to Brussels next Monday for the General Affairs Council.
Bob Stewart
Is it possible that we could just say, “No, we are not giving you that money”? We know that that would break a treaty, but surely we are not alone in Europe in that respect. Would not one option for us to think about be for Britain to say no, as Margaret Thatcher did?
Mr Lidington
However tempting my hon. Friend’s suggestion might be, the problem with unilateral action is that it can so easily be used to justify unilateral action by others that would be profoundly detrimental to our national interest. Aspects of the European Union—most obviously the single market, the creation of Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative Government—have benefited the prosperity of and employment among British citizens. They have helped attract vast foreign direct investment to these shores. Other European countries have, at times, fumed and sworn at the fact that the single market meant that they had to dismantle protectionist barriers. However frustrating some aspects of the way in which the EU is organised may be, and however we might aspire to see changes in those structures, I caution my hon. Friend against unilateral action, because that could set a damaging precedent.
We in this Government believe that tax policy is for member states to determine at national level. The Commission has proposed certain new EU taxes. We think that those would introduce additional burdens and damage European—not just British—competitiveness. The United Kingdom will oppose any such new EU taxes.
If we look beyond the annual 2012 budget to the next, probably seven-year, financial perspective, where unanimity rather than qualified majority voting applies, we will see that the Prime Minister has stated jointly with his EU counterparts that the maximum acceptable expenditure increase is a real freeze in payments and that that should be year on year from the actual level of payments in 2013, not from the level of commitment, which is usually above the level of the money actually paid out.
I also assure my hon. Friends that the Government will certainly defend the United Kingdom rebate, which remains fully justified owing to expenditure distortions in the EU budget. We should not cease to remind the British people of the fact that the increases in our direct contributions, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham has referred, are the product of the shoddy budgetary deal negotiated by our predecessors, Mr Blair and the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown), when they were in office.
Jonathan Lord (Woking) (Con)
I welcome what the Minister has said about EU taxes and his approach to the budget, but what are we going to do about some of the social directives about temporary workers and so on when we desperately need to deregulate our economy to get growth? What are we going to do about that avalanche of new regulation coming from Europe?
Mr Lidington
The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, my right hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling), is working hard to assemble a coalition of like-minded Ministers and is engaging with the Commission to seek to avoid the sort of damaging additional social regulation to which my hon. Friend rightly refers. We are also keeping a particularly close eye on the position of the working time directive. The Commission may come forward with new proposals in the next 12 months. Our priority will be to protect the opt-out, which is valuable to British competitiveness. If there also prove to be ways in which to mitigate or reverse the impact of the European Court of Justice judgments that defined time on call as working time we would seek to do that as well.
My hon. Friend the Member for Witham called for greater efficiency and the reduction of waste. I support her on that, as I do on her call for increased transparency over all the activity and detailed expenditure of the institutions. The more transparency we have over EU spending and the legislative process, the greater evidence we will find to support our arguments for improved efficiency and the reduction of waste. An important part of transparency is scrutiny, and I am keen to ensure that we do everything possible to make our own parliamentary scrutiny processes still more significant. It is a vital part of the democratic process and the Government are committed to ensuring that scrutiny committees can clear proposals before we agree to them at ministerial level.
My hon. Friend is right that the priority should be growth, competitiveness and jobs. That is where Europe should be focusing its energy and attention now. We are pushing for a further drive on the liberalisation of the single market, on breaking down barriers to trade, and on making European regulation less burdensome and expensive, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises, on which so many jobs throughout Europe, not just the United Kingdom, depend. We are determined to resist any gold-plating of European Union legislation.
My hon. Friend talked about the Council of Europe and prisoner voting. The Commons has given a clear view that prisoners should not have the vote. Indeed, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has echoed that call. The Government believe that it is right to consider the final judgment in the Italian case of Scoppola, as well as the wider legal context, before setting out the next steps on prisoner voting. I want those next steps to be as close as possible to the clearly expressed will of the House of Commons.
Mr Lidington
Forgive me, but I want to reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Witham. On immigration, the Government are committed to applying transitional measures on the migration of workers from new member states. The framework for this has already been agreed with Croatia for controls of up to seven years. Under the terms of Croatia’s accession negotiations, member states can apply the same type and length of restrictions to Croatian workers as those that apply to Romanian and Bulgarian workers, who may obtain permission to work on the basis that they are highly skilled or have the offer of a skilled job. The precise controls that we will apply for Croatia have not yet been determined. My colleagues in the Home Office are considering that at the moment.
The Government believe in championing the British national interest within the EU. We champion the UK position on every issue. Sometimes, getting the reforms that we want to see is a hard and slow business, but we will be relentless in our commitment to get the best possible deal for the prosperity, security and well-being of our own citizens.
Question put and agreed to.
Written Ministerial Statements
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Double Taxation Convention (United Kingdom and Republic of Hungary)
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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The Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury (Mr David Gauke)
A new double taxation convention with the Republic of Hungary was signed on 7 September 2011. The text of the convention has been deposited in the Libraries of both Houses and will be made available on the HM Revenue and Customs’ website. The text will be scheduled to a draft Order in Council and laid before the House of Commons in due course.
Permitted Development Rights
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Andrew Stunell)
Fulfilling the mandatory requirements of the Green Energy (Definition and Promotion) Act 2009 we have laid before Parliament Statutory Instruments that amend the Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) Order 1995 and the Town and Country Planning (Control of Advertisements) (England) Regulations 2007. These measures will provide:
New permitted development rights to allow for the installation of electrical outlets for recharging electric vehicles in off-street public and private car parks, and amendments to clarify that local authorities can install on-street charging points for electric vehicle as permitted development; and
Deemed advertisement consent for installers of charging points and energy suppliers to display their nameplates on the charging points; and
New permitted development rights for householders to install small-scale domestic wind turbines and air source heat pumps on their premises, subject to strict limitations and conditions1
We will shortly publish a summary of the responses to the public consultation and a more detailed statement on the Government’s response to them. I will place copies of these documents in the House Library.
Subject to the views of parliamentary colleagues the provisions relating to electric vehicle charging points will come into force on 1 October 2011. Those relating to micro-wind turbines and air source heat pumps will come into force on 1 December 2011.
1Including a maximum noise limit of 42dB LAeq, 5minutes for both technologies. The noise limit will be reviewed one year after these measures come into force.
Parliamentary Oral Question (Correction)
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The Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change (Charles Hendry)
An error has been identified in the grouped oral answer that I gave to the hon. Members for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) and for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell), Official Report, 7 July 2011, columns 1636-1638. The answer refers to the announcement in March of at least 100,000 green deal apprentices being funded. The correct figure should have been 1,000.
The answer given was as follows:
4. Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab): What discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills on skills and employment in the energy sector. [64267]
13. Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) ( Lab): What discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills on developing skills in the low-carbon sector. [64277]
The Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change (Charles Hendry): My Department works closely with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills to promote skills and employment in the energy sector. The Budget announced £180 million of funding for 50,000 additional adult apprenticeships, and we announced in March that at least 100,000 green deal apprentices could receive Government funding towards their training. There are many opportunities, with the new build nuclear programme alone expected to create 30,000 high-skilled new jobs nationally.
The correct answer should have been:
My Department works closely with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills to promote skills and employment in the energy sector. The Budget announced £180 million of funding for 50,000 additional adult apprenticeships, and we announced in March that at least 1,000 green deal apprentices could receive Government funding towards their training. There are many opportunities, with the new build nuclear programme alone expected to create 30,000 high-skilled new jobs nationally.
Biodiversity Strategy for England 2011-2020
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The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mrs Caroline Spelman)
I am pleased to announce that the Government published the new biodiversity strategy for England 2011-2020—“Biodiversity 2020: a strategy for England’s wildlife and ecosystem services”—on 19 August, setting out a new strategic direction for biodiversity policy in England for the next decade.
The strategy describes how we will put into effect the convention on biological diversity agreements made in Nagoya as well as the European Union’s 2020 biodiversity target. It directly supports the aims of the Government’s natural environment White Paper setting out a more integrated approach to biodiversity conservation. The strategy builds on the evidence provided by the groundbreaking national ecosystem assessment and the independent review of England’s wildlife sites and ecological network led by Professor Sir John Lawton, and takes account of the European Union’s biodiversity strategy.
The strategy aims to halt overall biodiversity loss by moving away from the piecemeal conservation of the past towards a more effective and integrated large-scale approach delivering multiple benefits. It puts people at the heart of biodiversity policy, addresses environmental pressures and takes account of the need to improve our knowledge.
It sets clear outcomes describing what we aim to achieve over the next 10 years for habitats, species, ecosystems and for people, as well as a series of priority actions to take us to 2020.
It is a Government strategy. However, it cannot be delivered by Government alone. It is clear that our policies on biodiversity present an excellent example of the big society in action. Alongside Government and their agencies, there are a huge number of individuals and organisations already making a vital contribution to the conservation and enhancement of our biodiversity. This “biodiversity partnership” will be absolutely crucial to its success and the strategy will continue to support this partnership approach, and to build on it.
Copies of the strategy will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
Afghanistan
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The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr William Hague)
I wish to inform the House that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, together with the Ministry of Defence and the Department for International Development, is today publishing the ninth progress report on developments in Afghanistan.
This report focuses on key developments during the months of July and August, commonly associated with a seasonal escalation of violence, and the month of Ramadan, a period during which the Taliban leadership has called for increased activity. There have been a number of high-profile attacks, including the 19 August attack on the British Council, which seriously undermine perceptions of security, although overall there have been fewer enemy attacks across the country than last year. Progress has been made towards our security objectives but challenges remain, including civilian casualties as highlighted by the latest UN Assistance Mission Afghanistan (UNAMA) report. General Allen took command of ISAF in July and will conduct a campaign review in due course.
The first seven areas (including Lashkar Gah in Helmand) formally began the transition process in July. Transition does not mean an immediate withdrawal of international security assistance force (ISAF) troops but will see the Afghan national security force (ANSF) begin to take lead responsibility for security in the areas. ANSF numbers have now exceeded their October 2011 targets and a new target of 352,000 by the end of October 2012 has been endorsed by the Security Standing Committee of the Joint (Afghan and NATO) Co-ordination and Monitoring Board. There was a welcome reduction in overall Afghan national police (ANP) attrition which brings the rate back on target but Afghan national army (ANA) attrition rates still need to be reduced.
We welcome President Karzai’s decree of 10 August which ruled that the final decisions of the parliamentary crisis should rest with the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC). On 21 August the IEC announced its findings and called for the replacement of nine sitting MPs. It will fall to the secretariat of the Lower House of Parliament to implement the changes.
I am placing the report in the Library of the House. It will also be published on the Foreign and Commonwealth Office website (www.fco.gov.uk).
British Embassy (Côte d'Ivoire)
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The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr William Hague)
With the onset of civil war, the British embassy in Côte d’Ivoire formally closed on 1 April 2005. As stability returned to the country, the UK opened a political office in 2006, reporting to and supervised by our high commission in Ghana. Following the United Nations-certified presidential elections earlier this year and the inauguration of President Ouattara, I am pleased to announce the reopening of the embassy in Côte d’Ivoire.
As I said in Parliament on 11 May 2011, there will be no strategic shrinkage of Britain’s diplomatic influence overseas. I am committed to extending the Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s global reach and strengthening its influence. Reopening the embassy in Côte d’Ivoire, with a fully accredited, resident ambassador taking up residence in spring 2012 is part of that commitment.
Under President Ouattara’s Government, peace and stability are slowly returning to Côte d’Ivoire. However, President Ouattara and his Government face huge challenges if the country is to recover from the deep divisions created by the disputed elections and the subsequent civil war. Through the Government’s new building stability overseas strategy, the UK will continue to support security sector reform, national reconciliation, reconstruction and human rights in Côte d’Ivoire. It is important that justice is seen to be served on all those on both sides of the political divide who have been found responsible for crimes and human rights abuses in the recent conflict.
Since the closure of the embassy in 2005, our influence in Côte d’Ivoire has been limited. Reopening sends a clear signal that we are committed to helping peace, stability and prosperity return to Côte d’Ivoire. A fully accredited ambassador will be able to work more closely, and more credibly, with President Ouattara and his Government to help Côte d’Ivoire demonstrate their commitment to justice, reconciliation and human rights and to become a beacon of democracy in west Africa.
Reopening the embassy will also support our commercial ties. Côte d’Ivoire is the largest producer of cocoa in the world, the fourth largest exporter in sub-Saharan Africa, and has one of the best infrastructures for business in the region, there will be real opportunities for UK companies particularly in the agricultural, energy and financial sectors. Increased prosperity and growth in Côte d’Ivoire is in all our interests.
The reopening of the embassy will incur a marginal cost of £16,000. A limited consular service will be offered in Côte d’Ivoire. Our high commission in Ghana will continue to provide a visa service as well as full consular assistance.
Sudan and South Sudan
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr Henry Bellingham)
I would like to provide the House with an update, following the summer recess, on developments in Sudan and South Sudan.
We continue to support and encourage Sudan and South Sudan to develop as two independent states in peaceful co-existence with one another. Both countries face significant challenges. There remain many outstanding issues following the end of the comprehensive peace agreement, the responsibility for which must ultimately lie with the Governments of the two countries.
Conflict
Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile
The conflict in Southern Kordofan continues. We remain deeply concerned at this situation, and continue to call for an immediate end to the violence that is having a devastating effect on over 150,000 civilians. It is disappointing that, despite the announcement on 23 August by Sudanese President al-Bashir of a unilateral two week ceasefire, we have received reports of continuing violence and human rights abuses by both sides in southern Kordofan. As I made clear in the statement of 24 August, we urge the Government of Sudan and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (Northern Sector) to allow immediate humanitarian access to the many civilians affected by the ongoing violence.
It is very concerning that violence has broken out in Blue Nile State, which shares many of the challenges faced by Southern Kordofan. Thousands of civilians have already been displaced. As I made clear in the statement of 2 September, we condemn any action that endangers civilian lives, in particular aerial bombardments. We will continue to work closely with our international partners to push for an immediate cessation of hostilities and the establishment of an agreed process to address the root causes of the violence in both Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile.
Abyei
In Abyei, we continue to have concerns about the humanitarian situation, with over 100,000 people still displaced by the violence earlier this year. Following UN Security Council Resolution 1990, which authorised the deployment of up to 4,200 Ethiopian peacekeepers to Abyei as part of United Nations Interim Stability Force for Abyei (UNISFA), deployment of UNISFA troops is ongoing. UNISFA was primarily mandated to monitor and verify the withdrawal of SAF and SPLA troops from the Abyei area. We are very concerned that this has not yet occurred and call for both sides to immediately start withdrawing from the Abyei area. UNISFA should also provide de-mining assistance, facilitate the delivery of humanitarian aid, facilitate the return of civilians in the Abyei area and protect those under imminent threat of physical violence. We expect the Security Council to mandate UNISFA to provide force protection for border monitors, whose deployment was agreed to on 30 July by Sudan and South Sudan in Addis Ababa.
Darfur
We welcomed the Government of Sudan and Liberation and Justice Movement’s endorsement of the Doha Document for Peace in Darfur on 14 July. We now urge both parties to implement the agreements made. We are grateful to the Government of Qatar for their continued efforts to find a peaceful solution to the ongoing conflict, and look forward to working closely with Qatar through the Implementation Follow-Up Committee which meets for the first time on 11 September. Looking forward, we encourage continued engagement between the Government and the armed movements to prevent Sudan from breaking further into conflict. We stand ready to support the UN and AU as they prepare a road map setting out the next phase of the Darfur peace process.
Comprehensive Peace Agreement
We are disappointed that there has still been no conclusive agreement between the two countries on many of the outstanding unresolved issues from the comprehensive peace agreement (CPA) which ended on the 9 July. These issues include oil, citizenship and border demarcation. There has been no progress on agreeing the citizenship rights of southerners in (north) Sudan, and vice versa, beyond the agreement of a nine-month transitional period which will come to an end in March 2012. The five disputed areas of the border remain unresolved. We strongly encourage both parties to negotiate in earnest with the intention of reaching a lasting settlement.
We support the facilitation offered by the African Union high-level implementation panel (AU HIP), led by Thabo Mbeki, to come to an agreement on these matters. The UK has contributed £250,000 to AU HIP this year, enabling this crucial work. We continue to press both parties and the AU HIP to urgently engage in resolving these issues.
Sudan
President Bashir publically stated on 12 July that a constitutional review process, required following the completion of the comprehensive peace agreement, will be a broad-based and inclusive dialogue. We will continue to press for this to be the case.
South Sudan
In South Sudan, we welcome President Kiir’s announcement on 27 August of his first Cabinet, eight weeks after independence. This is an important step for the new country. We welcome his commitment to improving service delivery across Government and his intent to show concrete progress on this within 100 days. We now look forward to engaging with the new Ministers, and working with them in support of our shared goals. We will continue to highlight the importance of tackling corruption at every level.
UN Mission In South Sudan
The United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), mandated to support peace in South Sudan, continues to deploy. The mission, led by former Norwegian Development Minister, Hilde Johnson, will seek to foster state building and economic development, prevent and resolve conflict and protect civilians. Recently we have seen continued localised violence in South Sudan, which gives cause for real concern. There are ongoing sporadic bouts of fighting in Warrap state which are estimated to have killed around 100 people, while one recent incident of inter-tribal violence in Jonglei resulted in several hundred dead. I welcome the South Sudanese Government’s decision to send troops to the area to prevent further revenge attacks and an escalation of violence. We urge the Government of South Sudan to work swiftly to establish a reconciliation process and identify long-term solutions to the causes of such violence—as they have committed to doing.
Going forward, we encourage the Government of South Sudan, supported where necessary by the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), to be more proactive in addressing inter-tribal conflicts, and their underlying causes.
Economic Development
In Sudan and South Sudan, the growth and diversification of the economy will be a vital factor in establishing the long-term stability and development that will prevent conflict and the abuses of human rights that accompany conflict. The primary responsibility for this lies with the Governments of the two states. The UK will play its part, however, in supporting such development, for example in South Sudan we will create more employment opportunities in agriculture and work to help reduce the costs of trans-border trade; and in Port Sudan, where the opportunities for economic development are considerable.
UK Commitment/Conclusion
The UK will remain committed to supporting the development of two economically viable and peaceful states, underpinned by good governance, respect for human rights and an environment in which humanitarian assistance can reach all that need it. We continue to speak out against unacceptable actions in both countries when we feel it necessary. We will continue to work closely with the Governments in both Sudan and South Sudan and with our international partners in pursuit of those goals.
Welfare Reform Bill (Employment and Support Allowance)
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The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Chris Grayling)
As part of his spending review announcement, the Chancellor set out his proposal to introduce a time limit of one year for those claiming contributory employment and support allowance who are in the work-related activity group. The change will, subject to the passage of the enabling legislation, apply from April 2012. For those in the work-related activity group who have already received a year or more contributory employment and support allowance as at April 2012, entitlement will cease immediately.
In order to avoid delay in implementing this policy the Department for Work and Pensions has obtained approval for an advance from the Contingencies Fund of £2,705,000 to allow for the development of IT, ensure those potentially impacted by the time limit in April 2012 are notified of the change and to deliver the operational support that will be required before Royal Assent of the enabling legislation. Parliamentary approval for resources of £2,705,000 for this new service will be sought in a supplementary estimate for the Department of Work and Pensions. Pending that approval, urgent expenditure estimated at £2,705,000 will be met by repayable cash advances from the Contingencies Fund.
Grand Committee
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Arrangement of Business
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The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Haskel)
My Lords, before the Minister moves that the first statutory instrument be considered, I remind noble Lords that in the case of each statutory instrument, the Motion before the Committee will be that the Committee do consider the statutory instrument in question. I should make it clear that the Motions to approve the statutory instruments will subsequently be moved in the Chamber in the usual way. Should there be a Division in the House, the Committee will adjourn for 10 minutes.
I must also inform the Committee that at some point between 4 pm and 5 pm the Leaders and the Whips have arranged that the Information Office will bring a photographer to the Moses Room to take photographs of this Committee in action.
Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Carrying on Regulated Activities by Way of Business) (Amendment) Order 2011
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord De Mauley
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Carrying on Regulated Activities by Way of Business) (Amendment) Order 2011.
Relevant document: 27th Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments
Lord De Mauley
My Lords, the purpose of this order is to ensure that the regulation of the sale and rent-back market will operate as originally intended and deliver appropriate consumer protections. To set it in context, I hope that your Lordships will allow me to give a little background on the sale and rent-back market.
These schemes allow consumers to sell their property to a public or private sector organisation and then rent it back. This allows a consumer to stay in his or her own home and avoid the distress and expense of repossession. In 2008, the Office of Fair Trading published a study of the market. It found that it was not working well for consumers and recommended that the Treasury should introduce regulation by the Financial Services Authority. This was deemed necessary because the sale and rent-back market suffers from an imbalance in the relationship between those consumers considering taking up a sale and rent-back agreement and those selling the schemes.
Sale and rent-back agreements are extremely complex contracts. The OFT study showed that consumers entering into these agreements are often vulnerable people with low levels of financial understanding. They are often already in debt and believe that their financial situation is out of control. They are unlikely to seek independent financial advice, probably because they do not know where to go. Conversely, the sellers of sale and rent-back agreements are professional salespeople, who in some cases may also play on the emotional aspects of a sale and rent-back agreement—for example, the consumer’s attachment to the family home. This results in two significant impacts on the consumer. First, there is financial loss to the consumer through a distressed sale. Evidence suggests that most sale and rent-back providers pay between 70 per cent and 90 per cent of the market value of the property. Secondly, there is a lack of security over tenure for the consumer, who may believe that they cannot ever be evicted from their home, whereas in reality, many consumers suffer rising rents or, indeed, eviction.
Following the OFT study, an interim system of FSA regulation was introduced in July 2009. This was replaced by a full regime in June 2010. Today’s order amends the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Carrying on Regulated Activities by Way of Business) Order 2001 to make clear that any provider of a sale and rent-back agreement, unless they are closely related to the consumer, will be regarded as doing so by way of business and will therefore need to be FSA-regulated.
Currently, the FSA’s regulation captures only those firms that meet the strict “by way of business” test. That test is intended to include firms who carry out the specified activity as a business arrangement but exclude those who carry it out for other purposes, such as arrangements with immediate family members. However, some providers have misunderstood whether they are entering into a regulated activity, while others, dare I say it, have chosen to interpret the rules such that they are not acting by way of business and thereby have avoided FSA regulation
The order clarifies the position. Everyone who enters into a sale and rent-back agreement, unless they are closely related to the consumer, will be regarded as doing so by way of business and will therefore need to be FSA-regulated. About 80 per cent of sale and rent-back transactions are still taking place outside regulation, despite the intention of the original regime, so the sale and rent-back market continues to generate a high level of consumer concern. In the 12 months from April 2010 to March 2011, citizens advice bureaux received more than 1,000 inquiries about sale and rent-back providers. In March this year, a report by Which? highlighted cases where a number of firms were acting outside FSA regulation. In July this year, there was an investigation by Channel 4’s “Dispatches” into sale and rent-back providers. Citizens Advice, Shelter and Which? have all publicly supported the Government’s work to address this genuine gap in the regulatory architecture and make it clear to providers when they are acting by way of business.
The costs and benefits of the order were set out in the impact assessment. The order will ensure that FSA regulation of sale and rent-back agreements operates as originally intended, when the costs were expected to be incurred at the time of the original legislation. The benefits of the order will be felt by those individuals who sell and rent back in their houses through fairer sale prices and fairer tenancy agreements. The FSA’s regulation of the sale and rent-back market attempts to address those issues through, for example, pre-sales disclosure and rules on terms and conditions of tenancy agreements.
The option for a consumer to avoid repossession and have the choice to enter into a sale and rent-back arrangement, and remain in his home when it is financially viable to do so, is important, but it is equally important that appropriate consumer protection is in place. The order is scheduled for debate in another place next week.
I hope that I have reassured your Lordships that the order merely clarifies the intent of previous efforts to address issues in that market and that the Committee will therefore give its support.
Lord Newby
My Lords, in view of the statement by the Deputy Chairman at the start of our proceedings about about the photographer, I am now tempted to give a 45-minute speech just to make sure that I get my picture taken in action to prove that I do things in your Lordships’ House other than turn up. However, I probably will not.
I am extremely grateful to the Minister for his introduction to the order, because it filled out the information in the Explanatory Memorandum. The phrase “sale and rent-back” is new to me; I am used to the phrase “sale and lease-back”. My first question relates to that terminology: is there a difference in law between sale and rent-back and sale and lease-back? When I think of sale and lease-back, I have commercial activity in mind. I remember that Tesco was notoriously involved in sale and lease-back of properties via the Cayman Islands a few years ago. I wondered whether this regulation meant that commercial companies involved in those kinds of deals on commercial properties are now brought into the legislative net, or whether the phrase “sale and lease-back” is already recognised in law. If I decided that I wanted to buy a Tesco store and lease it back to them, would I be covered by something that already exists or would this newly apply to me?
My other questions relates to Article 6 about the sunset clause. Within a year, more or less, of this provision coming into force a report has to be produced on how effective it has been. Presumably, the intention is that between then and 2015, if the report suggests that it has been effective, a subsequent order will be made, which no doubt will cover lots of other things as well but would continue this provision. I cannot remember, from when the Financial Services and Markets Act was going through, how this sunset provisions worked. If, as I suspect, we would expect a successor order to this one to be introduced before 1 January 2015, how long would that last for? Is this a rolling series of orders that have to be renewed every five or 10 years? Subject to that, this seems to be a sensible additional component in the consumer protection framework.
Lord Davies of Oldham
My Lords, I am somewhat shocked that the noble Lord, Lord Newby, feared that our proceedings might be concluded before the photographer arrives; I have my customary one-hour speech on a statutory instrument, so there is no call for anxiety on that front.
I thank the Minister for both the clear way in which he presented the issues around the SI, and for the sympathetic way in which he addressed himself to those who may be involved in this exercise by being forced by financial circumstances to engage in this operation. As he rightly says, there is an obvious imbalance between the professional service of those who provide the resources and seek to strike the agreement and the householder who most often is already entering into these arrangements through fairly dire financial circumstances. As the Minister accurately said, they are unlikely to think of recourse to financial advice or even to be able to afford it anyway, even if they thought it was a good idea.
This is consumer protection legislation, after all, and we are at one with the Government in seeking to enhance it, particularly as it is derivative from the 2009 Act passed by the previous Labour Administration. However, I ask the Minister to address himself to several points. First, because the order follows reasonably quickly from its predecessor, it is suggested that there was no need for further consultation. On the whole, all such SIs of this kind, prepared by the Treasury and other government departments, should be subject to consultation beforehand. After all, the previous consultation took place against different terms from this order. I am therefore somewhat surprised that no consultation took place specifically on this order.
Secondly, will the Minister address himself to the important point that the noble Lord, Lord Newby, expressed? I am sure that the Committee will be grateful for the clarification—and, I hope, confirmation—that the Minister will be able to give about the nature of the rent position regarding the law and this order.
Lord De Mauley
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Newby and the noble Lord, Lord Davies, for their helpful and constructive comments and questions. Let me see if I can address them. First, my noble friend asked about the difference in law between a sale and rent-back agreement and a sale and lease-back agreement. Essentially, there is no difference between the two terms, but this order relates to where firms provide sale and rent-back arrangements to individual consumers. Commercial property is thereby not covered; that is the essential distinction.
My noble friend asked about the sunset clause and whether there will be a new order after 2012. It will be for the Treasury to decide whether to renew the order with a further order—with or without a sunset provision—depending on the outcome of the review.
The noble Lord, Lord Davies of Oldham, asked whether consumers who are already involved in an arrangement will gain protection through this order. This order clarifies that all providers entering into sale and rent-back arrangements need to be FSA-authorised. It is a matter for the FSA whether to take enforcement action against those firms who have already entered into existing arrangements outside regulation, and decide whether these have taken place by way of business. That is the key and the defining factor. Where an unregulated sale and rent-back transaction, which should have been FSA-regulated, has taken place, those consumers will still have recourse to the Financial Ombudsman Service.
The noble Lord asked why there had been no further consultation. This order merely clarifies the intention of the original order, which was subject to full consultation by the Treasury and the FSA. Perhaps I could also concur with the noble Lord in being concerned about people facing repossession. The Government are deeply conscious of the effect that this has on people and, as I think he intimated, the purpose of this order is absolutely to prevent exacerbation of the problem. I pay tribute to the work of the previous Government in setting us on this course in the first place.
This order amends the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Carrying on Regulated Activities by Way of Business) Order 2001 to make clear that any provider of a sale and rent-back agreement, unless closely related to the consumer, will be regarded as doing so by way of business and will therefore need to be FSA-regulated. The order improves outcomes for consumers entering into sale and rent-back arrangement first, by increasing the transparency of information provided by sale and rent-back providers; secondly, by reducing the potential for consumers to enter into unsuitable arrangements; and thirdly, by increasing product quality by driving providers to improve, or exit, the market.
It has been universally welcomed by consumer groups. Citizens Advice welcomed the government commitment to ensure that people with sale and rent-back agreements are protected against bad practices. The order will ensure that FSA regulation of sale and rent-back agreements operates as first intended. I commend this order to the Committee.
Weights and Measures (Specified Quantities) (Unwrapped Bread and Intoxicating Liquor) Order 2011
(12 years, 9 months ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Baroness Wilcox
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the Weights and Measures (Specified Quantities) (Unwrapped Bread and Intoxicating Liquor) Order 2011.
Relevant document: 27th Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Baroness Wilcox)
My Lords, the order amends the specified quantities which apply to non-prepackaged alcoholic drinks and unwrapped bread. The legislation that is amended by this order comprises Part 4 of Schedule 3 to the Weights and Measures Act 1985, the Weights and Measures (Miscellaneous Foods) Order 1988, the Weights and Measures (Intoxicating Liquor) Order 1988 and the Measuring Instruments (Capacity Serving Measures) Regulations 2006. The order does two things: it removes all restrictions on the sizes of unwrapped loaves and it allows greater flexibility over the sizes available for the sale of alcoholic drinks.
Fixed sizes were introduced in the 1960s. They ensured that consumers could easily compare the quantities and prices of staple foods such as bread and flour. However all fixed sizes for prepackaged foods, apart from wines and spirits, were deregulated in 2009. This followed changes at European level. Once universal quantity labelling and unit pricing were adopted for prepackages, specified quantities became largely unnecessary. Consumers could see for themselves the quantities they were purchasing, so that the restrictions on pack size could go. However, that deregulation dealt only with prepackaged goods. Today we are dealing with non-prepackaged products, specifically unwrapped bread, and non-prepackaged alcoholic drinks served on licensed premises.
The results of a public consultation on the future of the remaining specified quantities found strong support for the retention of specified quantities for the sale of alcoholic drinks. Support came from consumers, the enforcement community, business and those in the health field. There was widespread recognition that the sale of alcohol differed from the sale of other foods because of its health effects and connection to anti-social behaviour. As a result, greater care is needed to ensure that consumers are made aware of the quantities being purchased than is needed for other products. However, the consultation identified some demand for specific changes. Some businesses felt that the existing regime stifled a legitimate demand for new sizes or products. The Government have listened to these concerns. The changes that we propose today will allow for innovation but, at the same time, retain necessary protection for the consumer.
Turning to the specifics, today’s order introduces a two-thirds of a pint size for the sale of draught beer and cider. This new size will allow licensed premises to satisfy demand for a size between half a pint and a pint. There will be no mandatory requirement for businesses to offer two-thirds of a pint; it will be optional. However, I understand that at least two major breweries have plans to introduce the new size if it becomes a legal measure.
The order also deregulates small glasses of wine—those of less than 75 millilitres—from the requirement to be sold by quantity. Under the current law, the smallest legal serving of wine by the glass is 125 millilitres, so samples may be given away but not sold. There is a demand for samples that cannot be met at present because of this restriction. Therefore, by deregulating very small servings of wine the order will allow businesses the opportunity to innovate and respond to untapped demand for sales of samples, tasters or flights of wine. This proposal was strongly supported by consumers and businesses eager to create a new market for their products.
The order also reduces the existing specified quantities for fortified wines from a minimum of 125 millilitres to the smaller size of 50 millilitres or 70 millilitres, or a multiple of either, This brings the law on fortified wines into line with current trade practice. It will also allow for smaller sizes more appropriate to the sale of fortified wines, which can be significantly stronger than still wines. This proposal has the support of health groups, trading standards authorities and business.
Finally, the order deregulates the specified weights that apply to unwrapped bread. Under current law, unwrapped loaves may be sold only in sizes of 400 grams or a multiple of 400 grams. After deregulation, unwrapped loaves may be sold in any weight, including the traditional sizes. This will give greater freedom to bakers and retailers to make up and sell unwrapped loaves of any weight that they like. It will also bring the sale of unwrapped loaves into line with prepackaged bread, for which the specified weights have already been deregulated. However, to ensure that consumers can tell when the sizes have changed, retailers adopting new sizes will be required to display clearly the quantity of any new sizes being offered for sale. There will be no additional burdens on bakers or retailers, since there will be no requirement to offer the new sizes. Information on weight will be required only when new sizes are introduced. For example, bakers who continue to offer only traditional sizes of 400 grams and 800 grams will not have to change their current practice at all. However, for those who want to innovate—for example, makers of artisan loaves, the different densities of which do not easily fit with traditional sizes—these changes will give a new stimulus to the market, allowing for the sale of new loaves in new sizes.
The changes set out in this order will give consumers more choice and provide greater freedom for bakers, retailers and licensed premises to offer new sizes and products. A full impact assessment has been completed and there are no new burdens on business or trading standards as a result of this order. These changes will support business growth through innovation and the creation of new markets. I therefore commend the order to the Committee.
Lord Young of Norwood Green
My Lords, what a pleasure it is to be back dealing with the wonderfully random nature of statutory instruments. I could not help reflecting: where do the two items, bread and liquor, come together? I thought of the religious context, but then I thought: no, there is another place where the two come together—and I could not resist the lure of this quote for those of you who are familiar with the work of Edward Fitzgerald in his translation of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. He said,
“A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread—and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness—
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!”
It is probably the first time that that has been quoted here.
Lord Young of Norwood Green
I digress only slightly. The statutory instrument before us proposes to amend the legislation whereby it will no longer be necessary for unwrapped bread to be sold in quantities of 400 grams, as the Minister told us. We welcome that and I will not go into any more detail. It brings us into line with European directives and, as she said, follows similar amendments, made in April 2009 when Labour was in government, regarding prepackaged loaves. The only reassurance that the public will require is that loaves should be clearly marked. One can see opportunities for mis-selling or, perhaps, confusion. I should welcome some comment on that.
As to wine, there was a word that the noble Baroness struggled with, if she does not mind me saying so. I was not sure exactly what it meant. She referred to a “flight”. I thought, “I can think of ‘flute’”; so I should welcome some clarification on that. I do not say that in any way other than to ensure that we get it right. Perhaps I misheard—in which case, I apologise. As to selling samples of wine, I read through the explanations in the impact assessment. Again, I should welcome some assurance. What are described as “samples” and “tasters” are allowed to be sold, without there being any specifics as to what they may be. What protection will there be for consumers in knowing exactly how much they will be purchasing. I am talking about only the wine, not fortified wine.
When I was reflecting about beer, I thought that when we now go to the pub the position is quite obvious. I ask my noble colleagues what they are having, and it will be either a half or a pint. Could it be: “No, I will have a two-thirds”? I could not get my head around this and I should welcome any suggestions as to a handy description of what that would be. I am sure that it will find a ready market.
We understand the purpose of these measures, which we generally accept the need for and are ready to support, subject to the clarifications that I look forward to hearing.
Lord Razzall
My Lords, of course I will not oppose these measures, but I have significant reservations as to whether they represent the real world. Leaving aside the provisions on bread, which I of course fully support, I am concerned that the consultation exercise seems to have involved organisations relating to wine, beer and spirits rather than relating to what happens in the real world in wine bars and pubs. Until I read all this material, I had not appreciated—of course, I should have done—that there was any restriction on what a publican could sell. I had assumed that the fact that you ordered either a half or a pint of beer was simply tradition, because that is the way that it had always happened. I had not realised that it was a mandatory requirement.
Of course, in the real world of pubs, they vary. In many village pubs when your pint of beer goes down to a quarter and you ask for a half they will pull the pump so many times you almost end up with another pint. The fact that they have charged you only for a half is not material to the measure that you have actually been served. As far as wine is concerned, at the moment as I understand it, you can have only a small or a large glass if you go into a pub or wine bar. Those are the required measures, but there is nothing to stop six of you ordering a bottle of wine and serving it to yourselves in whatever proportions you want; and if you want more, you have another bottle of wine.
I find the regulation of this rather strange and not necessarily representative of what actually happens in the pubs and wine bars of our country—those that remain open. Had I started with a clean piece of legislation, I would have gone for option two and deregulated the whole lot, but I recognise that the consultation makes that rather difficult.
I also wonder whether there has been proper consultation with the people at the sharp end. Will those who run my local village pub have to spend a fortune buying two-third pint glasses which they do not have? If so, are they in favour of this, or would they rather stay with the existing requirements? I would have assumed that, were the Tory element of our Government—and, I suspect, the Liberal Democrat element too—starting from scratch, they would think you should simply say, “Here are the products we sell, whether it is two pints, one pint, three-quarters of a pint, two-thirds of a pint, half a pint and here is the price,” rather than saying, “You cannot sell anything unless it is one pint, half a pint or two-thirds of a pint.” So I have reservations about the order, as I have expressed, but of course I am not going to oppose it.
Baroness Wilcox
My Lords, I thank the noble Lords, Lord Young and Lord Razzall, for their questions, which allow me to clarify some points and—as the noble Lord, Lord Young points out—maybe even clarify to myself what a “flight” is.
On whether bread will be clearly marked, I can reassure the noble Lord that the answer is yes. Any new sizes will have to be labelled with the weight clearly shown so people can see exactly what they are buying. What is a wine flight? We are both happy to learn the answer to this. It is a selection of different samples served with a meal. There we are. We are both ready to use this word again. I can see both of us rushing out soon asking for a flight.
I was asked how, if small glasses of wine are deregulated, drinkers can keep track of their consumption if they do not know how much they are being served. This deregulation is aimed at a specific market, that of samples and wine tasters served in small volumes of below 75 millilitres. It will not affect the vast majority of wine sales, which will continue to be regulated. There is nothing to stop drinkers asking for information on the quantity of wine samples or tasters in the same way that they would ask for information on alcohol by volume, to work out the units and ensure that they keep within the daily guidelines. I hope that the noble Lord finds those answers helpful.
I have already had exchanges with the noble Lord, Lord Razzall, today on a very different subject—nuclear power stations. I hope I can satisfy him on this more technically than I did with my earlier answer. I am very impressed with his experience of pubs and wine bars. A bit of research had to be done on this job and I am grateful to him for doing so. It must have taken time, effort and expense. He is quite happy with the bread, it seems, but with beer and wine, he did not realise that there is a mandatory restriction. There we are.
The noble Lord made an interesting point about how things vary in real pubs. He talked about something that we all know when we go to local pubs: you do not ask for another pint in your pint glass—you drink a bit and then ask for another half in that glass, because it is impossible to get it right. In fact, you usually end up a winner, so I am with him on this.
On why we do not simply get rid of specified quantities and allow pubs to sell any size, alcohol is a regulated product and the consultation found widespread support for the retention of specified quantities for the sale of alcoholic drinks. In any case, there are unlikely to be any significant savings for business from full deregulation, and there is very little support for it. There is, however, significant support for the continued use of specified quantities of alcohol from consumer groups such as CAMRA, trading standards departments, health agencies and charities including Alcohol Concern and Alcohol Focus Scotland, as well as from businesses.
Finally, the noble Lord asked about the cost of introducing a two-third pint. The answer is that a two-third pint is optional and will be introduced only if there is a business case for it. We know of at least two major brewers which are planning to use it, so I shall be most interested to see what it looks like. When I came here, I thought it might be a good idea to line up a few glasses so that we could actually see what we are talking about, but my Private Secretary decided that that was a bit risqué.
I thank noble Lords for their consideration of the order. The policy objective underpinning it is to free the market from unnecessary regulation while ensuring that the market works effectively. The order delivers greater freedom to business over the sizes that can be sold, while ensuring that consumers will continue to be able to judge the best deal and, we hope, keep track of their alcohol intake. Pubs, bars and restaurants will have more choice over the sizes they serve; bakers and retailers of unwrapped bread will be able to sell loaves in any shape and size, and consumers will have greater choice. The order will ensure that consumers continue to be empowered but will also help to create a more positive environment for business by allowing for greater innovation and growth. I commend the order to the Committee.
Construction Contracts (England) Exclusion Order 2011
(12 years, 9 months ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Baroness Wilcox
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the Construction Contracts (England) Exclusion Order 2011.
Relevant document: 26th Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Baroness Wilcox)
This instrument and the Scheme for Construction Contracts (England and Wales) Regulations 1998 (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2011 are being made using powers in the Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996. I should like to set out the context for these instruments.
Part 2 of the 1996 Act regulates construction contracts and has two key aims: to improve cash flow and to facilitate the quick resolution of disputes through adjudication. The 1996 Act has played an important role in improving payment practices in the construction industry. It works by requiring contracts to make certain provisions on payment and on adjudication. Where a contract fails to meet an effective provision, a safeguard is needed. The Scheme for Construction Contracts (England and Wales) Regulations 1998 (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2011 provide that safeguard.
The Department for Business has engaged in an extensive review of the construction legislation with the industry. This identifies a number of weaknesses and regulatory burdens in the 1996 Act. After two formal consultations with the industry and a further consultation on draft Bill clauses, a package of measures was introduced to reduce these burdens and fix weaknesses. These measures were included in Part 8 of the Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act 2009. The measures improve access to adjudication and reduce costs, and improve the exchange of information relating to payment to enable better cash flow management and remove administrative burdens. We now need to mirror these changes by amending the scheme for Construction Contracts (England and Wales) Regulations 1998 (Amendment) (England) Regulations.
There are three main areas of change: adjudication costs, the slip rule—that is, the adjudicator’s ability to correct simple errors or slips—and payment notices. The 1996 Act was silent on the cost of adjudication. Some in the industry have chosen to exploit this by drafting contract clauses that use the cost of the adjudication process as a barrier to adjudication. Such clauses, which are commonly referred to as Tolent clauses, can require one party to bear all the costs, including both parties’ legal costs, irrespective of who initiated the process and regardless of the outcome. To prevent such onerous contract terms the 2009 Act will make agreements on adjudication costs ineffective, except in two cases. These are: where it is an agreement in writing in the contract that allows the adjudicator to allocate his fees and expenses between the parties; and where it is an agreement, whether concerning the adjudicator’s or the parties’ costs, made in writing after the notice of intention to adjudicate had been issued.
As a consequence, it is necessary to amend the scheme. The consultation exercise showed strong support for this amendment. The 2009 Act will require construction contracts to provide that the adjudicator has the power to correct a clerical or typographical error in his decision—the so-called slip rule. The scheme currently contains no such provision. It is therefore being amended so that the adjudicator has the power to make such a correction within five days. The consultation exercise showed unanimous support for this approach.
The 2009 Act will make changes to the statutory payment notice framework. In particular, it will remove restrictions on who can issue a payment notice, which removes a burden, and require it to be issued even when the amount owed is zero, which will improve communication. As a consequence, amendments to paragraphs 9 and 10 of part 2 of the scheme are required. Most respondents to the consultation agreed that no further amendments were required to the payment schedule. Apart from a minor change to cure an ambiguity, no further changes are being made.
I turn now to the Construction Contracts (England) Exclusion Order. The 1996 Act prevents the use of “pay when paid” clauses. A practice has emerged whereby some contracts make payment—its timing, amount or both—dependent on the issue of a certificate, such as a valuation of the work by the client’s agent, under the superior contract. In effect, this creates the same effect as a “pay when paid” clause. The Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act 2009 therefore closes this loophole. It states that the requirement for a contract to have an adequate mechanism for determining what will be paid and when is not met if it makes payment conditional on obligations being performed under another contract. This provision, contained in what will become Section 110(1A) of the Act, will adversely affect PFI projects to an unwarranted degree.
Different circumstances apply in PFI contracts from those that exist in traditional contracting. For instance, it is frequently a feature of PFIs that the construction contractor has a shareholding in the special purpose company. It will therefore be intimately aware of the project agreement and the terms of funding. Even where the construction contractor does not have a shareholding in the special purpose company, it will be a term of its first-tier subcontract that it has full knowledge of the project and funding structure. The first-tier contractor will invariably take legal advice when agreeing its contract, unlike more traditional contracts. The construction contractor will therefore have full knowledge of the funding arrangements and project contract. Further, in PFI projects it is, in practice, the construction contractor itself that performs the construction obligations contained in the head contract with the authority. This means that it is in a good position to assess and price the risk, in contrast to the general position with more traditional construction projects. Recognising these important differences, the exclusion order will mean that the special purpose company can continue to make payment to the first-tier PFI subcontractor, conditional on obligations, although not payment obligations, being performed under another contract—the head contract. The exclusion extends no further than the specific contractual relationship. That is, it will not affect any contracts that the construction contractor has with its supply chain.
The various consultation exercises have demonstrated significant support in the industry for the 1996 Act. Almost everyone believes that its adjudication provisions have played an important role in improving contractual relations, although it is fair to say that sentiment about the payment provisions is more mixed, with views largely determined by where firms sit in the supply chain. The Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act 2009 made some important amendments to the 1996 Act to ensure its more effective operation. Before those changes begin to bite, they need to be reflected in the mirroring secondary legislation, the scheme for construction contracts. I commend these orders to the Committee.
Lord Razzall
The two orders are being taken together. I am entirely happy with the first one, which seems to be a very sensible tidying-up of the situation. On the second one, which basically deals with PFI, I am sure that the Minister will be aware that PFI is a highly controversial topic at the moment, not only with Private Eye but with House of Commons committees. It would not be beyond the wit of man if, as we speak, HM Treasury was looking at the details of PFI to see how it could be improved.
PFI contracts normally contain three elements: the management of the project, the finance and the construction. One of the issues here is that the construction element is to some extent being brought into the financing, and the arguments for this order go to how PFI contracts are financed. I am happy to support the order, but it would be helpful if the Minister could assure us that when HM Treasury completes its review of existing PFI contracts and the future procedures for PFI, this will be on the table again so that, if it is necessary as a result of that exercise to look again at this issue, that will be done. This does not have to be the end of the story. It may well be that that is not necessary, but if there is currently a review—not only by Private Eye, as I say, but by a more salubrious body—this should still be on the agenda if necessary.
Lord Young of Norwood Green
My Lords, I welcome the comprehensive statement read by the Minister. We do not see this as a matter of controversy; its origins lie before the 1997 election and it continued until the 2009 legislation. We do not see the proposals as controversial and we do not intend to oppose them. I tend to agree with the noble Lord, Lord Razzall, on PFI contracts. If I had one other comment to make, it would be to ask whether there would be an impact regarding the participation of SMEs in these contracts, something that I know the Government see as desirable. With those comments, I await the Minister’s response.
Baroness Wilcox
I thank noble Lords for their patience in listening to the great amount that I had to say on the order, but I felt that we could not cut it shorter because it is important stuff. Clearly, the private finance initiative is something that generates strong feelings. I have experience myself in business of a PFI contract. The noble Lords, Lord Razzall and Lord Young, have referred to PFI, but the exclusion order that we are debating today is simply a technical exercise to acknowledge the fundamental differences between private finance construction contracts and traditional construction contracts. It does not concern the wider policy landscape. I asked the same questions myself, and it does not, so I can reassure noble Lords on that. Of course, we will look at it again if circumstances change.
The noble Lord, Lord Young, mentioned SMEs. Measures to help SMEs by promoting cash and simplifying dispute resolution are under consideration anyway, as the noble Lord would have expected. As he rightly said, the Government are very concerned about SMEs and their future. I thank both noble Lords very much for their interventions; I am grateful. I hope that I have dealt with the key points that they made and I commend the order to the Committee.
Scheme for Construction Contracts (England and Wales) Regulations 1998 (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2011
(12 years, 9 months ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Baroness Wilcox
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the Scheme for Construction Contracts (England and Wales) Regulations 1998 (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2011.
Relevant document: 26th Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments
Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act 2010 (Consequential Provisions and Modifications) Order 2011
(12 years, 9 months ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act 2010 (Consequential Provisions and Modifications) Order 2011.
Relevant document: 25th Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments
The Advocate-General for Scotland (Lord Wallace of Tankerness)
My Lords, I beg to move that the draft order laid before the House on 22 June 2011 be considered. Perhaps I may provide the Committee with a brief explanation of what the order is intended to achieve. It is made under Section 104 of the Scotland Act 1998, which allows for necessary or expedient changes to UK legislation in consequence of an Act of the Scottish Parliament.
In this case, the order is laid in consequence of the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act 2010, which I shall refer to as the 2010 Act. The Merits Committee of your Lordships' House has reviewed the order and has not noted it as of special interest. The 2010 Act makes a number of changes to the law, and the order relates to some of the changes made to sentencing, criminal procedure, criminal law and criminal justice. The 2010 Act introduced a new community sentence in Scotland, known as the community payback order. This order will enable the transfer of community payback orders imposed by a court in Scotland to England and Wales or Northern Ireland where an offender resides or intends to reside there. For an offender who subsequently proposes to move or has moved to England and Wales where an order is already in place, this order provides for the transfer of community payback orders and allows the court to impose a community payback order on an offender who resides or will reside in England and Wales. In both scenarios, the court must not impose the order unless the offender is aged 16 or older. In addition, the court must be satisfied that arrangements had been made or can be made for the offender to comply with the requirements imposed by the order in accordance with arrangements that exist in the relevant area for offenders. The court must also be satisfied that either a responsible officer will be appointed or that the offender will be supervised by a relevant probation service.
The analogous order to a Scottish community payback order in England and Wales is a community order—or, for offenders aged between 16 and 18, the youth rehabilitation order. When transferred, the community payback order has effect in England and Wales as if it were a community order made by a court there.
The order we are considering today contains almost identical provision for cross-border transfer of the community payback order in relation to offenders who reside or will reside in Northern Ireland, with a number of necessary modifications. In Northern Ireland, the corresponding order to the Scottish community payback order will be a probation or community service order under the Criminal Justice (Northern Ireland) Order 1996.
The 2010 Act also sets out what use can be made of various sources of forensic data about individuals who are arrested or detained under suspicion of having committed an offence. The order will allow forensic data, as well as data taken from terrorist suspects, to be used for the reserved purpose of national security and for the purposes of a terrorist investigation. The provisions clarify that forensic data taken for reserved purposes can also be used for specific devolved purposes. The provisions are a valuable tool for the prevention and detection of crime in Scotland.
The 2010 Act also ensures that a person will be made subject to the sex offender notification requirements when they are convicted of the offence of possession of extreme pornography. The order extends that as a matter of law in England and Wales and Northern Ireland. That ensures that a person made subject to the notification requirements as a result of a conviction for possession of extreme pornography in Scotland cannot evade the requirement to register by moving elsewhere in the United Kingdom.
Finally, the 2010 Act makes a number of improvements to the operation of the foreign travel orders. The order extends the Scottish offence of breaching the requirement to surrender passports under the foreign travel order to England and Wales and Northern Ireland. We believe that it is a sensible measure given the increased mobility of offenders, who try to avoid their obligations by leaving one jurisdiction for another, and it also addresses a growing international concern about sex tourism.
The order demonstrates the Government’s commitment to working with the Scottish Government to make the devolution settlement work. I hope that the Committee will agree that the order is a sensible use of the powers in the Scotland Act and that the practical results are to be welcomed. I therefore commend the order to the Committee.
Lord McAvoy
My Lords, this is the second time that I have responded to a statutory instrument on behalf of the Opposition. For the second time, I place on record my appreciation for the co-operation and understanding of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness, in offering me assistance in dealing with this. The behaviour of the noble and learned Lord is always an example to me of how I should aspire to be in this House, but that may take some time.
I place on record my appreciation for the contact from the Minister's office offering that help. I can assure the young lady who contacted me that although I may not have needed assistance this time, I am sure that at some point I shall be knocking on her door instead of her coming to me first.
The order is sensible. Following last night’s deliberation on the Scotland Bill, it shows the sensible co-operation that can and does take place since devolution has been brought to Scotland. I am quite impressed by how the two systems can work together to ensure that there is no avoidance of the community payback scheme. That is first class.
The Minister has explained the order well. However, in the other place, the honourable Member who has the honour to represent the Royal Borough of Rutherglen, Mr Tom Greatrex, asked some questions for clarification about the guidance, the collection and use of the forensic data that will be transferred between the north and the south and how the arrangements would work. The Minister undertook to write to the Members of that Committee. Can we have an update on that? Can the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness, clarify that for the Committee?
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
First, I thank the noble Lord, Lord McAvoy, for his generous remarks. Indeed, it helps the Committee’s consideration of these orders to work if there is an exchange of information.
The noble Lord asked about guidance, picking up the points made by his illustrious successor representing the Royal Borough of Rutherglen, Mr Greatrex. The position is that the Scottish Government have published guidance on all the forensic data provisions of the 2010 Act, including Section 82, which is the section that gives rise to this part of the order.
The Home Office and the Government are in the early stages of working with the relevant law enforcement authorities to develop specific guidance in the forensic data matters arising from the Protection of Freedoms Bill and indeed the wider use of forensic data. My right honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State in the Scotland Office, Mr Mundell, has written to Mr Greatrex confirming that,
“the Home Office and the Scottish Government are working with the relevant law enforcement authorities (including the Serious Organised Crime Agency and HM Revenue and Customs) with the intention of developing specific guidance on forensic data matters arising from both the Protection of Freedoms Bill”—
which is currently before the other place—
“and the wider use of forensic data. Part 1 of the Schedule to the Criminal Justice and Licensing Section 104 Order amends the”,
Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995 in Scotland,
“to avoid operational confusion and ensure that there is a clear legal basis for the retention and use of forensic data in Scotland for both reserved and devolved purposes”.
The Protection of Freedoms Bill will also impact on this area because of the,
“provisions in Scotland under the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995”,
as amended by the Act that triggers this order.
The other point that Mr Greatrex raised related to the foreign travel orders. My right honourable friend’s letter says:
“the latest version of guidance produced by the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland … relative to the management of registered sex offenders is subject to continual monitoring and review in light of developments in the law and in policy and practice”.
My right honourable friend is advised that,
“This guidance is currently being amended to take account of the amendments made to the … regime”,
as a result of the primary legislation this order. I understand that the guidance will be made available to the police in good time. I hope that that gives an explanation to the points raised by the noble Lord, and I commend the order to the Committee.
Landfill (Maximum Landfill Amount) Regulations 2011
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Henley
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the Landfill (Maximum Landfill Amount) Regulations 2011.
Relevant document: 25th Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments
Lord Henley
My Lords, the purpose of the instrument is to set new maximum amounts of biodegradable municipal waste that can be sent to landfill. They apply to England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and, obviously, the United Kingdom as a whole. The new amounts replace the maximum amounts set out in the previous set of regulations, the Landfill (Scheme Year and Maximum Landfill Amount) Regulations 2004, with which noble Lords will no doubt be familiar.
The EU landfill directive sets challenging targets for diverting waste from landfill. That is in line with its overall objective of reducing the negative effects of landfilling on the environment, including reducing the production of methane gas from landfills. This fits with the Government's view, as stated in the recently published waste review, that landfill should be the last resort for biodegradable waste.
The new targets and the definition of municipal waste set out in the directive were transposed into UK legislation by the Waste and Emissions Trading Act 2003—the WET Act. The Act also set up the landfill allowance schemes to deliver this reduction. At the time, the schemes and the definition of municipal waste applied only to waste collected by local authorities. However, discussions with the European Commission have led us to agree that the UK's existing approach was too narrowly focused. Our environmental objectives would be far better addressed by a broader interpretation. The United Kingdom has changed its interpretation of municipal waste so that more commercial waste collected by the private sector is subject to the diversion targets.
The revised targets reflected in the instrument have been agreed by the European Commission and the devolved Administrations. The reclassification of municipal waste and the revised targets are not expected significantly to change the amount of waste dealt with by local authorities and the private sector respectively. Furthermore, it is not necessary to introduce new measures to meet the new targets. Continued increases to the level of landfill tax and other policies to encourage the prevention, recycling and recovery of waste are sufficient. In fact, as announced in the waste review, the targets will be met while removing a burden on local authorities, as England's Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme will be ended after the 2012-13 scheme year. I commend the draft regulations to the Grand Committee.
Lord Knight of Weymouth
My Lords, these regulations are straightforward and well explained in the Explanatory Notes. Clearly, we need to do this. I am happy with the timetable, it all seems very sensible and if we do not do it, there will be infraction proceedings against us anyway. The Explanatory Note states at paragraph 8.1 says that consultation on the regulations did not ask for views on the interpretation or revised target, but on the policies needed to meet the targets. I do not wish to delay the Committee for very long, so my limited comments will be on the policy rather than on the new interpretation or revised targets, because those are straightforward.
Before I get into detail, could the Minister let us know what proportion of waste going to landfill is food waste? There is a question on the Order Paper tomorrow where these issues are pertinent to food waste fed to chickens and in pig swill.
As for policy, I know from the Minister’s comments during the Question in the main Chamber today that he is not a fan of targets. I understand that philosophical view. None of us is a great enthusiast for imposing targets on people, but if we are not going to use recycling targets to minimise the amount of waste going into landfill, I would be grateful if the Minister could set out what leverage he is going to use to ensure that it happens. I have heard, for example, stories about local authorities who, faced with funding constraints, are having to close recycling centres. What leverage is he going to have over local authorities to ensure that they meet their obligations so that England can play its part?
As he knows, because this was pointed out earlier in the main Chamber, other devolved Administrations are retaining targets and indeed setting more ambitious targets than those set out in the regulations. It would be interesting to know whether Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland overshoot their targets—which should be applauded—England could get away with undershooting, given that these are UK-wide regulations? Could it benefit from the more aggressive stance of the devolved Administrations?
I turn to my final question, and I apologise that I am not completely clear in my research on this. It has been suggested to me that it is possible to export material that would otherwise go to landfill without paying any kind of tax, despite a landfill tax being levied in this country. If that is the case, are any conversations going on between Defra and the Treasury to ensure that there is no incentive for local authorities to export their waste to avoid paying tax?
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer
My Lords, I am pleased that the Government have met the previous targets. Although I do not want to take issue with the noble Lord, Lord Knight, I understand that this is all about targets and that they are driven from the EU—the final target, of course, being zero waste to landfill—so we are tied in. One of the benefits of the EU is that it keeps us to targets, however unpopular they may be; it forces us to take action, and the effectiveness of that is shown by the continuing progress here.
I am particularly pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Henley, was able to explain to us that municipal waste now includes commercial waste collected from, for example, catering outlets, restaurants and so on. Under this statutory instrument we are discussing biodegradable waste. It was difficult when there was one set of biodegradable waste collected from households and another stream that was regarded as commercial. The fact that those can now be regarded as one is a good step forward.
I am looking forward as well to the Question tomorrow. That is particularly pertinent when we are looking, for example, at traditionally fed pigs. Although we learnt a hard lesson through the BSE crisis, we need to move on and look at a much more constructive approach to what we do with what we may regard as waste—used vegetable matter, waste from the production of cheese and so on—and ensure that we are not importing, for example, soya that has forced further rainforest destruction, when we could have been using our waste to feed our own livestock that we then eat. That is the traditional way that it was done; people liked the taste of pork in those days, and there is no reason why we cannot go back to that.
Given the limited nature of the statutory instrument, those are my only comments. Were it any wider, I would ask the Minister what further responsibility the Government intend to give to producers, because producer responsibility is also an important way to reduce overall landfill. However, I see this SI as a good step on the way to zero waste, and I welcome it.
Lord Henley
My Lords, I am grateful to both noble Lords for their comments. I hope to answer some of them. First, let us deal with the Question on pigswill tomorrow. Let us hope that we can have a rational discussion on it and that it will not turn into one of those Parliamentary Questions that appear on Radio 4 the next day where they try to mock this House. This House can discuss these things properly, and let us hope that we can.
Secondly, moving on to the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Knight, about targets, I gave my views earlier. In general, I am not a great fan of targets because they have a danger of distorting how people behave. Targets can play a part, though, and they appear here. We have to live with targets sometimes because they are imposed upon us, but I think we all accept that targets do not always work in exactly the way that we would like.
Thirdly, the noble Lord asked how much organic waste, food waste and all that went to landfill. Obviously, we would like to put somewhere else all of what we call in crude terms “smelly waste”, and get it out of the black bag. It is not good that it goes there; that is a bad thing; it creates methane that seeps out; and there are better ways to dispose of it. How that should be done is a matter that, in the main, is best left to local authorities to decide in their local areas, because different areas have different ways of collecting refuse and different priorities.
Fourthly, the noble Lord, Lord Knight, asked for my general view on the waste review. It is rather difficult to give a complete summary at this stage of what we are trying to do. Subject to the usual channels, we might have a debate on it. Perhaps I may put it in very simple terms: our view is that we want to make it easy for people to do the right thing because we believe that people want to do the right thing. We believe that institutions and local authorities want to do the right thing, but we want to make that easy for them, rather than regulating and forcing them into line. We will have to pursue that and see how it goes. The noble Lord can propose a debate on this subject in future, when we can consider it at greater length.
Fifthly, the noble Lord asked about local authorities closing recycling centres. I have seen comments about this in the press. Local authorities, as noble Lords will know, have a duty to provide the appropriate amount of recycling centres for their areas. As I understand it, those local authorities have been closing sites that they felt were superfluous. Obviously, it is a question of fact and the degree to which they are still meeting their obligations. We and others will look at that issue. It is important that local authorities continue to provide appropriate cover, as they are obliged to by statute.
The noble Lord asked whether it would be sufficient if Wales and Scotland did better than us and we did slightly less well, but overall the UK was within EU targets. I had better take advice on that before I properly respond, but one has to accept that England represents about 85 per cent of the UK and it is therefore unlikely that super performance by the three devolved Administrations would be sufficient to get us across any boundaries. We will see about that and I will write to the noble Lord, if appropriate.
The same is also true of the Treasury—that dread word that the noble Lord mentioned. I am always very wary when anyone mentions the Treasury. He mentioned exports of landfill. We will have a look at that point and I will respond in due course, if necessary.
I hope that I have dealt with most of the noble Lord’s questions. If I have not done so, I shall write further. I congratulate him because his colleague in the Commons took up all of seven lines on this subject and the debate was completed in seven minutes. We have now reached 15 minutes, which shows that the greater scrutiny of this House is, as always, working as it should be.
International Renewable Energy Agency (Legal Capacities) Order 2011
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Wallace of Saltaire
That the Grand Committee do report to the House that it has considered the International Renewable Energy Agency (Legal Capacities) Order 2011.
Relevant document: 23rd Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
I beg to move that draft Order in Council be approved together with an Explanatory Memorandum, as required for all affirmative statutory instruments. This Order in Council confers, in the UK, the legal capacities of a body corporate on the International Renewable Energy Agency, IRENA. It is a new international organisation that will work to increase the deployment of renewable energy technologies globally. It has been established by a treaty, the IRENA statute. This Order in Council was approved by the House of Commons Committee on 14 July 2011 this year.
The UK signed the IRENA statute in 2009. The Government believe that the UK should now ratify the statute. To that end, a copy of the statute was laid before Parliament on 7 June, together with an Explanatory Memorandum, in accordance with the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010. The statute requires that all members of IRENA should confer legal capacity on IRENA in their territories. We therefore need to make this order to enable the UK to ratify the IRENA statute and become a full member of the organisation.
Let me explain the background to IRENA in a little more detail. This was a German initiative. The statute was agreed in Bonn in January 2009 and subsequently signed by the UK on 26 June 2009. The treaty entered into force in July 2010, after the deposit of the 25th instrument of ratification in Bonn. The statute establishes an international renewable energy agency to promote the widespread use and increased adoption of renewable energy technologies. The principal effect of the order is to enable the UK to become a full member of the agency.
So far, IRENA has 149 signatories. To date, 82 of these signatories have ratified the statute, including the United States, Japan, 18 EU member states, the European Union itself and 49 developing countries. With such a wide membership, IRENA will be the first truly global organisation devoted solely to renewable energy technologies. This is a young organisation, with its first assembly taking place in April this year. However, it has high ambition and is seeking to become an international centre of excellence for renewable energy technologies, with a specific focus on the developing world. IRENA will be able to bring together renewable energy experts from across the world to develop best-practice technical and policy examples. It will also be able to produce objective reports on the renewable energy market to help inform regional development across the world.
Renewable energy needs to play a key role in meeting global energy demand. Deployment has been increasing rapidly in recent years. Of the approximate 300 gigawatts of new electricity-generating capacity added globally during 2008-09, 140 gigawatts, nearly half, came from renewables. Global co-operation, through an organisation like IRENA, will be essential to ensuring that renewable energy deployment continues to increase.
The use of renewable energy has great potential to tackle climate change. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimates that between 2010 and 2050, renewables can make CO2 savings of between 15 per cent and 37 per cent against the world economic outlook 2009 reference scenario. There is also a role for renewables in increasing global and domestic energy security. The greater the deployment of renewable technologies internationally, the less pressure there will be on traditional energy sources such as oil and gas.
The deployment of renewable energy technologies can also support greater energy access, particularly in rural communities. IRENA will mean that the UK and others will have a framework within which to share technical and policy expertise with those most in need of securing innovative energy solutions.
The UK has a strong reputation internationally in the deployment of clean energy technologies. We are world leaders when it comes to offshore wind and have just introduced the world’s first financial incentive for increasing levels of renewable heat. In the future, renewable energy will play an increasingly important role in the UK’s energy mix. The renewable energy road map, published in July, sets out the Government’s vision for meeting our domestic renewable energy target for 2020. Increasing our domestic renewables capacity will mean that we can decrease our reliance on fossil fuels. Greater deployment of renewables globally will also mean that costs for these technologies will fall, making fulfilment of our domestic renewable energy ambitions more cost-effective. We want to remain at the forefront of this growing industry and ensure that UK interests are represented in what will be such a landmark global organisation.
The UK Government have made a commitment to push for greater efforts to tackle climate change internationally and to deliver investment to increase deployment of renewable energy technologies. We will thus be acting in accordance with this commitment by becoming full members of an organisation whose activities will help to make this happen. This is an important order, which reflects cross-party commitment to reducing global greenhouse gas emissions. I therefore commend it to the Committee and hope that it will receive the Committee’s full support.
Lord Liddle
My Lords, on behalf of the Opposition, I offer our support for this order, which is quite a significant positive step for mankind. It is a multilateral agreement in an area where multilateral agreement has been extremely difficult to achieve. Until relatively recently, the United States did not accept that climate change was a problem of any kind, yet it is signing up to this international agency to spread best practice in renewables. That is extremely welcome. We hope that Britain will try to play a leading role in IRENA.
It has a clear purpose, which is set out in paragraph 7.2 of the Explanatory Memorandum. Technology in this area is changing rapidly. There is a need for knowledge dissemination and not only competition but co-operation to make sure that technological advances spread at the most rapid rate throughout the year. There are well known market failures in applying renewable technologies, which means that there is a role for public intervention. As we know, the carbon price today does not reflect what it will be in the future as a result of the growing problem of climate change. Therefore, there is a problem about market incentives. In the developing world, where this type of organisation can play an important role, there are problems of governing capacity, project management capacity and access to finance. An organisation such as this, working in co-operation with bodies such as the World Bank and the world’s regional development agencies, can play an important role. Therefore, the UK should look at this positively as an opportunity for leadership.
I should like to probe the Minister on what kind of agenda Britain intends to pursue in this agency. If I may, I should like to indulge in a flight of fancy of my own about the kind of agenda that I would like to see explored. This is in line with the economic thinking of the Opposition. One of the risks that we face, and one of the reasons why it is important to have these multilateral institutions, is that climate change is falling down the political agenda as economic problems climb up it. That is a real problem; we saw it in the European Parliament vote on the 30 per cent target, and it is a worrying theme. This is precisely the moment, at a time when interest rates are very low and according to many experts a great depression is looming—we are facing a kind of Japanese decade in the West—when we ought to be thinking about the long-term investments that will pay off richly regarding renewable energy.
I should like to repeat an idea that I heard an eminent and far more distinguished person who is far more knowledgeable on these subjects, the noble Lord, Lord Rees, talking about at a conference on this subject. He thought that the kind of visionary project that we ought to be thinking about in Europe now is the use of solar renewables in the Sahara and wind renewables in the Aegean to power the industries of northern Europe, building grids from Africa, helping the Arab spring to have some kind of economic future and building networks to bring renewable energy to northern Europe. This is more important when countries such as Germany have announced that they are gong to abandon nuclear power.
Not only could this be a way of tackling the development problems of those countries that we so much want to help, particularly in north Africa, it could also help to revive the European economy in a major way at a time of crisis in the eurozone. However, it needs a mix of public and private finance. We must not be myopic about public deficits if we are going to be able to finance these types of very long-term projects, which could really pay off.
That is just an example, but there is huge potential for renewables, not just to solve the problems of climate change several decades hence but to help solve our economic problems in the coming decade. I would like to think that Her Majesty’s Government shared that view and would be using organisations such as this excellent IRENA to explore how such radical possibilities could be developed.
Lord Reay
My Lords, it is an agreeable irony that the headquarters of this fledgling international organisation that we are in the process of legitimising, and which is supposed to spearhead the dissemination of renewable energy technology throughout the developing world, as the Explanatory Memorandum tells us, is situated in the city of Abu Dhabi, one of the hydrocarbon capitals of the world. If the Government of that state seriously believed that renewable energy was likely to replace fossil fuels in whole or substantial part as a source of power throughout the world, one wonders if they would be quite so happy to be the host to such a threatening body.
However, nothing is quite as it first seems in the wonderful world of renewable energy. In fact, developing countries have not the slightest interest in adopting renewable energy policies. Their interest, quite rightly, is in economic growth. Under present technologies, that is best provided—because most cheaply provided—by fossil fuels, chiefly coal. That was the lesson of Copenhagen, and it is why China and India abruptly refused to sign up to any global agreement to cut carbon emissions. That, though, does not suit the western developed countries, which have all foolishly signed up to cripplingly expensive renewable energy policies to leave developing countries to go their own way. That is because it is a manifest absurdity for developed countries to set out to reduce global carbon emissions on their own. To give an example of how absurd that would be, China’s annual increase in carbon emissions in recent years has been roughly equivalent to the UK’s total emissions. Those countries that have adopted these ruinous renewable energy policies, therefore, have to lay claim to be leading the rest of the world. For this claim not to look absurd, developing countries—or some of them—must be made to look as if they were co-operating in the pursuit of these policies.
This, of course, can be done if the West puts enough money on the table. Hence the extraordinary commitment undertaken at Copenhagen to provide immediately $10 billion a year to developing countries for climate change purposes with the aim of increasing this eventually to $100 billion a year.
There is also the lamentable so-called clean development mechanism. This is a mechanism to pay developing countries for projects that are supposed to reduce emissions instead of cutting our own emissions. Needless to say, this has developed into a complete scam riddled with conflicts of interest and dubious validations. I would refer noble Lords interested in further details to a marvellous new book, Let them Eat Carbon, by Matthew Sinclair, director of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, which dissects brilliantly most of the ramifications of renewable energy policies. Readers will find in it most of the points I am making and many other revealing ones besides.
IRENA, I am afraid, is a part of this charade in which developing countries are lured into showing sufficient interest in renewable energy to enable the West to claim that it is leading the world. IRENA, of course, is only a small cog in the machine. Nevertheless, it has its costs. I note from the minutes of the first session of the IRENA assembly in April this year, that it attracted 950 participants, including one head of state—of Tonga I think—30 ministerial-level officials and 670 country delegates. The climate is probably quite agreeable in Abu Dhabi in early April. It would be interesting to know how many carbon emissions such a gathering was responsible for.
I gather from what the Foreign Office Minister said in another place on 14 July that the annual budget to keep this show on the road is $25 million a year. He also said that the United Kingdom contribution is £700,000 per annum. I wonder if the Minister can confirm that figure and say whether the department expects it to remain at that level in future years.
One day in this country we will have to wake up and shed a policy that is quite pointless in the absence of a global agreement and which we certainly cannot afford. In our straitened circumstances, and desperate as we are for economic growth, that day cannot come a moment too soon. When it does, it is us who will be following the lead of the developing countries and not the other way round.
Lord Teverson
I absolutely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Reay, in his use of the word “crippling”. What we have seen over the past few years is a crippling increase in fuel poverty in this country, something like a doubling. I do not know the exact figures, but is up to about 6 million because of the increase in fossil fuel prices that households have to pay. I also agree with that word “crippling” in terms of the increase in energy prices that we have seen. Gas, a well known fossil fuel, has increased by some 30 per cent this year. Those prices are truly crippling. That is the word to use in terms of the repercussions of the fossil-fuel based economy that we have at the moment. I do not want to get into that argument too much.
With regard to renewable energy worldwide, it is tempting to look just at new technologies, but we should remember that, globally, renewable energy was the only energy until the Industrial Revolution; before oil it was a major part. Renewable energy already accounts for about one-sixth of the world's energy production. Of course, that is not wind power or the other new technologies; it is largely biomass—I must admit that not all of that was renewable, but, I hope, most of it now is—and hydroelectricity, which is a major proportion of world energy generation even today. Renewables account for about one-fifth of energy production worldwide.
From what I read on the body's website, it is not just about future technologies, which are not greatly applied, but traditional renewables. That is why it is important to bring together the world community on renewable power. I was pleased to see that there are already 149 signatories and 82 members—including, as the Minister said, the European Union. I was disappointed to see that although the United States is a signatory, that is not true for China, Canada, the Russian Federation or Brazil. I do not know whether they are in the queue to join; I very much hope that they are.
Outside the argument of the cost of renewables against that of fossil fuels and technologies such as nuclear power, it is undeniable that renewables are, have been through human history and will be a really important contribution to energy production globally. That is why it is important that IRENA has been founded. I am surprised that it took so long—until 2009—before it was. The noble Lord, Lord Reay, magnifies imperfections that we all see, but I hope that it will be a body that will help the evolution of renewable power more effectively and successfully.
It is easy to set up international organisations and pay for administrations and bureaucracies, but I would be interested to understand what the priorities are in the practical programmes of IRENA in its next time horizon of three years. That is slightly more specific than the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, which is important, of how the UK will contribute. I was not clear from the publicity of IRENA exactly what it was trying to do over the next few years in research and co-ordination, because however worthy an international organisation and its cause is, it must be effective. It costs money, so it has to produce results.
I very much welcome the Government’s move to complete our signing up to IRENA as this is clearly an important area of technology for our future.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
I thank noble Lords who have contributed. Perhaps I may answer the question from the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, and then extend it to the question of what IRENA’s agenda should be for the next three years.
The United Kingdom has accepted the position of chair of the IRENA policy and strategy committee, so we will be playing a leading part in defining the agenda. British interests are clear. First, we want to support the channelling of investment in energy in the developing world as far as possible towards renewable energy and away from the further consumption of fossil fuels.
Secondly, we wish to promote the full ownership by developing countries of the switch towards renewables. I have to say that the role of Abu Dhabi and the UAE is extremely positive in this. It demonstrates that it is not simply the West pushing this agenda on the developing world, but that we have partners in the Arab world who are themselves actively concerned to assist developing countries in investing in renewables. I will come back to the role of Abu Dhabi in a minute. Thirdly, there are opportunities for UK expertise and industry, both in exports and the economies of scale that come from a larger market, which will then drive down the prices we have to pay for renewable technologies at home.
In terms of a practical programme for the next three years or so, I understand that the underlying purpose of IRENA is to encourage co-operation in renewables across the developing world. In the same way that the IPCC at an early stage put a great deal of effort into training experts from developing countries so that it was not simply a western argument about climate change being put across the developing countries, so IRENA will try to encourage the development of expertise and adoption of these technologies in those countries—both at the macro level and very much at the micro level. In a lot of these developing countries where the population is dispersed, micro power, for which renewable schemes are often extremely helpful, will be very much the local example.
The noble Lord, Lord Reay, made a number of points. I should say to him, first, that we face long-term rising demand for fossil fuel, which is, as we already notice, driving up long-term prices for fossil fuel. Further development of and investment in renewable technologies is moving in the opposite direction, driving down the prices and costs of renewables. That is part of the process we of course wish to encourage.
The Matthew Sinclair book has, as the noble Lord will know, very kindly been sent to, I think, all Members of the House of Lords, and I dare say that a number of us may read it. Countries such as Tonga are not just along for the ride. Tonga is, after all, one of those Pacific islands that have very little land way above sea level, and it is thus directly threatened by the impact of climate change. The Pacific islands are therefore among the most active countries in pushing for a switch to renewables and a really serious effort to contain the expansion of CO2 in the atmosphere.
There is also an energy security dimension to this, as I mentioned in my opening remarks. Dependence on a small number of countries for supplies of fossil fuel over the long term is potentially a major source of global insecurity, and the more that we can reduce dependence on imported fossil fuels for all countries, the better we do.
The UK’s contribution to IRENA’s budget is on the scale provided for in British contributions to the United Nations and other agencies. It is currently £750,000; it will increase to £1 million and, no doubt, in the long run will increase further. The Government’s view and that of our predecessors is that this is a worthwhile and modest investment. I should perhaps add that so far the largest contributors by far to IRENA are Germany and Abu Dhabi, which, in addition to the scale of their contributions, are making some substantial and very valuable voluntary contributions. The interests of Abu Dhabi, I understand, are that fossil fuels should not last for ever as the driver of its economy and that it wishes to diversify its economic interests. This is very much an enlightened approach. German interests are also mixed. Germany has a highly developed renewable energy industry and its Government certainly see major opportunities for exports as this area expands. That is something that we as a country also need to look at, and that is part of where we hope the future revival of British exports may indeed come from.
On renewable energy, I simply say to the noble Lord, Lord Reay, that I spend my summers walking around the Yorkshire Dales, past weirs that used to produce power and in one or two cases, as in Grassington and Upper Wharfedale, used to produce electricity 60 or 70 years ago. We are now at last, although very slowly, beginning to put some of those weirs back into production, producing electricity. The French have been doing this for 30 or 40 years. There is a great deal that we can still do in this country.
I had an argument with a Conservative MP recently who said that it would deface the southern Yorkshire plain if we were to have windmills on it. There are in fact a number of ruined windmills scattered across the plain, but when I drive across it I find that the biggest eyesores that one faces are Drax and the other two big coal-fired stations. If I may say so, I find those who object to switching to renewable energy and wish to go on burning fossil fuels on the scale on that we do, importing coal from Poland, Australia and elsewhere, a little short-sighted in terms of our long-term interests in energy security and the balance between imports and exports.
Having, I hope, answered most of the questions raised, I hope that I may take the Opposition’s welcome as being very much cross-party approval.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Harris of Richmond)
My Lords, that completes the business before the Grand Committee this afternoon. The Committee stands adjourned.
House of Lords
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Environment: Litter and Waste
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Baroness Gardner of Parkes
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they will establish recommended standards for dealing with litter and waste, adapted for different areas and needs and including labelling plastic carrier bags with the length of time they take to biodegrade.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Henley)
My Lords, the Code of practice on litter and refuse sets cleaning standards for local authorities which vary according to an area’s intensity of use and litter levels. The key to reducing the environmental cost of carrier bags is reducing usage, encouraging reuse and recycling. It is unclear whether labelling carrier bags with details of biodegradability influences consumer behaviour. It might wrongly imply that quicker-degrading bags have less environmental impact.
Baroness Gardner of Parkes
I thank the Minister for that slightly doubtful Answer. Has he become aware, or does he know, that the chemical additive d2w, in use since 1970, has now been developed to a degree of accuracy that almost the exact date of self-destruction can be built into plastic-bag manufacture? Would it not be an advantage for everyone to know this death date so that bags could be tailored for certain markets, such as the fast-food industry—blamed for bags clogging our waterways? Other bags intended for long-term storage would not unexpectedly turn into confetti. Is the Minister aware that some people are now beginning to hoard free plastic carriers because they are so fearful that they may become unavailable?
Lord Henley
My Lords, I was aware of the brief chemistry lesson that my noble friend has given me but I am grateful for that. Labelling plastic bags is not quite as simple as that. Some bags break down in different manners in different environments, according to where they are left, whether it is in the sea or on land. Some will break down into different things, whether plastic or, if they are made of some organic matter, in other ways. All things break down in different ways and labelling would not necessarily help the consumer. I am always prepared to listen to any further advice that my noble friend and others have on these matters. We want to deal with the long-term problem particularly of the single-use plastic bag.
Baroness Finlay of Llandaff
My Lords, are the Government giving consideration to the decision taken by the Welsh Government to charge for plastic bags from 1 October, to encourage the reuse of bags and of good old-fashioned shopping bags?
Lord Henley
My Lords, I have not always been the greatest fan of devolution but one of its great advantages is that we can profit from lessons learnt in other countries. We will certainly look carefully at what they are doing in Wales and keep an eye on that. The noble Baroness is quite right to talk about what she referred to as “good, old-fashioned shopping bags” or the bags made available by supermarkets at a cost to encourage reuse of them. Often the problem with those is that one ends up buying too many. I have a very large stack of those bags at home waiting to be reused.
Lord McConnell of Glenscorrodale
My Lords, are the Government aware of the example of Rwanda, where the Parliament and Government banned the use of plastic bags completely, leading to it being widely described as the cleanest country in the whole of Africa? The impact on litter pollution and also civic duty in Rwanda has been considerable. Will the Government look at international examples to deal with this horrendous problem?
Lord Henley
My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord for bringing to the House the experiences of Rwanda. I recently met the Rwandan forestry minister on a completely different matter and unfortunately, because I was not briefed on this matter, did not have a chance to discuss it with him. Should I have a chance again, I will do so. That is an option that one could look at. We are not happy that the decline in the use of single-use plastic bags has not been maintained and that there has been an increase. When we got those figures in the summer, I made it clear that, if we do not see an improvement, we may have to consider additional measures in the future, and we will certainly learn from all other countries.
Baroness Eaton
Would the Government consider having their experts look at drawing up a recommended list of materials for recycling, which could be very helpful both to local government and to individuals?
Lord Henley
My noble friend is quite right to draw to the House’s attention the problems of the vast variety of different plastics that we use—I cannot remember how many there are—and the problems of recycling them. I think that currently we recycle some 24 per cent of packaging. We would like to get that figure up. Obviously it might be easier to do that if we could reduce the number of different forms of plastic, but that would take quite a long time, a great many behavioural changes and changes by the producers. Certainly, as my noble friend suggests, it is something that we could look at.
Lord Knight of Weymouth
My Lords, the Government’s waste review set out the noble ambition of a zero-waste economy. I ask the Minister, what role do standards and targets have in achieving that? The previous Government legislated to take powers to tackle the profusion of plastic bags, and we have heard how such powers are being used by the Welsh Assembly Government. Wales also has a recycling target of 70 per cent. Is this Government’s lack of action connected to the abandoning of any recycling targets in England?
Lord Henley
I am not always convinced that targets are necessarily the right way to go forward. Targets can very often distort behaviour and distort priorities and how people deal with things. We made clear in our waste review that we want to make it easy for individuals and organisations to do the right thing, because a great many of them want to do just that. We will continue that process, and I hope that as a result we will head towards that zero-waste economy that we are looking for.
Lord Greaves
My Lords, would my noble friend agree that, in the general area of litter and waste, and indeed offensive graffiti, localism really should reign and prevail? It is not up to central government to tell local people and local councils exactly what they should do and how they should do it. It is up to local people and local councillors to get together to make sure that their streets and areas are clean and that unsightly graffiti are removed. Would he agree that it would be wrong for the Government to take away any of the existing powers that local authorities have in this area?
Lord Henley
My noble friend is quite right to link graffiti with both litter and waste, and I am very grateful that he did that. I am also grateful for his stress on the importance of localism. I have made it clear the whole way through this process, particularly when it came to our recent waste review, that we believe that it is for local authorities to decide on these matters and that they can get them right. What is right in one borough, such as Westminster, where I happen to live, or Carlisle, where I also happen to live, will be different processes. The same will be true for Pendle, where my noble friend lives.
Lord Grenfell
Would it not be possible to reduce the use of plastic bags if more could be done to encourage the producers and manufacturers of goods that are sold in supermarkets to stop packaging them as if they were mothballing an aircraft carrier?
Lord Henley
Again, it is not as simple as all that. We do encourage them to reduce packaging as much as possible. However, the noble Lord will find that some packaging actually does end up reducing waste. If one takes something as simple as a cucumber, wrapping it in plastic ends up reducing the amount of cucumber that is wasted because it goes off compared to the cucumber that is unwrapped. This is a simple fact. So packaging can play its part in reducing waste, and we will work with the supermarkets and others to make sure that, while packaging is reduced, packaging can also play its part in reducing waste.
Sellafield
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Baroness Worthington
To ask Her Majesty’s Government, in view of the recently announced closure of the MOX reprocessing plant at Sellafield, what plans they have for securing investment and new jobs in the local area.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Baroness Wilcox)
Sellafield is recognised as the most important nuclear site in the UK, employing over 10,000 people. That priority has seen record levels of investment from the latest government spending round, which will lead to the acceleration of decommissioning work at the site. The closure of the MOX plant is of course regrettable, but Sellafield Ltd is actively working with the 600 people who will lose their jobs at this time, and everyone in the area is doing their very best to see that these people find jobs very quickly.
Baroness Worthington
My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for her Answer and it is welcome that new jobs are being sought. However, my Question leads to the longer-term future for the site. Sellafield is a unique site in the UK and I believe that it could become the home of world-leading research into the use of next-generation nuclear reactors. Such reactors, as well as being more efficient in their fuel use, generating no long-lasting waste, can be designed to burn up existing stockpiles of plutonium held at the Sellafield site. In light of this, is there more that the Government can do to support R&D into new nuclear designs that will help to ensure that we develop the safest and most efficient new reactors?
Baroness Wilcox
First, I welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, and her new interest in nuclear, and I hope that she will feed in her views to the Government and allow us to help her where we can. I hope that she will share her vision of the new approach, which I think she was hoping would be based on thorium. On her Question, if we can turn a liability into an asset, this Government will explore every possibility. The Government consulted earlier this year on their preferred policy option for dealing with the plutonium stockpile, and will confirm their position later this year.
Lord Winston
My Lords, does the Minister not regard it as a crying shame that this country, which after all pretty well started the invention of nuclear power for peaceful uses, is now annually investing less than £25 million a year in research into nuclear fission, which is way behind all our major competitors? That makes us the poorhouse for developing further in the way that my noble friend has just mentioned.
Baroness Wilcox
The noble Lord, Lord Winston, is right that we have not been investing as we should. We have been in government for only a year and we are trying our best to get ahead as fast as we can. I know that he is doing wonderful work with Imperial College, and it is to people like him that we look to show us the way ahead.
Lord Razzall
Following on from the Question from the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, rather than jumping the gun like Usain Bolt, may I ask my noble friend whether there are residual liabilities under the processing contracts at the MOX plant at Sellafield in relation to cleaning up the plant? If so, who is going to bear them?
Baroness Wilcox
There are residual liabilities, and we will have to work out exactly what we are going to do. Can we turn the existing plutonium stocks from the MOX plants from a liability into an asset? That is an area that we must look at and see what we can do. The Government consulted earlier this year on their preferred policy option for dealing with all those stockpiles and will confirm their position later this year. I thank my noble friend for his question.
Lord Taverne
My Lords, in dealing with the future of nuclear sights, will the Government draw the public’s attention to the fact that most fears about radiation are enormously exaggerated?
Lord Grantchester
Does the Minister agree that there would be great benefit to the area and the UK if the existing plutonium stock stored at Sellafield could be converted into an asset? With the right kind of advanced reactor, the plutonium could be completely consumed while making new fuel from thorium, which could be used in increasing carbon-free electrical generation capacity, generating 20 per cent more than the UK is currently using. Could the Minister confirm that this would be of huge benefit to jobs in Cumbria?
Baroness Wilcox
It would be of huge benefit to everyone if we can get this off the ground, absolutely. I really am very grateful, as is my noble friend Lord Marland, for the noble Lord’s personal interest in this subject. I understand that he is going to Sellafield soon and we would very much like to hear his views on his return.
Baroness Wall of New Barnet
Will the noble Baroness and the Government do all that they can to encourage the creation of new jobs in these areas, as my noble friend has suggested in her Question? Will she also confirm that the number of apprentices already at Sellafield is the way forward in creating those new jobs and building a future for that area?
Baroness Wilcox
I agree with the noble Baroness, particularly about apprenticeships, which I know are very close to her heart. UK Trade and Investment is looking at this area and seeing what it can do to help, the Cumbria Local Enterprise Partnership is working extremely well, the docks at Warrington have been opened for the new containers, and a lot of apprenticeships are, I understand, being sought in that area. So yes, I do agree with her.
NHS: Medical Records
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Naseby
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they intend to continue to computerise all NHS medical records.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Earl Howe)
My Lords, the Government aim to continue to computerise NHS medical records so that patient experience is enhanced, patient care is made more efficient, and patient safety is improved. However, we recognise the weakness of top-down, centrally imposed IT systems. Although elements of the programme have been successful, the policy approach taken has failed to engage the NHS sufficiently. The findings of recent reviews will contribute to planning currently under way for future informatics support to the modernised NHS.
Lord Naseby
Is my noble friend aware that the current programme for the NHS database has cost over £6.2 billion, has taken 10 years and is currently totally unworkable? Is he aware of any other country in the world that has attempted such a project and succeeded? As far as I can see, no other country has even attempted it. Would it not be far better if Her Majesty’s Government bit the bullet and scrapped the whole scheme, as they did with the RAF’s Nimrod programme, which was itself a brave decision?
Earl Howe
My Lords, I can well understand my noble friend’s acute disquiet over this matter, particularly in light of the recent report from the Public Accounts Committee. The view we have taken is that some very good things have been achieved so far, particularly from the national elements of the programme, but it is equally clear that the top-down policy approach taken to the computerisation of the NHS has not delivered the benefits at local level that everybody was hoping for and has failed to engage the NHS sufficiently. Those are the things we are now concentrating on: making sure that the governance of the programme is sound; learning lessons from what has happened; and achieving value for money.
Lord Warner
My Lords, I declare an interest as the former Minister responsible for this programme—one does have to own up to one’s past from time to time. Could the Minister assure the House that the Government are fully committed to the idea of an electronic patient record system as the way forward for the NHS, given its benefits for patient care, research and NHS efficiency? Could he tell the House what proportion of the population has now been able to avail itself of an electronic summary record?
Earl Howe
I pay tribute to the work that the noble Lord did when he was a Minister. Yes, the Government are committed to a summary care record, which, for the benefit of noble Lords, is a record that includes a defined set of key patient data, other than for patients who choose to opt out—that is an important rider. Clinicians can then access essential medical information that they need to support safe treatment and to reduce the risk of inadvertent harm, especially during emergency care. To answer the second question that the noble Lord asked, over six million patients now have a summary care record, which is a considerable increase over a few months ago.
Lord Patel
My Lords, would the Minister agree that to improve the quality of healthcare we would need comparable indicators of health outcomes? In the absence of nationally collected computerised data, how would we achieve this?
Earl Howe
My Lords, the noble Lord is absolutely right. We have to measure performance in order to improve upon it. That is why we are focused on producing an information strategy, which we hope to publish later this year. A lot of work has already gone on and the NHS Future Forum, as he may know, is looking at this area. He is absolutely right that this will be central to the performance management of the NHS.
Baroness Jolly
My Lords, we are now well into the 21st century. Can the Minister give us some indication as to when patients might be able to access their own records online?
Earl Howe
This is a commitment that we have made. We fully support the concept of patients having full access to their medical records online. A great deal of work is going on at the moment to make sure that the protocols are sound, because clearly the one thing one does not want is for the wrong people to access the wrong patient data. If we can achieve that and do it in a simple way, we shall roll the programme out as soon as we can.
Baroness Pitkeathley
I take on board what the noble Earl says about engaging local commitment and the failure that there has been in that so far, but does he agree that one of the most important things about local commitment is that different localities may have different systems? As far as the patient is concerned, it is absolutely essential that the systems can talk to each other. How will that be ensured if we go down the local route?
Earl Howe
The noble Baroness makes a very good point. I said that the top-down approach to local service provision has not worked when it has come to local service provider systems. We think that local requirements are best judged and best met by decisions being taken locally but that does not mean that they will be left on their own. There will be the necessary support from the centre wherever needed. She is again right that the key will be that these local systems must be interoperable.
The Countess of Mar
My Lords, does the Minister agree that while technology is incredibly beneficial to the National Health Service, we must be wary of people working within the health service depending too much upon technology and ignoring the human aspects of care for people who are in hospital—talking to patients, touching them and holding their hands when they have problems? My recent experiences in hospital have been very unpleasant because people have relied entirely on technology and not listened to what I have had to say.
Earl Howe
The noble Countess is of course correct that good patient care is about humane and sensitive treatment by the staff who serve in the National Health Service. At the same time, I think we are all clear that technology has a role to play in enhancing patient safety and improving the quality of care that the good staff of the NHS can deliver.
Baroness Thornton
My Lords, can I entice the Minister into being slightly more definite about when the House might see the new IT strategy which the Government keep telling us that they are about to publish? As a former Minister, I know that the answer “soon” is one that the House always looks at with some wry smiles. If we could have a more definite date, that might be helpful.
Earl Howe
My Lords, we plan to make an announcement towards the latter part of the autumn about the way forward for informatics, which will mean—we are clear about this—that we continue to gain more value for money from taxpayers’ investment and ensure that informatics support is fit for purpose in the modern NHS.
Prisoners: Sanitation
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Ramsbotham
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action they are taking to speed up the ending of “slopping out” in prisons in England and Wales.
The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord McNally)
My Lords, the use of slopping out as the primary method of prisoner sanitation ended in 1996. Currently, less than 3 per cent of the prison population are required to use unacceptable alternatives to in-cell sanitation. All new build has in-cell sanitation and, in some cases, in-cell showering facilities.
Lord Ramsbotham
My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reply. In September 1991, the then Home Secretary, the noble Lord, Lord Baker of Dorking, assured everyone, at paragraph 6.8 of his White Paper Custody, Care and Justice, that,
“no prisoner will have to endure the inhumane and degrading practice of slopping out after the end of 1994”.
The announcement made by the Prisons Minister Ann Widdecombe in 1996, which the Minister quoted, was premature because there have been, and are, cases of slopping out. The Scottish Prisons Service has admitted that the practice breaches human rights. Recently, the Scottish Court of Session has agreed that prisoners can sue for damages for being made to slop out. Might the prospect of literally thousands of British prisoners taking the same route encourage the Government to fulfil the assurance given 20 years ago that slopping out would end 15 years ago?
Lord McNally
No, my Lords. The figures I have given are accurate: less than 3 per cent of prisoners have facilities that do not comprise in-cell sanitation. The main alternative is electronic unlocking, which is not a perfect system but is certainly not degrading in the terms that the noble Lord suggested. As far as we are concerned, it is compliant with humanitarian and human rights legislation. The truth is that we have a prison estate in which it is extremely difficult to meet the full commitment to in-cell sanitation. Therefore, I cannot be enthusiastic at present about promising a rapid reduction in the numbers. As I say, as new build comes on stream, there will be more in-cell sanitation, but that will not happen quickly. We are down to almost an irreducible minimum whereby electronic unlocking is the alternative to in-cell sanitation.
Baroness Linklater of Butterstone
My Lords, given the Scottish experience, what provision is being made in England and Wales to prevent a similar situation developing here, where, in round numbers, 1,973 prison places are still affected by this disgusting situation?
Lord McNally
It is not helpful to suggest that it is disgusting to ring a bell to open the cell door in order to use the toilet. As my noble friend said, that applies to fewer than 2,000 prisoners in a prison estate of nearly 88,000. They have to do that because in certain prisons it is physically impossible to put in the facilities that would be desirable.
Baroness Howe of Idlicote
The independent monitoring board makes no mention of women. Will the Minister confirm that this grossly offensive practice—I stress those words—of slopping out does not apply in women’s prisons? If that is so, does not equal treatment mean that this should be an equally unacceptable practice in all men’s prisons?
Lord McNally
It is an unacceptable practice. I understand that the only time people are asked to use a removable bucket to slop out is if there is a breakdown in the system. I am assured that in no part of the prison estate do women have facilities other than in-cell facilities.
Baroness Knight of Collingtree
My Lords, could we be told who has to do this job, when it is necessary for it to be done, if prisoners do not do it?
Lord McNally
I am told that when it is necessary to carry out some slopping out it is done by a unit of prisoners. Individuals are not asked to slop out but, as happens in many prisons, it is part of the cleaning or other duties that a group is asked to do. It is done by prisoners. But I again emphasise that where there is in-cell provision and electronic provision, slopping out will take place only when there is a mechanical breakdown of one or other of the systems. When that happens I am told that most prisons use a cleaning squad of prisoners to carry out that job.
The Earl of Listowel
My Lords, does the Minister agree that reducing the prison population would be one way of tackling this problem? Reducing the adult prison population would be helpful in addressing this problem. Will he consider the success of the Youth Justice Board which, in the past three years, while the adult prison population has increased, has decreased the child prison population by 30 per cent? Rather than abolishing the Youth Justice Board, will he consider whether that model of governance might be applied to the adult estate?
Lord McNally
We will have learnt a lot that is beneficial from the role of the Youth Justice Board. Indeed, we will take those lessons to the Ministry of Justice and continue to work along those lines with the youth system. The noble Earl is right and that is why my right honourable friend the Lord Chancellor has drawn attention to the central part in government policy of our programme of rehabilitation. We have far too many of the wrong people within our prison system. If we could reduce prison numbers it would be a win-win situation for taxpayers and a way of getting more civilised accommodation within the prison estate.
Arrangement of Business
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Baroness Meacher
My Lords, on a point of order on the coming business of the House, may I make a plea on behalf of the House for the Chief Whip to review the date of the Second Reading of the Health and Social Care Bill, which has now been scheduled to take place at the time of the Tory party conference, during a week when many Peers do not expect to be present?
Baroness Anelay of St Johns
My Lords, we do not have points of order in this House, but it may be helpful if I remind the House that the dates for such matters are agreed in the usual channels, and these were readily agreed by both the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, and the opposition Chief Whip, the noble Lord, Lord Bassam. Of course, as ever, I can improve that—as I see that there seems to be some unusual reaction opposite, including from the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton. I suggest that these matters continue to be discussed in the usual channels.
Lord Bassam of Brighton
My Lords, the Chief Whip has made the correct point in concluding her remarks that we should continue discussions in the usual channels. I rather confess to being the junior partner in these discussions but clearly we need to be flexible. I am more than prepared to be part of a flexible discussion when it comes to discussing days for parliamentary business to be conducted in your Lordships’ House.
Baroness Williams of Crosby
My Lords, is it not reasonable that, for those of us who are anxious to take part in the business of the House, not least on this central and crucial Bill, we are entitled to express our views to the Chief Whip? We ask her to take into account the very substantial problems that many of us in this House are having with the rather late notice on the change of dates, which means that people who have a good deal to contribute will find it almost impossible to do so. It is not unreasonable that when the usual channels take their usual course, they take some notice of the position of other Members of this House.
Baroness Thornton
My Lords, since I have been mentioned in this regard, perhaps I may say that I am only trying to be helpful. When asked if I would be available on 4 October, the truthful answer was that I would be—but I am also available on three days of the following week. I am prepared to be entirely flexible and put myself in the hands of the usual channels on this matter.
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Lord Strathclyde)
My Lords, I am loath to involve myself in this, but the House needs to get itself back into order. There are good ways of settling this. I should perhaps add that it is impossible to suit every Peer unless the Chief Whips have a copy of every Peer's diary for the course of the next few weeks. That is simply not practical. I hope now that we can continue with the business of the House.
Information Committee
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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The Chairman of Committees
That Baroness Stedman-Scott be appointed a member of the Information Committee in place of Viscount Bridgeman, resigned.
Localism Bill
(12 years, 9 months ago)
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17:44 - Division on Amendment 52A - Ayes: 183 / Noes: 207 - Amendment 52A disagreed.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendments 43 and 45. Clause 155 introduces the concept of settlement payments to facilitate the self-financing system that will replace the housing subsidy system when it is abolished. A devolved system of council housing, whereby councils are able to manage their stock using their own rents, will be achieved by a one-off debt settlement. We discussed this on Monday. The amount of debt allocated to each authority will be calculated on the basis of what its business plan shows it is able to support. The 30-year cash flow of income and expenditure is converted to a capital valuation using standard discounting techniques. If the valuation is below the amount of housing debt for which an authority currently gets support through the subsidy system, the Government will make a settlement payment. If the valuation is higher, the local housing authority will make a settlement payment.
The cash flows for the 30-year business plan will require the forecasting of rental income and of costs for repairing and maintaining stock, as well as debt servicing costs. Clause 155 gives the Secretary of State the authority to make determinations for providing the basis of calculation of the settlement payments. It covers the right to make assumptions about receipts and payments. Any determination can include an assumption even if it is not borne out by events. Further, it can include an assumption whether or not it is likely to be borne out. The amendment seeks clarification of this phrase. Does that mean that at the point when the assumption is made, it does not matter whether it is likely to be borne out? This probe is not just nitpicking; it is important to be clear on the evidence and analysis that will be needed to underpin the assumptions that will be used. These are the sorts of issues on which my noble friend Lord Whitty sought clarification when we last debated this.
I will take one example of an unrealistic assumption. It is understood that the calculation assumes that the initial year’s income is available to offset the cost of the self-financing payment at the start of the year, whereas in practice it will accrue throughout the year. Similarly, the loss of rental income from right-to-buy sales is assumed to operate only from the end of each financial year. This is demonstrably unrealistic and operates against the interests of local housing authorities.
There are also, as I understand it, issues about demolitions. To the extent to which they are recognised, they obviously reduce income in the 30-year plan. However, it is understood that they are recognised only if a degree of actual planning for them has occurred or is under way. Clearly, over a 30-year period, this will not always be the case initially. What is the current position on this? I do not expect an answer to the technical points here and now; but, if correct, they support the proposition that some unrealistic assumptions are built into the calculations operating to the detriment of local housing authorities. What is the process of resolving these?
Amendment 43 focuses on Clause 157 and relates to settlement payments arising from the abolition of the housing revenue account subsidy scheme. Clause 157 covers certain aspects of settlement payments. In particular, it allows the Secretary of State to charge local housing authorities interest, if they pay late, an amount equal to any additional cost that the Government incur. This amendment simply provides for reciprocity should the Secretary of State not pay at the time determined. It may be considered that the Government will never default on a payment or, indeed, on a payment timetable, but we could be dealing with circumstances were there is administrative error or, indeed, an IT problem. As the sums involved could well be significant, it seems entirely reasonable that local housing authorities should be kept whole.
Lord Shutt of Greetland
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, for speaking to his amendments, the first of which is Amendment 39. Clause 155 provides a power for central government to make determinations providing for the calculation of a settlement payment in relation to every council that retains its own housing stock. This payment is a mechanism for adjusting each council’s housing debt to a level which it can sustain after meeting the costs of managing and maintaining its stock. It will leave every council in a position to finance its own housing stock from its own rental income without need for subsidy. The clause sets out that these determinations may be calculated according to a formula, and that this formula may include variables relating to income, expenditure needs and levels of existing housing debt.
The methodology that we will use to calculate these settlement payments has been extensively tested and refined with local authorities through two public consultations. It has also been the product of joint working with local authorities and others working in the sector. Subsequent to these consultations, we have issued two detailed policy documents this year confirming our intentions to make full reforms based on the key principles set out in these consultations. These policy documents include the models we will use to value the stock and working drafts of the determinations that we will issue. We will publish a further consultation in November on the final proposals, when we have the latest data.
It is therefore fair to say that this policy has been subject to unusually high levels of public scrutiny and debate. In valuing the business, the expenditure needs are rooted in unit costs identified in independent research which was itself published for consultation. The income assumed is that set out in the Government’s national social rent policy. The settlement payments will reflect the difference between the value of each housing business and its existing housing debt. Where the debt is greater than the valuation, the Government will pay the difference to the council. Where the valuation is higher than the debt, the council will pay the difference to the Government.
The amendment which the noble Lord seeks would remove a degree of discretion available to the Secretary of State in setting the assumptions upon which the determinations will be based. This is unnecessary, as the assumptions will be based on the best information available at the time and have been extensively tested and consulted on. In addition, the determination setting out each settlement payment will be subject to a further consultation this autumn, during which councils will be able to correct any errors. Therefore I trust that this amendment will not be pressed.
On Amendment 43, Clause 157 sets out the practical provisions under which settlement payments should be made. It gives a reserve power to the Secretary of State to charge interest or recoup costs incurred if councils make their settlement payments after the time specified in the determination. I have described these as reserve powers as we do not expect to use them due to the excellent track records councils have in meeting their financial obligations. The noble Lord’s amendment would establish reciprocal arrangements whereby the Secretary of State would make additional payments where any sum payable by the Secretary of State to particular local authorities was not paid on time. I can assure you that the Government will make its payments to local authorities on time.
That sounds grand, so I thought I would check it out a bit further. Presently housing revenue account subsidy is paid in 10 instalments in the year, and is paid on time. When councils receive regular revenue support grant, it is paid and it is paid on time. On the rare occasions, for some technical reason, it has not happened on time, the Government have voluntarily paid compensation. The determination setting out the payment date will be issued by the Government and detailed arrangements for the day have already been set out by the Department for Communities and Local Government in the policy document Self-financing: Planning the Transition, which was issued this July. Therefore, I do not believe that this amendment is necessary, and I trust it will not be pressed.
On Amendment 45, we had some discussion on these areas on Monday and we already debated the power we are taking to set a cap on housing debt as part of our reforms. As I noted previously, Clause 158 is not a minor or technical part of these reforms, it is integral to protecting the Government’s central fiscal priority—to bring public borrowing under control. I understand that many councils do not want a centrally imposed limit on their ability to borrow for housing, but our reforms must not risk undermining national fiscal policy on public debt. Self-financing will give local authorities direct control over a rent income stream of around £6 billion a year. This could potentially be used to finance a large increase in public sector debt. It is not possible to say confidently how many councils might choose to borrow more but we know that councils will start out under self-financing with much less debt per dwelling than housing associations with similar costs and incomes. It is just not possible to take the risk that this deal might drive a big increase in public sector debt.
Noble Lords have asked why the prudential borrowing rules are not sufficient to protect against this. The prudential borrowing rules have worked very well but, as I said previously, our concern is not that local authorities will act in ways that are imprudent locally, it is that in aggregate these borrowing decisions may be unaffordable nationally. The amendment tabled by the noble Lord would remove this specific cap on housing borrowing and replace it with a power for the Secretary of State to issue guidance or regulations under the Local Government Act 2003. The Act does include powers to cap the debt of individual local authorities, but these are,
“for the purpose of ensuring that the authority does not borrow more than it can afford”.
As I have said, our concern is not that a council would borrow more than it can afford, it is that in aggregate councils may borrow more than the country can afford. The bespoke powers we are taking ensure that this cap will apply only to housing debt and not to any other borrowing by local authorities. Indeed, I have some sympathy with the intentions but I have to resist the amendment and I trust that it will not be pressed.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his very detailed, if predictable, reply. In relation to Amendment 45, I honestly do not think that he has reasonably addressed that point about the power that already exists with the Secretary of State being able, for national economic reasons—which is why he wants it in this clause—to set limits in relation to the borrowing of money by local authorities. That power is there. Why is an additional power needed? I do not think that the noble Lord has dealt sufficiently with that point.
As regards Amendment 43, as I understand it the proposition is that should the Government be late with their payments for technical or any other reasons, as has happened albeit infrequently in the past, they will make a voluntary payment. Is that on the record and what we are dealing with here? The amendment simply seeks to enshrine that formally in legislation. But, as I have said, I will not push that point if the noble Lord is putting on the record that in those circumstances the Government anticipate keeping local authorities whole.
Lord Shutt of Greetland
That would be the anticipation but the idea is that the Government pay on the dot at the appropriate time.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
Of course it is. One would hope that they do and I accept that overwhelmingly they have, under the current subsidy system. But it is good to have that clearly on the record.
As to Amendment 39, I recognise and understand that there has been extensive consultation around these important provisions and that there is more to come. I was seeking to get a better view on the extent to which there may still be disagreement challenges over the technical aspects of how the settlements are proposed. What is the process for settling that? Consultation is all very well but it is a question of how the Government respond to that if there are at least residual challenges about those calculations. As I have said, I do not propose to press Amendment 39. We will see where those future consultations and discussions lead us. I made my point in relation to Amendment 43 and we have something on the record.
I am inclined not to push Amendment 45 today, although I urge the Minister to give us a better explanation of why proposed new subsection (4) is not sufficient to cover what the Government seek to achieve. Without that, I give no guarantee that I will not seek to bring that point back at Third Reading.
“Proceeds of sale of social housing
(1) In section 11 of the Local Government Act 2003 (duty to determine affordable borrowing limit), omit subsections (2)(b), (3) and (4).
(2) Any regulation made under section 11(2)(b) of the Local Government Act 2003 shall cease to have effect from 1 April 2012.”
Lord Best
My Lords, Amendments 41 and 51 are also about local authorities having greater freedom to organise their housing affairs without constant barriers being put in their way. These amendments concern the restrictions on local authorities that flow from taxing the sales of right-to-buy properties or any other sales of properties by housing authorities at 75 per cent of the money received by the local authority. Housing associations can sell properties, whether under the right to buy that they operate or on the open market where they have a vacant property. They can recycle 100 per cent of their receipts back into housing, to improving their housing stock and to building new homes.
The housing association of which I used to be chief executive, the Joseph Rowntree Housing Trust, had a programme of selling alternative vacant properties on our estates so that we could get a better mix of people of different incomes living in the same community. We could replace every home that we sold because we received 100 per cent of the funds from that sale to recycle into new homes elsewhere. However, local authorities have to pay 75 per cent of their proceeds back to the Treasury. Now that we are in the mode of reforming the housing revenue account, this seems to be the moment at which that restriction should be lifted and local authorities should be liberated to recycle the proceeds from sales.
I understand that the Treasury is very reluctant to forgo the receipts that it currently collects. That perhaps is understandable, because this is serious money that is coming into the Treasury. It has managed to scoop the pool here for many years, and tens of billions of pounds from right-to-buy sales have gone into the Exchequer. I understand that it does not wish to say goodbye to those arrangements. I also understand that in settling the debt in the new self-financing scheme for local authorities, account has been taken of the rental income that people will forgo once a property is sold. Nevertheless, saying goodbye to 75 per cent of the proceeds from right-to-buy sales, in stark contrast with the way housing associations are treated, seems to be an item on which reform at this time would be very significant.
Let me make it clear that it is not only right-to-buy sales that attract a 75 per cent tax—not a tax on the capital gain, but a tax on the sum received—as it is also imposed on the sale of bits of land and properties that are vacant and not subject to the right to buy. Where local authorities, like the Rowntree trust, would like to sell council houses to get a better mix of incomes across an estate, local authorities will not be able to recycle the proceeds from those sales, as they will have to pay 75 per cent to the Treasury. I think that the Treasury will argue again that it would like to see those receipts coming back to it since deficit reduction is top of the list of the Government’s priorities, but the Treasury is not going to receive anything from the sale of properties outside of the right to buy if local authorities know that it is such a bad deal to sell them in order to regenerate an area using the money they raise. No businesslike authority will proceed with these sales in order to pay money to the Treasury as a voluntary act. Local authorities simply will not do it. The Treasury is not going to forgo capital receipts if the 75 per cent tax on councils is lifted for those properties where the right to buy does not exist—in other words, where the council can make a sale voluntarily rather than being compelled to do so, as with the right to buy. I hope that the Government will be able, if deficit reduction in this spending round is so paramount that nothing can be done about the right-to-buy receipts, at least to offer to some extent a reassurance in relation to the sales of other properties that are not subject to the right to buy.
During the summer I have had discussions and correspondence with the Minister, and I hope that she will be able to tell us this afternoon that there may be some change of the Government’s mind about this very severe restriction on local authority activity, one where the ludicrous level of taxation makes it very difficult to run a business. I beg to move.
Lord Beecham
My Lords, the noble Lord referred to the 75 per cent tax levied on the proceeds of right-to-buy sales. It is interesting to note that at the moment there is a good deal of pressure on the Government to abandon the 50 per cent tax charged on those with substantial incomes and that, indeed, at least part of the coalition Government is interested in a mansion tax, which I suspect would be levied at substantially less than 75 per cent. In the context of housing, we should not be thinking in terms of taxation. The nation is paying a very heavy price in terms of housing need for the refusal of Government, initially in the 1980s, to allow any of the proceeds of the sale of council housing to be reinvested in housing and, it must be said, for the somewhat belated and modest change that was made to those rules by the previous Government. It does not seem to make any kind of economic sense.
The money raised by the right to buy would be ploughed back into housing provision. That would have two effects, the first of which would be that it would create assets on the balance sheet; it would not disappear into thin air. Secondly, it would give a much needed boost to the construction industry and therefore to the economy at a time when, as the Chancellor has belatedly conceded, things are not looking good in terms of the projected growth rate. Thirdly, it would lead to employment being taken up and thus a reduction in the cost of paying benefits. Most particularly, I suspect that the result would be that houses would be built rather more quickly than through the hoped-for gains to be made by the proposals in the national policy planning framework, which seem to assume that planning is the reason for the low number of houses being built, whereas of course the key issues are in fact finance and people’s capacity to buy.
Looking at it purely in housing terms, the noble Lord’s amendment makes a great deal of sense. I hope that the Government will rethink their position because it would make an immediate and much more significant contribution to dealing with the housing problem, as well as helping with economic growth without damaging the balance sheet. Indeed, in some respects it would strengthen the balance sheet with assets that are likely to appreciate.
The Earl of Listowel
My Lords, I hesitate to speak, having not taken part in previous work on this Bill, but my noble friend’s amendment and his words bring to mind some research that was brought to my attention some years ago into lone mothers living in isolation with their children, scattered around cities. They were often forced to live a long way from their communities and extended family because there was insufficient housing stock to enable them to be placed closer by. So if my noble friend’s amendment will help local authorities to supply enough housing to ensure that parents—more often than not mothers—bringing up children on their own had easy access to their communities and extended family, I certainly want to support it.
Lord Whitty
My Lords, I also strongly support this amendment. First, if we look retrospectively, had this provision applied from the start of right to buy, much of the pressure on social housing, and by extension on other housing sectors, would not have arisen. I am not saying that it would have completely resolved it, but it would have made a major contribution to stopping us being in the position that we are in.
The second point, which the noble Lord, Lord Best, emphasised, is that it would have enabled a lot of our worst housing stock to develop the manner of mixed tenure, creating a stable, reliable and interactive community instead of the isolation into which some of those estates have fallen.
The other point, also made by my noble friend Lord Beecham, is that I do not understand the economics of this. It would be an asset on the books of part of the public sector. Economically speaking, the deficit relates to the totality of public borrowing. In international opinion, raising money relates to the total deficit on public spending. The fact that it is in the Treasury’s accounts rather than the local authorities’ accounts economically makes no difference. It makes a bit of difference to the credibility of the Chancellor of the Exchequer from time to time, but economically this has always been nonsense and it is nonsense that we should now end. If we are to interpret localism and self-financing of the housing activities of local authorities effectively, surely this anomaly needs to be rectified. I hope, therefore, that at some stage the Government are going to recognise that.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, we have put our name to this amendment and support it thoroughly for the reasons that have been advanced by all noble Lords who have spoken in favour of it. I want to pick up the point my noble friend Lord Whitty made about how it all pans out in the Government’s accounts. It seems to me that the Government’s arguments on deficit reduction have not been entirely logical. They recognise the loss of rental income that arises with local authorities because the proceeds are snaffled by Government to the extent of 75 per cent. Therefore, debt that is imposed on local authorities is reduced by £862 million.
Correspondingly, the government debt is higher. If local authorities retained the proceeds, the government debt would be lower, presumably by £862 million, and local authority debt correspondingly higher. That seems to be a net nil. Local authorities would then have the proceeds either to pay down their debt or, as we would all urge and my noble friend Lord Beecham in particular urged, to reinvest in new stock. So I think the Government are entirely in the wrong place on this.
Lord Shutt of Greetland
My Lords, I thank the five noble Lords who have spoken and I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Best, and his work in housing over many years. The business of the amount gained when houses are sold and how the money is used is a subject that many of us have been debating for most of our years in public life.
What we have here is a total, and there are trade-offs in this element of the Bill. Although I understand the intention behind proposed new Clause 51, which is to end the surrender to central government of 75 per cent of receipts from the sale of right-to-buy and similar houses, and although I appreciate councils’ disappointment that we have not been able to end the policy, its continuation is necessary to help with the country’s huge fiscal deficit. The Government have ensured that the viability of the self-financing settlement is not affected by the decision. We are compensating local authorities for loss of rental income from future right-to-buy sales. To do this, we have included a forecast of right-to-buy sales in our valuation. The level of debt that authorities will take on has consequently been reduced in our latest estimate, as the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, indicated, by £862 million. In addition, all councils will still retain 25 per cent of receipts. They will also be able to retain 100 per cent of receipts from other sales to spend locally on affordable housing or regeneration. It is worth noting that receipts generated from right-to-buy sales have rapidly declined, sales being now about 5 per cent of what they were at their peak.
I hope the noble Lord will draw some comfort from the fact that we issued a consultation on 25 August, which set out proposed amendments to the regulations governing the use of receipts arising from the disposal of council housing assets. We have proposed to amend the regulations to make it clear that the requirement to surrender 75 per cent of receipts to central government shall apply only to receipts arising from right-to-buy sales or sales that are right-to-buy in all but name: that is, sales to existing council tenants. Sales at market value to other purchasers could then be retained, provided they were spent on affordable housing, regeneration projects or paying off housing debt. I trust that that is helpful and, bearing it in mind, that the amendment will not be pressed.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
The Minister said that the Government were reducing the level of debt that local authorities would otherwise take on because of this policy by some £860 million. Does it follow that central government debt is correspondingly £860 million higher than it would otherwise have been, and how does that help deficit reduction?
Lord Shutt of Greetland
I might have to think that one through, because I see the contra. On the other hand, there is only one central Government. The problem that we have all along is that some 170 local government entities are involved in housing. At least you know where you are with central government and that £862 million. The position can be entirely different in local government.
I would like to think that there will be a time when this policy is not in place. However, as I indicated, it is no longer the big deal that it was, given that so many former council houses have been sold and the amounts coming in are nothing like they were at their peak, when this Government were not in business.
Lord Best
My Lords, the housing revenue account is often compared to the Schleswig-Holstein question. Of the only three people who understood it, one had committed suicide, one was in a madhouse and one was in a monastery. Following the debate on the housing revenue account today has been a bit like that.
I am very grateful to noble Lords who have spoken on this. The noble Lord, Lord Whitty, made two fundamental points. First, if only we had kept the receipts during the past 30 years, we could have built a lot of houses and renovated a lot more. That money has evaporated. If we could get that changed henceforth, that would be thoroughly commendable. The noble Lord also made the point that if local authorities had been able to sell vacant properties on some of their estates on the open market, they could have introduced people on different incomes and created mixed-tenure estates, which would have been better socially for everyone concerned. However, there is absolutely no reason why local authorities would do that, because they would lose all the money that they received from the sale and could not then replace the home that they had sold. I am very grateful for that intervention and for those of the noble Lords, Lord Beecham and Lord McKenzie.
I shall certainly bank the very important point that in respect of sales outside the right to buy—the voluntary sales by local authorities—the intention is that in future the levy will be lifted. That could be quite a significant change in the future. The leader of the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham, Councillor Stephen Greenhalgh, is very much in favour of this. He explained to me that he has properties which, going back to the days of municipalisation, are scattered in some streets and are now in need of substantial repairs or improvements, although they are also very valuable. Rather than spend a great deal of money on some of those properties when they become vacant, it would be much better for Hammersmith & Fulham to sell them on the open market and not spend the money on the repairs. That money would be recycled, getting two or three flats elsewhere for the price received for those properties in Parsons Green or wherever they happened to be in Hammersmith & Fulham. Therefore, the Minister’s concession here may open some opportunities for councils to take in receipts to recycle in a very meaningful way, and I am very grateful for that concession.
In relation to the right to buy, we live to fight another day. For the moment, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
“Social housing rents
Landlords of social housing may levy a rent above the target rent for that dwelling to fund the capital cost of additional facilities requested by the tenant.”
Baroness Hollis of Heigham
My Lords, this is a relatively small amendment but I think that it may have wider repercussions. First, I declare an interest as chair of Broadland Housing Association. It is a medium-sized, traditional-build housing association—not a stock transfer—which seeks to meet housing need in Norfolk and north Suffolk. Every one of our homes is of decency standard and properly insulated, and we are effectively at target rent levels.
Last year, a dozen or so middle-aged and older tenants in a small close of bungalows in sunny Norfolk asked us to install solar panels at a cost of some £3,000 to £4,000 a property. We did so and I understand that the tenants’ fuel bills have fallen considerably. However, the cost of those solar panels has effectively fallen on other tenants, either in increased rents if they are below the target rents or in opportunities forgone—for example, in environmental works.
There is now a queue for work such as the installation of solar panels, which is understandable, but as a housing association we cannot afford it for all who wish it. We know that hundreds of thousands of tenants throughout the country are in fuel poverty. They may be elderly or disabled or they may be lone parents with large families, and they want and need to reduce their fuel bills. We, as a country, are investing in grants for loft and cavity wall insulation to cut fuel poverty and reduce energy consumption. Nearly half of all carbon emissions come from buildings. As a housing association we have done all that. However, many tenants now want us to go further with, for example, solar panels, but we cannot afford to help them as we would wish, and of course they cannot afford the capital cost of doing the work themselves under the feed-in tariff proposals, amounting to some £3,000 to £8,000 a household. The Green Deal is proposed for next year, but housing associations do not yet know how it will apply to them, if at all, and they doubt that it will.
We would like to suggest co-payment. If, say, the fuel saving from installation of a solar panel was £10 a week, the rent could rise by £5 a week above the target rent to contribute to the capital cost of the loan of that money. The tenant would keep as a bonus the other £5. Why can we not do that now? Very simply, we are at the target rent for properties, which takes no account whatever of energy efficiency. That is foolish. The Minister in her letter in August—for which I thank her—explained that she could not support the amendment. She said, first, that it would lead to increased rents, which was unacceptable, and, secondly, that this could lead to unacceptable rises in housing benefit. I challenge both those points.
The concept of the target rent that the Minister said cannot be exceeded has of course been exceeded by Government with the introduction of 80 per cent market; that is, affordable rents. In future, with two identical houses, side by side and currently up for re-letting, one will go for a rent of £90 as it is social housing, the other will go for a rent of £120 because it is at the new 80 per cent of market value. That increase is simply because we have relabelled the description of tenure over the lintel of that house.
Why does it make sense to have increased rent properties because we have renamed the tenure, adding nothing of value at all to the property, but not be able to increase the rents when we have markedly improved the property by reducing fuel costs? Why have we got to choose either a rent of £90 that equals social housing or one of £120 that equals 80 per cent of market value intermediate rents when it would make sense to have a rent of £95 because of investment in energy efficiency? Raising rents above the target, despite the Minister’s letter, involves no new principles because government is doing that already.
But, says the Minister in her letter of August, it might come out of housing benefit. The Minister says that such increases are not affordable and that the taxpayer would not obtain value for money from this increased public expenditure. There are two points on that. First, her new 80 per cent of market rents will largely be financed by housing benefit. Virtually every tenant going to our housing association is on HB. Whatever the tenure label—social housing or intermediate rent—it will largely be met by HB if our housing association is anything to go by. Indeed, it is calculated that to fund Mr Pickles’s building programme through 80 per cent market rents at the DCLG will add £2 billion to the housing benefit bill of the DWP. The DWP is paying for the building programme of the DCLG, which reflects no added value and cannot be used to fund improved facilities, as we would all wish.
The Minister then went on to say that such investment may not represent value for money for the taxpayer, at a time when the same Government are urging energy companies and individuals to take up government grants to increase loft and cavity wall insulation, replace boilers or install wind turbines—which are, as is solar power, renewable. If a part of Government is urging all of us because it thinks it prudent to invest in energy reduction, why does the DCLG oppose it? Indeed, why is the DCLG not positively encouraging us to do what we wish and get housing associations to work with tenants to consider energy renewables such as solar panels? As I say, that will reduce fuel poverty and carbon emissions—both goals we all want. Therefore, I think that the Minister’s letter in August, in reply to the original tabling of this amendment in Committee, is entirely invalid.
I would like to make a proposal to the Government. If increased HB would be the obstacle, because the increased rent would be met by housing benefit—
Earl Ferrers
The noble Baroness is making a very interesting speech, but she will talk in acronyms. She talks about HBs, DCLGs and so on, and some of the more modest of us are not quite certain what she is talking about.
Baroness Hollis of Heigham
I apologise to the noble Earl. As I am so anxious to persuade him to agree with me, I will happily take extra time in spelling out the acronyms.
If indeed housing benefit is the issue—because an increase in rent of £5 would be covered by housing benefit—I put it to the Government that any increase in rent above the target rent for such purposes should not be covered by housing benefit, quite simply. That way the housing benefit bill to the Government would be protected and the tenant could choose whether to proceed with solar panels by way of co-payment. If the tenant did so choose, the tenant would enjoy reduced fuel bills and contribute to lower energy consumption in this country. The choice would be with the tenant, there would be no additional cost to the Government, but the reduction in conventional energy and the substitution of green renewable energy would be a gain to us all. I beg to move.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, the amendment proposed by my noble friend Lady Hollis is most interesting and has considerable merit. She has considerable experience in the local government and social housing sectors. Where tenants want to make major improvements or improve other amenities, I can see the case for this being financed by an increase in the rent paid on the property. My noble friend makes compelling points in particular regarding fuel poverty and green energy and also dealing with the issue of housing benefit. If the Government are not able to accept the amendment, will the noble Lord at least agree to take it away and reflect on it? It could be explored further and perhaps introduced at another time following discussion with relevant departments.
Lord Shutt of Greetland
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness and the noble Lord for their contributions. It is more complicated than I thought. The amendment is clearly about additional facilities requested by the tenant, yet the points made by the noble Baroness have been about solar panels and, basically, energy. Clearly the amendment is about any form of enhancement required by a tenant. All I would say on the detail is that my noble friend Lady Hanham has shown me a letter that she wrote to the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, on 9 August offering to discuss this matter. She may not have got the letter or something may have gone wrong, but this offer has not yet been taken up. My noble friend Lady Hanham would be happy to discuss the matter and that could well be a helpful way forward. I cannot give a commitment on where that would lead, but I think it would be a good thing if that offer were taken up.
I cannot accept the amendment because it would allow landlords complete freedom to charge rents above the target rent for particular properties in order to fund the cost of additional facilities. This would lead to an unacceptable rise in the housing benefit bill. There are two types of landlord to whom the amendment could apply: local authority landlords and housing associations. Both sectors are able to exercise some flexibility over rent setting but are subject to important constraints. In the case of local authority landlords, there is the “limit rent”, which is the maximum that the Department for Work and Pensions is willing to pay in housing benefit. This cap is vital to control the welfare bill. For housing associations, a direction on rent is set each year by the regulator in order to achieve a degree of consistency in rent levels across the sector and to protect the housing benefit bill. Noble Lords may not be aware of this, but for two-thirds of all tenants in council and housing association properties, the rent comes from housing benefit. So it clearly would be significant.
The noble Baroness’s amendment would remove an important control by Government over rents, which they will largely pay for. While this could pay for some improvements, it would result in uncontrollable increases in the housing benefit bill that we can ill afford. Furthermore, there would be no assurance that the taxpayer was obtaining value for money from the additional public expenditure. For this reason, I must reject the amendment. Councils and housing associations can charge affordable rents of up to 80 per cent of market rents as part of an agreement with the Homes and Communities Agency to build new homes. The extra rent must be used entirely to fund the new homes, which will produce a housing benefit saving as they are still at rents below those charged in the market.
I hope that, in the circumstances, the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, will take up the offer from my noble friend Lady Hanham and that on this occasion she will not press her amendment.
Baroness Hollis of Heigham
My Lords, I regret that the noble Lord, Lord Shutt, did not actually listen to the arguments I sought to make. He has repeated the two points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, in her helpful letter in August, which I sought to rebut in my speech and on which the noble Lord, Lord Shutt, has not commented. It was as if the speech had not been made and that the arguments of August were still the only arguments in town.
I remind the noble Lord that I was not arguing for complete freedom for landlords, as he suggested. It was made very clear that this would be at the initiation of the tenant. The reason I used the solar panels example was because it had such obvious spill-over benefits for the tenant, fuel poverty, energy consumption, renewables and the reduction of carbon emissions, so we would all gain. I used the example, too, because it is consistent with the drive by this Government in the Department of Energy for the further extension of insulation and the use of renewables. So it is entirely consistent with government policy, though in a different department, and it would be initiated by the tenant and would therefore not give complete freedom to the landlord.
Secondly, the noble Lord argued, as was argued by the Minister’s letter, that it would lead to an unacceptable rise in housing benefit. I hoped that I had made it clear that if the Minister so wished it could all be outside and above the rent covered by housing benefit. I am well aware of the role of housing benefit—I made that point explicitly—but the Minister has not replied to that offer as a way forward that would address the issue, which I understand, of housing benefit, but would equally allow us to respond to a perfectly proper and appropriate request by tenants to be able to reduce their fuel bills at no cost to the Government. That is what I sought. The noble Lord, Lord Shutt, has not answered that point at all.
Given that there is clearly no meeting of minds, because people are not listening to each other’s arguments, I wish to take up the suggestion made by the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, for a further discussion about this matter. I assure her that surveyors across the country are very interested in trying to proceed with such policies as a way of producing the nearest that we can get to things such as passive housing, and so on, which we need to see in this country. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
“( ) In section 36 of the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 (information in relation to social housing) in subsection (1) after paragraph (c) insert—
“(d) engaging with the Housing Ombudsman.””
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
In moving Amendment 52A, I shall speak in favour of amendments in the same group, particularly Amendment 68, standing in the name of my noble friend Lord Whitty and myself, and of similar principles as set out in Amendment 69, which appears in my name and in the names of my noble friend Lord Kennedy and the noble Lord, Lord Best.
Clause 167 introduces what is called a “democratic filter” as regards the housing ombudsman. What it means is that all complaints that currently go to the housing ombudsman would instead have to be taken to an MP, a councillor, or a tenant panel member for a hearing. Not only that, but a tenant would not be able to take their case to the ombudsman unless agreed to by one of these people, giving them a veto over these citizens’ access to the housing ombudsman.
I would like to go through seven reasons for resisting this clause. The first is the role of MPs untrained in this area and the conflicts of interest that might be involved, which I think are fairly obvious. It would be a brave MP or councillor who rejected a complaint maybe three weeks before an election. The councillor could, of course, be the provider of housing, which would be a serious conflict of interest. What if that MP or councillor had already heard of the complaint in their surgery in their role of representative? How could they then adjudicate de novo on a complaint? If the councillor happened to know the local housing official, it would hardly be seen as an independent hearing of the complaint.
Furthermore, our MPs and councillors, wonderful though they are, are not trained in alternative dispute resolution or complaints handling, or in the accurate recording of such findings and giving the reasons thereof; nor indeed are most of them well-versed in some basic rules of natural justice and fairness and the handling of evidence. They will not be accustomed to awarding redress and they will not have the authority to enforce their awards.
There could also be a threat to a tenant’s privacy if they had to reveal some personal circumstances to an elected officer who was not under a code of conduct to respect confidentiality. There could be a lottery between the findings of different councillors and MPs. At present the housing ombudsman deals with about 5,000 cases per year, with a high measure of consistency to add to the centrality of fairness. It could, of course, also be a very heavy burden on an MP and councillor. I have to confess that I have been neither, but I do wonder whether they are ready for this extra little task.
It would also make MPs adjudicators. They would therefore lose their role as champions on behalf of their constituents, quite unable to advise them on how to formulate a complaint if they themselves were the people to hear the complaint. Furthermore, having rejected the complaint, how could they then promote it to the housing ombudsman?
So the first of the seven problems is about the role of the councillor and MP. Secondly, the British and Irish Ombudsman Association strongly opposes the proposed filter in the Bill. The association believes:
“Public service ombudsmen form an integral part of the administrative justice system and it is essential that citizens’ access to justice should be unfettered. Any restriction on access is counter to the principles upon which the ombudsman institution is founded”.
Indeed, one of the principal conditions for being an ombudsman is that citizens should have direct access. The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman regards their MP filter as restricting access to their service.
Thirdly, let me quote from others. The Law Commission says that this clause as it stands could hinder investigations and it calls for the filter in this clause to be scrapped. The commission prefers a dual system whereby complainants could either go through a local representative or direct to the housing ombudsman, which is what these amendments set out.
The National Housing Federation believes that MPs and councillors should only be involved at the discretion of the complainant, not at the insistence of the Government. The federation strongly opposes the proposal in the Bill to deny access to the ombudsman without the MP or councillor’s permission. It also notes that similar requirements have been abolished elsewhere, such as for the Local Government Ombudsman.
Coming from Kentish Town, perhaps your Lordships will excuse me if I also refer to the Camden Association of Street Properties and Kentish Town District Management Committee, which have said that they are angry at the proposed block on tenants’ rights to access the ombudsman, which in their view has worked so well.
Lord Tope
Whereas the noble Baroness began by saying that she had been neither an MP nor a councillor, I begin by saying that I have been both. I was an MP for a rather short tenure a very long time ago but have been a councillor for the past 37 years, representing a ward with a substantial amount of social housing. Therefore, I have real and practical experience of some of the issues that have been spoken of. The noble Baroness will know well that I have considerable sympathy with much of what she has said. Indeed, my noble friend Lord Shipley and I have our names to Amendments 70 and 73 in this group. As I say, I have great sympathy with what the noble Baroness has said. My preference would certainly be to have unfettered direct access to the Housing Ombudsman. I feel strongly that tenants should have the right of direct access to the Housing Ombudsman when necessary, and I wish to spend a few moments considering when that is necessary.
It is for the Minister, and certainly not for me, to explain the Government’s reasons for the proposals in the Bill and for wanting to tackle the matter in this way. However, we have to recognise that, certainly in the 37 years that I have been a councillor, the involvement of local authorities, and therefore of councillors, in housing management issues has decreased. We have had the wholesale stock transfer and the creation of ALMOs. Generally, the move has been away from involvement. It is fair to say that some councillors—I cannot say that this has been my experience—have much less engagement in the day-to-day business of housing management, and therefore of knowing and understanding the issues that their constituents, as tenants, experience. If the Government wish to bring politicians, particularly councillors, closer to these issues—I do not know what the relevant phrase is—that is an objective we all share. We might have varying degrees of cynicism about how effective that will be, but it is an objective that we all share. I certainly share the Government’s objective in that regard.
If the Government’s objective is also to ensure that, whenever possible, complaints and issues are resolved locally, I am sure that we all share that objective too. That is clearly desirable for all sorts of reasons. It is usually quicker, more effective and engages people. I would expect that, in most instances when a tenant has a complaint of this sort, normally the first port of call would be a councillor or MP, partly because they are better known—or at least their existence is better known—than the Housing Ombudsman and they are more accessible and accountable. Therefore, I would normally expect an issue to be raised first with a councillor or Member of Parliament. I would expect that, in pretty well every case, that representative would try to get the matter resolved locally as that is what councillors and MPs do. Instead of immediately going off to the ombudsman, they go to the relevant housing management authority to try to resolve the issue and then tell their constituent what a wonderful job they have done in resolving the problem. That is what happens in reality. When they are successful, that is good, right and proper.
The difficulty that I have with the Government’s proposal is that, while I am sure that we all share those objectives, one of the—I hope unintended—consequences is that it will give councillors, Members of Parliament and tenants panels a right of veto. I have to say that that is wrong. I do not think that it is our job as councillors, Members of Parliament and so on to be the final adjudicator of the rightness or wrongness of the complaint. I would expect that in practice most Members of Parliament and most councillors would anyway refer something to the ombudsman—whether the Local Government Ombudsman or Housing Ombudsman. That was always my practice whether I thought the complaint was wholly justified or even unjustified. I felt that the complainant had the right to independent arbitration and to go to an ombudsman, and referred it that way.
I have had the opportunity to discuss this at some length with the Housing Minister, who says that as an MP that was what he always did. The reality, which I know from personal experience, is that some elected representatives, for whatever reason—and sometimes for no good reason other than personal idiosyncrasy—refuse to do that. That is wrong. I do not think that a Member of Parliament or a councillor should have the right to deny the tenant access to the ombudsman to have the complaint, whether justified or not in our view, properly investigated and independently decided upon.
A little later this afternoon we will get to Amendment 73A and those with it. Amendment 73A is a compromise to try to help the Government, which is always our objective on these Benches. Amendment 73A says that, if the designated person will not refer the complaint—we should have included the words, “or fails to do so within 30 days”, or some other given period—the tenant has the right to go direct to the ombudsman. That amendment has been decoupled from this group for reasons that I understand, but I hope that when the Minister replies she can give us clear and strong words of comfort that it is not the Government’s intention to give the right of veto to us councillors to decide whether or not a complaint is worth forwarding. We need to ensure that the tenant may do so when necessary—I come back to those important words—if a designated person who is willing to forward the complaint cannot be found. That is a pragmatic and sensible compromise to find a way through the entirely honourable and proper intentions of the Government, which we would probably all support, and the undesirable effects of the way in which they are trying to do it. I hope that the Minister can give us clear comfort on that. If she is able to do so, we will judge what to do with Amendment 73A when the time comes.
Baroness Hollis of Heigham
My Lords, like the Minister I, too, have been a housing chair in a local authority, for some 11 years. I am also chair of a housing association—an interest that I have declared—and regularly sit at stage 4 of precisely these complaints panels that are the subject of discussion. I am sure that the Minister knows but I wonder whether your Lordships realise how thorough the complaints procedure is, and rightly so, within housing associations and local authorities, particularly encouraged by the TCA of the Homes and Community Agency.
At stage 1, the tenant’s complaint—often, it is a complaint against the behaviour of a neighbour of some sort—is investigated by the local senior housing manager. If that is not resolved to the satisfaction of the tenant, stage 2 means that it will go to the housing manager at the top of the organisation, who will then seek to get all the information, build the file and see whether some resolution can be arrived at. If that is not satisfactory, there is a stage 3 where the complaint goes to the chief legal officer, who is usually the deputy chief executive of the housing association, who goes through the file, takes the evidence, makes further notes and attempts again a further resolution of the difficulty. If that is not enough—by this stage, most complaints have been reasonably addressed—the matter goes to stage 4, which involves the panel, chaired by someone like me, alongside the tenant board representatives of the housing association and the senior staff. Five or six of us spend perhaps a couple of hours going through a thick file and seeking as best we can to hear and resolve the tenant's complaints and concerns.
Lord Newton of Braintree
My Lords, I ought to declare a string of interests. I am an ex-MP; my wife is a district councillor; I was chairman of the Administrative Justice and Tribunals Council, which had a close relationship with the British and Irish Ombudsman Association; and I know Mike Biles, the Housing Ombudsman, quite well. I should also apologise to the noble Baroness for not having added my name to her amendment, as she encouraged me to. I would happily have done so, and should have done.
I will make clear to my noble friend that I agreed with every word that she said, and every word that the noble Lord, Lord Tope, said. The starting point is that if this is administrative justice—and most people would say that it is—what right have the Government to say that somebody is to intervene in somebody else's right to seek administrative justice? It could not conceivably be argued that somebody should need an MP’s or a councillor’s permission before going to a tribunal, a court or anything comparable in the administrative justice field. Why should we have it here? All this comes at a time when the Parliamentary Ombudsman has a consultation document out, which I know she feels quite strongly about, for the removal of the MP filter in respect of the ombudsman. This was supported by unduly sensitive MPs 50 years ago when the ombudsman—a foreign creation—was introduced. However, as far as anybody can judge, now it is not supported by most MPs, who also think it should go.
Why should people be subject to the vagaries of what their councillor, tenant panel or even—dare I say it?—MP thinks about whether it is a case for the ombudsman? That is a matter for the ombudsman to judge. If there are procedures that the tenant should go through beforehand, such as those described by the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, the ombudsman can make the point: “We are not looking at this until you have had it looked at along the other lines”. It would be perfectly reasonable for him to do that, but there is no serious case for what the Government are proposing in the Bill. I very much doubt whether it was part of the coalition agreement or has been seriously endorsed by the Prime Minister or the Deputy Prime Minister, because it is just not the kind of proposal they would support. Individuals ought to have this right, and we in this House ought to be defending it.
I have one last question to which I would like an answer. We have lots of ombudsmen in this country. We have the Parliamentary Ombudsman with an MP filter; we have the Health Service Ombudsman, who is also the Parliamentary Ombudsman, in practice, with no MP filter; we have the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman, with no filter at all, for Scots; we have the Public Services Ombudsman for Wales with no filter at all in respect of matters that he or she can consider so, in a way, this is yet another form of discrimination against the English, and I am fed up with it. It is wrong in principle, it is daft and the Minister should take it away and get rid of it.
Lord Beecham
My Lords, I welcome the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Newton, not least because he is only the second Conservative Back-Bencher to speak in seven hours of debate on Report. I dare say we will hear a great deal more from him and, I hope, others as we go forward.
I entirely endorse the remarks that have been made so far by noble Lords, and I share the experience of the noble Lord, Lord Tope, of serving as a local councillor. It is frequently a local councillor’s task to take up tenants’ complaints, as one does, with the relevant housing department or ALMO—many authorities have now transferred their stock—to help people through the council’s complaints procedure and to help them move complaints to the ombudsman. Many of us have done that. I find it rather patronising of those who suggest that it is somehow necessary to reconnect councillors with social housing. Most of us who represent areas with social housing regard that as part of our daily, weekly and monthly routine.
However, there are some additional issues to which I would like to refer briefly. First, as I read the Bill, there need be no nexus between the individual making a complaint and the councillor for the area in which he lives, because the Bill speaks of a member of the housing authority. It could be from one end of Newcastle to the other in my own case. There is no necessary connection between the tenant and the member he approaches, and that is hardly sensible, even if one follows the line of the Government’s thinking on this matter.
Secondly, I presume that under the adjudication by the ombudsman there may be the possibility of an award of compensation. That is not necessarily binding on an authority, but it is pretty indicative and most authorities, though I regret to say not all, comply with those recommendations and make a payment when one is indicated. On the face of it, it would seem that the individual member adjudicating would also have that responsibility. It seems distinctly worrying that there should be implicit pressure on a member not only to make a finding but also, perhaps, to award compensation. That does not seem to be a healthy relationship between an elected councillor or, for that matter, a Member of Parliament, and a constituent.
The third factor that we may have to bear in mind is that there are pending changes in the legal aid and advice system that will effectively strip people of their right to legal aid and advice. In this housing area, whether it be with local authorities, housing associations or other landlords, there is frequently a need for legal advice and support, and one fears that effectively removing that source will be unhelpful to tenants. Frankly, imposing the responsibility on elected members, whether councillors or MPs, is by no means a substitute for such proper advice.
All these factors tend to the same direction, namely that the amendment should be accepted by the Government. There is no huge political issue here. As we have heard, there is no demand for this outside, from tenants, their representatives or anybody else. There is no logical basis for the recommendations and I hope that the Minister will indicate that she will think again about the desirability of this additional superstructure on a system which is working perfectly well.
Lord Whitty
My Lords, my name is on Amendment 68, which provides for a dual system. I do not think anyone is arguing that the tenants or leaseholders should not have the right to call in their councillor, MP or tenant panel. The issue, as has been said, is whether they should also have—from the start, not just when they have already been to their councillor—the ability to go direct to the ombudsman.
I have two points on this. First, it is not only a contradiction to principles of administrative law, it is also a direct contradiction to most consumer practice in the rest of the economy. As the noble Lord, Lord Newton, said, there are numerous ombudsmen. Some were set up by Parliament, such as the financial services and energy ombudsmen, and some are industry-based, dealing with anything from double glazing to property. In none of those cases is there a filter after the initial filter of having to raise the complaint with the provider in the first place, as my noble friend Lady Hollis has said. After that point, there is not a single example where a third party, of whatever description, is required to intervene. That may be discrimination against the English, but it is certainly discrimination against tenants and leaseholders as compared with any other consumer.
Secondly—this ought to be an obvious point, but it has not yet been spelled out in this crude way—there are a lot of reasons why individual tenants and leaseholders may not want to go to their local councillor. They may have fallen out with them, or had a terrible decision from them, or they may be their political opponent. There are also all sorts of reasons why they may not wish to raise the issue through the tenant panel, although I believe that is a good innovation. They may know people on the panel whom they disagree with or they may not approve of earlier decisions made by the panel. It surely should not be for Parliament to say to them that, despite all their reservations and previous experience, they must go through one of these three channels. All three channels are important and should be there, and if they need to be put on the face of the legislation let us do so. But we must not deny the ordinary social housing tenant or leaseholder within social housing provision the right to go direct to the ombudsman. I plead with the Government to drop this absurdity.
Baroness Eaton
My Lords, I was delighted that the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, referred more positively to the role of councillors than has been the case elsewhere, except for the noble Lord, Lord Tope. I am very supportive of stock transfer, but I do feel that with these arrangements there has sometimes been a reduction in the ability of councillors to be involved in housing activities in their area.
As we all know, in our role as councillors—and I declare that I am one—we are expected to be community leaders. One of the most important parts of the well-being of a community is how its housing operates and functions on behalf of tenants—the social housing aspect. I firmly believe that it is important that elected members have the opportunity to work closely with tenants. As the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, said, those of us who are active in that area already do not really understand why some people do not agree. It has become less obvious nowadays to tenants of housing associations and ALMOs that councillors really are their first port of call. I very much support the role of the councillors in this activity.
Lord Best
My Lords, I, too, support the role of councillors and their engagement in these processes, but I do not think that this is an either/or. My name is against Amendments 69, 71 and 72. If people do not wish to go to the councillor for any reason, surely they should have the opportunity to go directly to the ombudsman service. My interest is that I have been on the receiving end of the ombudsman’s judgment, complaints having been made about organisations that I have chaired and run, and I think the ombudsman service is great. It resolves complaints that have been running sometimes for ages; the filing cabinet is full of going backwards and forwards, the ombudsman sorts it out, the decision is final. It is a professional service. The British and Irish Ombudsman Association thinks that an essential ingredient in any ombudsman service is that the consumer has a right of direct access to that service.
I chair the Council of the Property Ombudsman, which looks after the private sector, separate from the arrangements for the Housing Ombudsman in the social housing sector. In the private sector, of course, tenants can go direct to the ombudsman; they do not have to go to a council, an MP or a tenant panel. That system works extremely well. I have watched the process from both sides of the fence. Ombudsman services really work and direct access to them seems an important ingredient.
We have one example. The noble Lord, Lord Whitty, said he did not think that there were any examples of there being a bureaucratic filter of this kind, but I think the Parliamentary Ombudsman is the last outpost of this approach. It applied to the Local Government Ombudsman but was scrapped as it was found to be unworkable and unnecessary, but with the Parliamentary Ombudsman, going through your MP remains. However, Ann Abraham, the Parliamentary Ombudsman, says:
“The MP filter delays the resolution of complaints by the ombudsman and even deters some people from taking their complaints to the ombudsman at all”.
I think it likely, as a result of the consultation now going on, that the filter will be dropped in that last case of the Parliamentary Ombudsman. So let us by all means engage councillors and encourage people to go to their councillor—sometimes that can be the best kind of mediation and local way of organising things—but let us allow people, if they wish, to go direct to the ombudsman service. It is there as a professional body and it sorts things out.
Lord True
My Lords, I also declare an interest as a local councillor. I must say to the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, that my aged aunt, who has a great fear of spiders, says, “In September and October never talk about a spider, otherwise you will talk one up”, and one invariably comes up. I heard what he said about the contributions of Members on this side to these debates. When he makes such comments, I have to point out that we made very little progress with groups yesterday and there may be some connection—not with the Conservatives but with other Members in the Chamber.
I wish to follow very strongly what my noble friends Lady Eaton and Lord Tope said. I have visited a number of authorities and it is true, sadly, that in many authorities where there has been large-scale voluntary transfer, there is a growing disjunction between the council side and RSLs. As I see it, aspects of this proposal from the Government may be designed to break that down and to reinforce the role of a councillor. In my authority we have introduced a tenants’ champion system in order to encourage people to use the local resource of the council as a first resource for complaint and redress against social landlords. That is desirable. Surely in the spirit of this Bill things should be settled as locally as they can be. There are all forms of bureaucracy and the ombudsman system in itself is potentially that. I agree that tenants may not need a filter, but in some circumstances they may need a local champion.
I am not quite so absolutist about these proposals as some others who have spoken. However, I hope that my noble friend will listen to the debate, particularly to the points made by my noble friend Lord Tope, and see whether some middle ground can be found that will enable tenants to have this recourse, but perhaps in the normal course of events to encourage people to seek to settle matters locally.
Lord Greaves
My Lords, this is the first time that I have spoken on Report so I should declare a few interests. I am an elected member of a district council in Lancashire, a vice-president of the LGA, a vice-president of the Open Spaces Society and a member of the access, conservation and environment group of the British Mountaineering Council. Those are the interests I can think of that might come up during Report. If I have any others, I shall declare them later.
I apologise for having to nip out of the Chamber for the latter part of the speech by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, and the beginning of the speech by my noble friend Lord Tope. I can assure everyone that I probably agree with every word that they said, even when I was not here, on the basis of what they have said otherwise. We had a glowing account from the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, about how wonderful the complaints and resolution system is in her housing association.
Baroness Hollis of Heigham
My Lords, I was not trying to say that. I was trying to say that, having gone through such an exhaustive system, I could not see what added value would come by having a fifth tier, an MP or a councillor, as opposed to going direct to the ombudsman.
Lord Greaves
I entirely accept that. However, in my experience, not all housing associations are the same and some do this better than others, which is inevitable with any type of organisation. In a sense, if there are housing associations or social landlords that do not do it quite as well as the organisation in which the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, is involved, that is an even more important reason why tenants should be able to go to the housing ombudsman as easily and quickly as possible.
Like my noble friend, we on these Benches would have preferred that this proposal from the Government was not in this Bill. It seems to go back to a local government ombudsman system that, as noble Lords have said, used to exist in local government but that, frankly, was not necessary and in some cases was harmful. There is no doubt whatever that on some occasions councillors used to find reasons not to pass complaints on or tried to persuade people not to pursue them. I always took the view that unless it was clearly vexatious I would automatically pass it on, even on one occasion when it concerned a complaint against the borough council about a housing matter in which I had been closely involved. I was chairman of the housing committee and I still said, “I will pass it on because it is right and proper that it gets dealt with”.
At Lancashire County Council, on one occasion I made a complaint against the education authority. Shortly after, I went to a reception of important people at county hall in Preston. As soon as I walked in the room, the then education officer came bounding across the room and at the top of his voice tore a strip off me for daring to question the reputation and organisation of that education authority. He then marched back to the other side of the room. I was much younger and a bit more timid than I am now but I still marched after him and, in an equally loud voice, tore a strip off him and told him that he was undermining democracy. In a sense, I should not have had to be there as part of that system. The people involved should have been able to go direct.
Along with other noble Lords, I think, around the Chamber, we have had quite a few discussions with members of the Government, particularly with Grant Shapps, who I believe is in charge of the housing parts of this Bill. We came to the view that we might win the argument but would not win the process of this legislation of removing these parts of the Bill or of putting in an amendment along the lines of that proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, which I would otherwise strongly support.
To help the Government, in these discussions we are looking for some compromise that at the very least provides a backstop so that, if any of these designated persons are not helpful and try to resist or are just incompetent in passing on a complaint, the tenant can nevertheless go direct to the housing ombudsman. It is a slightly messy process and it is not as good as now, but it can work and at the very least would maintain their right to go direct to make the complaint, even if someone else tries to persuade them otherwise or to block it.
Lord Whitty
My Lords, does not the noble Lord accept that if a tenant has reservations about their circumstances, which may be very personal, it is not just a question of whether if they go to them they may be rebuffed, but that they would be seriously inhibited about going to their councillor or their tenants’ panel, or possibly even their MP, in the first place? We should take that into account.
Lord Greaves
Yes, I accept that and I think the noble Lord is quite right. All I would say is that I would expect that most Members of Parliament are used to dealing with that kind of sensitive information, and if they are not, they are not fit to be Members of Parliament. I think also that there are councillors who are prepared to help and are experienced in dealing with that kind of information. I do not entirely take the view of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, that they have to be skilled in the processes of assessment, conciliation and so on. All they have really got to do is say, “You have a reasonable case. I will sign this and you can send it on”.
The objections to going to a councillor can be overstated. As the noble Lord said, the legislation states that you can go to any member of the housing authority, so you will have a choice of 40, 50 or 60 people to approach. I would have thought someone could be found who would pass it on, and not necessarily knowing all the details. Sometimes people come to me as a councillor and say, “I want to tell you all about this”. I say, “Look, I am not an expert in this. It seems to be very personal and I really do not want to know. What I will do is put you in touch with the people who can help you and with the authorities who might be able to sort it out”. So I think that this can be overstated.
Nevertheless, we are absolutely clear that we would like to support an amendment along the lines of that tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Whitty. We have a compromise amendment in an attempt to help the Government to resolve this in a way that is not as damaging as perhaps it otherwise would be, and perhaps not very damaging at all. However, we would really like an assurance from my noble friend the Minister that between now and Third Reading she will think seriously about this so that it can be considered again at that stage, either through a government amendment along the lines of our amendment or perhaps something a bit better. That is the assurance we are looking for and I hope that she will be able to give it. I should say that if we get it, I will not move my amendments when we get to them later on.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, I am pleased to support my noble friend Lady Hayter of Kentish Town in the amendment she has moved in respect of the Housing Ombudsman. I have known my noble friend for many years and we have worked together on numerous matters. As usual, she has hit the nail on the head, identified the problem and provided us with a sensible and reasoned solution which I think should command widespread support across the House. The Housing Ombudsman provides a free, independent and impartial service to the tenants of social housing providers. It is a respected organisation which provides resolutions for problems as well as valuable advice and guidance to the providers of social housing on how to get it right by developing effective complaints procedures.
As noble Lords are aware, tenants currently have the right to complain to and deal directly with the Housing Ombudsman where a complaint has not been resolved to their satisfaction. The Government propose to take away a tenant’s right to make a direct complaint to the Housing Ombudsman. That is just wrong. It serves no purpose other than making matters more complicated for everyone concerned, and especially for tenants, who will feel that they have already suffered an injustice and are seeking independent redress for their complaint. If this amendment is not accepted, as we have heard today, tenants will in future have to go through their local Member of Parliament, a local councillor or a tenants’ panel. Again, that is wrong. If the tenant wants their MP or local councillor to be fully involved and to make the complaint or support them, that is absolutely fine. I would welcome that. But to take away an individual’s choice in this matter is bizarre in the extreme. Can the Minister tell the House why the Government think that this is the right approach? Also, what happens if the local MP or councillor refuses to take the matter to the Housing Ombudsman? Where can the tenant go then?
There is also a practicality issue in that, in more cases than not, the complaints the Housing Ombudsman deals with are complex issues, often evolving over many months or years. Local MPs or councillors, who are working hard for their constituents, may not have the capacity in their offices or the town hall to deal with these complex matters as effectively as the ombudsman could. No criticism of anyone is intended—it is just an observation. In conclusion, I congratulate my noble friend on bringing this matter forward and other noble Lords who have spoken in support of this amendment, and I ask the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, to think again and accept my noble friend’s proposal.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, it has been a very interesting and helpful debate, mostly coming from people who understand the process in place at the moment. There has been a lot of talk about arbitration. However, this is not about arbitration; it is about resolution. It is about somebody having a problem and needing it resolved. They need somebody to write a letter to the housing chairman. They need somebody to write a letter because they have been through the process and they have not got a reasonable answer. As former councillors, we have all done precisely this and made sure that there is some means of resolving a problem for tenants. To say that councillors, MPs, and now tenants cannot do this seems absurd.
One of the reasons for suggesting that people take their complaints through one of those filters—if that is what they are—is, as my noble friend Lord Tope said, that there is a strong belief that removing housing by and large from the direct control and interest of councils and taking it to ALMOs and housing associations means that councillors and MPs become disconnected from the problems. Councillors in particular ought to know what is going on in the housing stock in their borough. I am sure the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, knows exactly what she is doing and has a very good complaints procedure. I am not sure that is true of every ALMO or even of the way council properties are run. So we want to reconnect councillors and MPs with what is going wrong within their area. Can we dump the suggestion of arbitration? Nobody is asking them to arbitrate. We are asking them to resolve a problem. If they cannot resolve the problem, they would be required to pass the matter on to the Local Government Ombudsman with the agreement of the complainant.
I do not want there to be any misunderstanding. We recognise that the Housing Ombudsman does an extremely good job. There is no doubt about that. It is responsive and it knows what it is doing. This is not about trying to exclude the ombudsman from the system. But the Housing Ombudsman has an enormous case load which went up by 72 per cent between 2007-08 and 2009-10. Maybe that reflects the fact that there are more complaints coming forward about housing, which could be dealt with locally if there was the opportunity to do so. An additional 11 per cent of complaints have been made in the past year.
We want to ensure that the ombudsman is not the first port of call. We do not want the immediate response to be, “Oh, I’m going off to the ombudsman”. There should be a step before that; namely, going to one’s tenants panel, a councillor or an MP and seeing whether the matter can first be resolved through them.
A dual-track model currently applies to complaints to the Local Government Ombudsman. In practice, although the ombudsman does not collect detailed statistics, complaints are almost always submitted directly to the ombudsman and not via local councillors. Therefore, we are not convinced that this model will help local complaint resolution.
I have listened carefully to what has been said and I know that these matters have been raised over a number of weeks. I understand what has been said about discussions passing a last barrier point between the council or tenants panel to the ombudsman. I am not clear that dual track increases the number of ways of resolving complaints, but I have heard what has been said. Bearing in mind what was said by the noble Lords, Lord Greaves and Lord Tope, and my noble friends Lord True and Lady Eaton, who all see the advantage of an initial stage, I am happy to look again at the second stage and how a matter would get to the ombudsman. I give a commitment to do that before the next stage of the Bill so that we can discuss how we think that could take over. We feel that this would be a good way to proceed. I hope that both my noble friends and the noble Lords opposite will be content for us to see whether there is a way through here without absolutely undermining the provisions that the Government wish to introduce. The Government believe that local people who are associated with local housing and have become disconnected from it should be aware of what is going on and be capable of dealing with a lot of the problems that tenants have without them having to approach the ombudsman.
My offer is one of discussions to see whether there is a way through. If we have not found one by Third Reading, we will be able to deal with the matter then. On that basis, I hope that noble Lords will not press their amendments.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, does the Minister accept that what has been proposed would enable tenants to keep their right to decide whether they want to go through their councillor or MP or go directly to the ombudsman? What the Government are proposing denies them that choice. That is the problem that we have on this side of the House.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, I do not think that it denies them the choice. I am happy to look into how the passing from one to the other can be done. We think that there should be an initial stage. Often, those initial stages work: a councillor intervenes; they see what is going on; and the matter is resolved at that level. If that does not happen and somebody goes directly to the ombudsman, it is very difficult for councillors and tenants panels to know exactly what people are thinking. People do not always want to go to the ombudsman and would quite like somebody to deal with the matter at a local level. That is why we think the initial responsibility for getting matters put right lies with one of those three groups. I am very happy to look at how we can deal with the question of whether it is a requirement for the MP or local councillor to be the final arbiter of when a matter is passed on to the local ombudsman.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
My Lords, I thank the Minister for her response and, indeed, I thank all noble Lords who have spoken. We all support the idea that the service provider should be the first person to solve the matter and that there should be good ways of doing so. We all prefer local resolution and we all want councillor involvement. I do not think that there is anything between us on that. The only difference is in whether an extra layer should be added and whether we want a veto regarding whether people can, after that extra layer, go to the Housing Ombudsman.
Obviously I am addressing myself to those who I think have already reached a compromise. I hope that they have not, because some problems remain with the amendments, which may not now be moved. One, which has not yet been covered, is that the complaint is still required to be made in writing. Part of our amendment was intended to remove that requirement. I realise that we are on Report rather than in Committee, and therefore that may be a possibility. However, it would be a new statutory requirement. It would go against good practice and, indeed, the Law Commission has specifically recommended against it. Its latest report on public service ombudsmen states:
“We recommend that all formal, statutory requirements that complaints submitted to the public service ombudsmen be written are repealed”.
That is because of vulnerable consumers.
Lord Greaves
Does the noble Baroness accept that our amendments are not intended to be a perfect answer? We tabled them to persuade the Minister and the Government not to resolve the matter finally today but to give us more time to discuss it before Third Reading and perhaps to come to a resolution that might be agreed around the House at Third Reading. The Minister has given a very clear assurance that that will now happen. The matter can be brought back at Third Reading and, on that basis, I wonder whether the noble Baroness will withdraw her amendment.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
The problem that remains—and I shall explain why I think there is still a problem—is the Minister’s final response, in which she did not give an assurance that the same right will remain for social housing tenants as exists for every other ombudsman—that of direct access to the ombudsman for justice without having a filter.
I should like to say one other thing about what I understand was an attempt to find a way through. Procedurally, I think that it is a bit of a nonsense to say that you must go to your MP or councillor in order to be able to go to the Housing Ombudsman but that if they say no, you can still go anyway. I accept that the wording was an attempt to get through this afternoon’s discussion but it is a bit of a nonsense to say, “Go through your MP but, if they say no, you have an automatic right to go anyway”. That does not seem to represent progress; nor does it remove the extra layer. If the councillor or MP is to become involved, they have to carry out another inquiry—they have to hear both sides of the case. That is all that I mean by natural justice. I believe that councillors and MPs are champions of their electors but I do not think that they are adjudicators. I deliberately use the words “adjudication” or “resolution”. In other words, they resolve a problem where someone else cannot, and coming in with a fresh mind rather than being a champion seems to be very important. I believe that it would be a form of discrimination to say that just one group could not go directly to an ombudsman. The noble Lord, Lord Best, chairs the Property Ombudsman service. I was a member of the Surveyors Ombudsman Service. In all these cases, people are allowed direct access to an ombudsman.
This is a serious matter regarding justice and I should like to test the opinion of the House.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
“( ) In section 36 of the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 (information in relation to social housing) in subsection (1) after paragraph (c) insert—
“(d) any accreditation or standards to be held by landlords of social housing.””
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, in moving Amendment 52B, I shall speak also to Amendment 85. During the course of deliberations in this housing section of the Localism Bill, we have referred on a number of occasions to the private rented sector, which plays an important role in providing accommodation to individuals, couples and families. There are some excellent private sector landlords—there is no doubt about that. We should always be concerned with driving up standards and making provision better for all. Good quality housing that meets the needs of tenants in the private rented sector is an aim we can all sign up to.
However, as with all types of housing, there are landlords who are not quite as good as they should be, and property that is not up to the standard that it should be. The proposal for a landlord accreditation scheme is an attempt to address this serious problem. The proposal is for local authorities to operate one or more voluntary—and I stress the word voluntary—landlord accreditation schemes. The amendment also gives the Secretary of State the power, if he wishes to use it, to make regulations in this respect, in consultation with the local authorities. This proposal will have the effect, when the schemes are operating, of highlighting the good landlords—those who manage their properties well, deal with their tenants properly and provide a reasonable product for a fair price. That will give tenants more confidence, as they can have information on the landlords on the scheme and have a procedure for taking action if they are found wanting. It will also shine much needed light on those landlords who do not always come up to the mark and in a number of areas can be found wanting, who are letting down their tenants and providing a poor product for what they are charging. Those landlords will be registered and shown to be poor or, because they offer a poor product, they will seek to avoid participation in the voluntary scheme.
If the Minister is not prepared to accept my amendment, can he give us an assurance that the department will keep the matter under review, as this is a genuine attempt to address a problem which we know all too well exists. I beg to move.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, these amendments focus on the potential impact of accreditation schemes, both in the private rented sector and the social rented sector. I turn to the social rented sector first.
Amendment 52B would give the Secretary of State the power to require the Homes and Communities Agency, and from April 2012 the Greater London Authority, to supply information about any accreditation or standards to be held by landlords of social housing. I assume that the amendment relates to the HCA’s future role as a regulator of social housing. The noble Lord nods. However, under the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 the regulator is already obliged to consult on its own standards for social housing landlords and to bring those standards to landlords’ attention. In practice, of course, the regulator’s standards are freely available for everyone to view on its website, so I do not see a need to empower the Secretary of State to require that this information is published by law.
The amendment could also encompass accreditation or codes that might be adopted by social landlords on a voluntary basis. It is important that this kind of voluntary activity is owned by the sector itself, so I am not convinced that the regulator should be required to publish information about it. Indeed it is important that there is a very clear distinction between the regulator’s standards, which are compulsory, and any codes or accreditation arrangements that are adopted by landlords on a voluntary basis. Of course, we would encourage such voluntary activity in the sector, but we do not believe that it would be helpful for the regulator to police it or to report on it.
Turning to Amendment 85, which deals with accreditation in the private rented sector, I think that we all agree that a good accreditation scheme can play an important role in developing a local authority’s relationship with their local landlords. Many local authorities already run successful accreditation schemes, but as with the social sector, accreditation works best when it is owned by those involved. One of the main strengths of voluntary accreditation to date is that local authorities have been able to tailor their schemes to local needs, and experience shows that accreditation works best when it matches local circumstances.
Instead of allowing that local discretion, the proposals in front of us today would impose top-down burdens on all local authorities, including those who, quite legitimately, decide that accreditation is not appropriate for their area. Worse, they would force all existing and effective accreditation schemes into a straitjacket designed by central government. Schemes that did not match up would have to be, quite pointlessly, dismantled and reassembled at considerable administrative cost. This does not seem to make much sense and we cannot support it.
My Lords, these amendments are intended to support accreditation—and the noble Lord explained why he believes them necessary—but unfortunately they would have the opposite effect by undermining effective schemes that are already in place. Given this, I would ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, I thank the noble Earl for his reply. However, I still think that there is an issue here that needs further consideration, so I hope that this will be kept under review. That said, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Best
Amendment 54 is in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy and myself. Currently, the Secretary of State is able to direct the regulator to set standards for social housing in certain areas. In a strictly limited number of cases, he is able to direct the content of these standards. Clause 163 of the Localism Bill seeks to strengthen his powers in this area, allowing him to shape the contents of standards regarding tenancy exchanges in which tenants can swap properties. The view within the housing world is that this is giving the Minister too many powers to direct the behaviour of social landlords. The danger of accumulating more and more powers in the hands of the Secretary of State is that eventually, as one Minister after another brings their own fresh and no doubt good ideas to bear, you are effectively nationalising the housing associations; they are becoming creatures of government. They then run the risk of being regarded by the EU and others as public sector bodies. If the housing associations are no longer independent bodies and are regarded as public sector agencies, then all their borrowing becomes public sector debt and we have lost one of the key elements in having a social housing sector that is outside of public sector control.
So I am very sympathetic to standards about exchanges and the mobility of labour, and to the Minister’s hopes that housing associations will behave in a particular way, but laying this down, through direction to the regulator over these standards, does seem a step too far. I beg to move.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, Clause 163 is important in increasing mobility for social housing tenants who may wish to move for work, or to give care to or receive care from family or friends. We want to increase opportunities for tenants to move through mutual exchange. We have been working with the existing main providers of home-swap services to develop a technical solution that will put in place a national scheme that enables tenants to receive information on all possible matches across all providers in a scheme. Alongside this, we want all landlords to be required to provide their tenants with access to good internet-based home-swap services. Indeed, the majority of landlords who responded to our consultation on housing reform also agreed with this approach and said they could see no good reason why landlords should not subscribe to such a scheme. We therefore propose, through using the powers in this clause, that the social housing regulator should set a mutual exchange standard to make sure that social landlords sign up to good-quality services.
The noble Lord also raised the issue of public sector debt. While I am not undertaking to reflect on that and come back at a later stage, I will undertake to satisfy myself, through discussions with my officials, that the problem which the noble Lord alludes to does not exist. While I accept that some noble Lords view this as an overly bureaucratic approach, we believe that the benefits of increasing choice and mobility for social tenants must be the priority and that we should seek to deliver this better service for them.
Lord Best
I am grateful to the noble Earl for that response. I agree entirely that improving mobility and exchange schemes is a thoroughly commendable line to pursue. I think that I am now on my 23rd housing Minister since I started in this world. They have all had important ideas to add to the things that housing associations ought to do; it is just that in the end, if one is not careful, the cumulative effect is the creation of an agency that is simply a government bureaucracy. I am grateful for the noble Earl’s reassurances and beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, I will be as brief as possible in speaking to this group of amendments. My Amendment 55 seeks to designate an individual within the Homes and Communities Agency to be responsible for regulation. The amendment has the support of the National Housing Federation, and it is important because it seeks to avoid a conflict of interest between the HCA’s regulatory and investment functions. It will help to ensure that regulatory issues can be addressed, even to the extent of formal legal proceedings, without compromising the investment function of the HCA, and vice versa. The HCA would of course still be required to appoint a regulatory committee to oversee the regulation officer. The Government may say that this proposal will diminish rather than enhance regulatory independence but I do not accept that that is the case at all. I am in fact arguing the exact opposite. If that is the Government’s position, I hope that the noble Earl will be able to give the House additional words of assurance on this matter. I beg to move.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, I am grateful for the way in which the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark, succinctly moved his amendment. The Government are committed to ensuring the continued independence of the regulatory function once it transfers to the Homes and Communities Agency. However, our view is that the nomination of a single individual as a regulation officer would diminish rather than enhance regulatory independence. Rather than vesting the regulation function in an independent committee, these amendments, as the noble Lord explained, would confer the statutory powers on a single member of the HCA’s staff. In moving his amendment, the noble Lord talked about the problem of a conflict of interest. However, this person could presumably be dismissed at any time by the HCA on normal employment grounds. It could prove difficult for a member of staff in that position to take decisions that were demonstrably independent of the HCA’s other functions. In addition, where formal regulatory decisions are made by a properly constituted board or committee, there can be greater confidence that those decisions are broadly based and take account of the full range of relevant factors. I hope that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendment in view of my explanation.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, I thank the noble Earl for his response. Clearly we are not going to agree on this. Nevertheless, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Best
My Lords, this amendment concerns the terms of appointment of members for the new regulation committee. The intention is that “unsuitable” should be removed so that those who are indeed unfit or unable to serve could be removed by the Secretary of State but not those whom the Secretary of State deems to be unsuitable. That is extending the power a step too far—again, a theme of the amendments that I am bringing forward. “Unsuitable” could imply people being removed from office on grounds that would be comprehensible to the Secretary of State. It would not ensure the independence of those people to argue and, if necessary, to be a nuisance within that committee. They might do that in fear that they would be regarded as unsuitable somewhere down the line.
The Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee uses the terms unable and unfit to describe the powers for the removal of any members of that committee. Those words would seem sufficient for the regulation committee as much as for the Monetary Policy Committee, which has done well and which has had some members who have been quite happy to raise objections—and to be quite forceful in doing so—but who might have been regarded as unsuitable if there had been powers of ministerial intervention. This amendment simply seeks to lose “unsuitable”. I beg to move.
Lord Newton of Braintree
My Lords, I cannot resist it, especially since I am well known to be classified as unsuitable by my Front Bench. I have some sympathy with the argument that has just been advanced. It is quite difficult to see what is not included in “unable” or “unfit” that is then covered by “unsuitable” that ought not to be covered. It depends on matters of judgment that could include political or personal judgment that would not be a proper consideration. I just want to know what is thought to be desirably covered by unsuitable that is not covered by the other words.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, the Opposition fully support the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Best. The amendment seeks to correct the use of what can only be described as an odd and unnecessary use of the term unsuitable. Like the noble Lord, Lord Newton, we ask the Minister to address that specific point of why unsuitable is being used. There is much concern that the Government are taking a much wider view and a much wider power and have additional intentions of using it. I hope that the Minister either accepts the amendment or that we have a very clear explanation about what this does and does not mean.
The Secretary of State already has the power to remove someone who is unable or unfit. As the noble Lord, Lord Best, said, this is adequate for the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England, so we on this side certainly think that it is good enough for the HCA regulation committee.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, it is important that the regulation committee is able to function effectively in order to retain the confidence of investors and the social housing sector. In extreme cases, it may prove necessary for the Secretary of State to intervene to remove a member of the committee to ensure that its crucial work is not jeopardised. “Unable, unfit or unsuitable” are fairly standard grounds and a nearly identical provision exists for membership of the boards of the existing social housing regulator and the Homes and Communities Agency.
In answer to my noble friend Lord Newton of Braintree and the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark, a member may be able and fit to carry out his or her functions without being suitable to exercise them. This might arise, for example, if there was an irretrievable breakdown in the relationship between the member and the rest of the committee. A member might engage in activities such as filibustering deliberately to disrupt the committee’s work, but that falls short of being “unfit”. He would be being very effective in disrupting the work of the committee, so I am sure that noble Lords can understand the need for “unsuitable”.
Government Amendment 61 is a minor amendment that will update the Housing (Scotland) Act 2010 and the Equality Act 2010 to reflect the planned abolition of the Tenant Services Authority.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, before the noble Earl sits down, does he see the problem that we on this side see: that somebody can be deemed unsuitable just because they are making a point that the others happen not to agree with? It is not filibustering but that they are making a perfectly valid point, which is not agreed with.
Earl Attlee
No, my Lords, that would not meet the test of what is unsuitable. If the Secretary of State tried to use his powers to say that someone was unsuitable because he or she disagreed with other members of the committee, he would leave himself vulnerable to judicial review.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
Would the noble Earl like to suggest the number of times you have to disagree before you are deemed to be unsuitable?
Earl Attlee
My Lords, I would imagine that a committee could have very free and frank discussions, perhaps lasting all afternoon, without falling foul of the test of unsuitability. On the other hand, if a member of the committee regularly interfered with the operation of the committee so that it could not function, the Secretary of State would have to step in.
Lord Best
My Lords, I will certainly not press the matter further. However, it is important for the Government to know that the housing sector is very concerned that this regulation committee is independent and that the people on it feel able to say things that are contrary to what the Government might wish to hear. That independence is paramount. I hope that that point has been taken. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Baroness Hanham
“Housing (Scotland) Act 2010 (asp 17)59A The Housing (Scotland) Act 2010 is amended as follows.
59B In section 18(2) (co-operation with other regulators: definition of “relevant regulators”) in paragraph (a) for “the Office for Tenants and Social Landlords” substitute “the Regulator of Social Housing”.
59C In section 68(3) (determination of accounting requirements for registered social landlords: consultation with other bodies) in paragraph (c) for “the Office for Tenants and Social Landlords” substitute “the Regulator of Social Housing”.
Equality Act 2010 (c. 15)59D In Schedule 19 to the Equality Act 2010 (public authorities) omit the entry for the Office for Tenants and Social Landlords.”
Lord Shipley
“Transfer of trusteeship of almshouses
In section 170 of the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 (overview) at the end insert—“(2) For the purposes of this Chapter, “disposal of property” shall include the transfer of trusteeship of an almshouse by a registered provider where, as a result of that trusteeship, the registered provider manages land or dwellings; and “disposal of land” and “disposal of a dwelling” shall be interpreted so as to refer to the transfer of trusteeship which entails management of land or dwellings accordingly.””
Lord Shipley
Amendment 62 relates to the transfer of trusteeship of almshouses. I am grateful to my noble friend the Minister for writing to me in the Recess to say that she was sympathetic to the case for this amendment and would be happy to consider the matter and discuss it further even though there was a need to be cautious about extending the scope of state regulation in relation to charitable bodies. I hope that discussions can continue between today and Third Reading.
At present, if a regulated housing association sells occupied social housing, that housing association requires the consent of the regulator, who in turn requires the housing association to consult its tenants. By contrast, when the control of an almshouse is moved from one corporate trustee to another, the ownership of the property remains with the Official Custodian for Charities. For that reason the regulator’s consent is not required for the change even if the residents’ homes are in effect being sold against their express wishes. The amendment would ensure that if a registered provider wanted to transfer the trusteeship of occupied dwellings, the consent of the regulator would be required. The regulator could in turn require the housing association to consult residents.
I move this amendment because a housing trust—the Anchor Trust—is transferring the corporate trusteeship of 11 almshouses spread through London and south-east England to another charity. Many residents oppose this proposal and would prefer to be transferred to a more local charity instead. The issue here is about the rights of tenants. If this was a stock transfer, say, of local authority housing, tenants would have the right to be consulted and, indeed, to give their consent to a transfer of their properties. The question that lies at the heart of this is: if there has to be consultation and consent given for a stock transfer, why when almshouses are being transferred is there not to be full consultation and consent? The legal situation is complicated because of the charitable status of the almshouses. I understand that in this specific case there have been meetings between Members of Parliament and the chief executive of the Anchor Trust and with the Charity Commissioners. However, we need to address this issue in Parliament because I cannot see why a different system should apply to tenants of almshouses as opposed to tenants in other forms of social housing.
I recognise the need for further work to be done on the legal issues. I also recognise that we are still on Report. However, I hope that there is time to look further at those legal issues to see what might be done about this situation. In the mean time, I hope that it might be possible for full consultation and consent to be obtained from those tenants affected by this and any other proposed transfer of almshouses. I hope that it will be possible for that further work to be presented to your Lordships' House at Third Reading.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, I offer my support and that of the Opposition to the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, as I have done on a number of occasions on Report. He has identified a problem that needs to be addressed. It involves real people with real concerns. If the matter requires further work, as he says, and it can be done—I hope that the Minister will comment on that—the issue may be sorted out. Given that we are discussing a charity, I understand that the issue may be more difficult than it at first seems, but I hope that the government Front Bench will give a positive response.
Amendments 65 and 67 in this group stand in my name. Amendment 65 would ensure that a parent company of a group of housing associations can be registered even if it owns no housing itself. This would allow the regulator to regulate group members via the parent rather than directly if he thinks that that would be more effective. Amendment 67 concerns the appointment of members to housing association boards. The law as it stands allows the regulator to make unlimited appointments to a registered provider’s governing body provided that they remain a minority. For a 10-member board, it would allow the regulator to make nine appointments. My amendment limits the number of appointments the regulator may make to no more than four. This is a proportionate number of appointments and would enable the regulator to strengthen the board by adding members with sufficient skills and abilities to deal with any concerns that they may have about the board’s performance. However, the number would not be too overbearing as this sort of appointment would be of a temporary nature to help the housing association board discharge its duties more effectively.
Lord Best
Amendment 67 stands in my name and that of the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy. It concerns the appointments made by the regulator. It is important to note that this amendment relates only to appointments made by the regulator where the housing association has not failed in any way. It is not a disciplinary measure but constitutes a voluntary helping hand for the organisation. In a number of cases that I know well additional members have been appointed by the regulator as new members of the board and have been very helpful. However, there are limits to the number of appointments that the regulator ought to make to the board. We suggest that these be limited in future to a maximum of four. In my experience three new people are usually appointed to strengthen a board that has become weak—four is quite enough. We are trying to protect the independence and sovereignty of these organisations.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, as regards the amendment moved by my noble friend Lord Shipley, I recognise the strength of local feeling in the case that he highlighted. We have looked at his proposal extremely carefully and have discussed it with the social housing regulator, the Charity Commission, the National Almshouse Association and the National Housing Federation. We have also received helpful representations from the United St Saviour’s Charity and from residents of the Hopton’s Almshouses in Southwark.
I fully understand the reasoning behind the proposed amendment. However, we are concerned that the amendment seems to require an increase in bureaucracy and potential state interference in the proper exercise of charity trustees' discretion. Currently, the identification of a new trustee is a matter for the existing trustee to decide and we are not convinced that new regulatory controls should be applied. The proposed amendment would apply only where the corporate trustee of an almshouse happens to be a registered provider of social housing. It is not clear that there is a strong rationale for requiring that these almshouse trustees, but not others, seek consent.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
I know that the Minister was not tempted by the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, but can he give the House any assurance that the issue the noble Lord raised will be looked at seriously by the Government? I accept that this involves charity law, which is complicated stuff, but it also involves real people with real concerns and the Government should look at this seriously.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, I am confident that my department will continue to monitor the situation, but we cannot do anything further with this Bill.
Lord Shipley
Will it be possible for the evidence that the Minister referred to from the regulator, the Charity Commission and other bodies to be provided in the Library so that we can see exactly what evidence they have supplied to the Government that indicates that legally this is very complicated? Would the Minister agree that it would be good practice for consent to be received where a transfer is being proposed for almshouses? Would he consider and give advice on what other steps could be taken to ensure that consent for transfer from tenants is delivered?
Earl Attlee
With regard to the evidence, if I can give the noble Lord some more evidence I will, but I am not certain that I can. I believe there are some difficulties with his second request.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
Before the Minister sits down, I shall press him on this point. In order to get time for this to be resolved, would he be able to facilitate a discussion between representatives of these organisations, the almshouses and their residents with officials and Ministers in the department?
Earl Attlee
My Lords, we will do whatever we can to assist a resolution of this problem. We will continue to monitor it, but my particular point is that there is not much more we can do with this Bill.
Lord Shipley
My Lords, when I moved Amendment 62, I quoted from the Minister’s letter which said that she was sympathetic to this case, so I am pleased that we seem to have ended on a note of sympathy and understanding of the problem. I think we need to try to find a solution to this. I repeat myself, but I do not think it is tenable for tenants of almshouses to be treated differently from tenants of other social housing or local housing. There is a principle at stake here. There may be legal complexities to deal with in this Bill, but I am very grateful for the assurance from the Minister that we can enter further discussions prior to Third Reading.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, I said that we cannot enter further discussions. We cannot use this Bill to solve this problem. I gave no such undertaking.
Lord Shipley
I understand the point that the Minister is making—that this Bill may not be the right forum for progressing the issue—but there will nevertheless be discussions about how the issue might be progressed in other ways.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, we are happy to continue work to resolve the issue, but not with this Bill.
Lord Shipley
I understand that situation. With that confirmation, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Earl Attlee
“1A In section 122 (restriction on gifts and distributions by non-profit registered providers to members etc) after subsection (6) insert—
“(7) The Secretary of State may by order amend this section for the purpose of—(a) adding to the permitted classes, or(b) modifying or removing a permitted class added by order under this subsection.(8) Before making an order under subsection (7), the Secretary of State must consult—(a) the Charity Commission,(b) the regulator, and(c) one or more bodies appearing to the Secretary of State to represent the interests of registered providers.””
Earl Attlee
My Lords, in Committee, the noble Lords, Lord Best, Lord Patel, Lord McKenzie and Lord Beecham, tabled an amendment designed to liberalise Section 122 of the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008, which restricts the payments that housing associations may make to their members, and a similar amendment has been tabled again by the noble Lord, Lord Best.
The Government agree with the aim of the amendment and have put down our own amendments to achieve it. The amendments we have tabled would give the Secretary of State the power, by affirmative order, to add to the classes of permitted payments that housing associations may make to their members. Taking this matter out of the Bill will give us sufficient time to explore a new exemption that delivers greater flexibility while protecting public investment. Any order would be made only following consultation with the Charity Commission, the regulator and the housing association sector. I beg to move.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
We are grateful to the Government for responding to the earlier amendment. I acknowledge that the noble Lord, Lord Best, will not move his amendment, but are classes 4 and 5 specified in that amendment classes that the Government would support and take forward under the process that they have set down?
Amendment 63 refers to,
“modifying or removing a permitted class added by order under this subsection”.
Do the Government have anything in mind concerning modifying or removing a particular class?
Earl Attlee
My Lords, those are exceptionally good questions, but unfortunately I will have to write to the noble Lord.
Earl Attlee
“17 In section 320 of the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 (orders and regulations)—
(a) in subsection (3)(a) (orders subject to approval in draft by each House of Parliament), after “114” insert “, 122”, and(b) in subsection (7)(a) (orders subject to annulment by either House of Parliament, and exceptions from that requirement), after “114” insert “, 122”.”
Lord Greaves
“(3A) If a designated person who is asked to refer a complaint to a housing ombudsman declines to refer that complaint, the individual making the complaint may make it directly in writing to that housing ombudsman.”
Lord Greaves
My Lords, we discussed this issue at some length when debating a previous group of amendments. The Minister gave a clear assurance that we can have discussions before Third Reading. I hope that we can come to some consensus. On that basis, there is nothing more that I need to say.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, I am in an interesting position. I offered discussions when debating the last group of amendments, but the offer was rejected forcibly by the vote. I have now been asked whether I will have discussions on these amendments, and I am happy to say that I am content to have them.
Lord Greaves
I think that that was an acceptable answer. I understand that we cannot bring back the amendment that was defeated in the vote, but there are plenty of things in these amendments that we can talk about in relation to what the Bill states. That gives us sufficient leeway to talk about what we want to talk about. Whether the Government will extend their offer of discussions to the Opposition, who rudely threw it back in their face on the previous group of amendments, I do not know. I would welcome their participation, but that is up to the Government.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
Perhaps I may make it clear that we voted on the original proposition because we believed that it would secure the best outcome. As that did not succeed, it is not inconsistent to want to see a lesser position that nevertheless improves on what is in the Bill. That is entirely sensible and reasonable. Whether we will be involved in those discussions is up to the Government. If they are going to bring something back—and I believe that that is the wish of the noble Lord, Lord Greaves—we will have an opportunity in this Chamber to join in the debate.
Lord Newton of Braintree
Before the noble Lord withdraws the amendment, as I presume he will, I will express the hope that the House will go along with this. We got into a mess earlier over the vote because of the separation of these issues, which could have been linked. We now have an opportunity to take up the Minister's offer of discussion. I think that we should, and I hope that neither she nor we will dig in out of purism, and that the Clerks will have their ears open.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
Of course, technically we voted on Amendment 53A. I did not move the other amendments.
Lord Greaves
These are all interventions on my speech, but that is quite all right. I happily give way to the Minister.
Baroness Hanham
I will try to dig us out of this muddle. I am happy to have discussions and to include the Opposition. The discussions might be overshadowed slightly by the way in which we proceed on these amendments. However, it is perfectly proper that we should have them and include everybody.
Lord Greaves
On the basis that we are all happy pals together, at least for the moment, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment and look forward very much to the discussions.
“( ) If having made a determination of pay compensation, the ombudsman must explain how the level of compensation has been calculated.”
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, this amendment also has the fatal “o” word—ombudsman—in it, but noble Lords need not be afeared because it is a very non-contentious issue to which the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, has kindly replied, and I agree with her answer. I tabled the amendment about the ombudsman because, when reading the Bill, one notes that the Housing Ombudsman will make a determination, but no mention is made of any compensation element. Determination is all very well, but an applicant may want monetary payment or grovelling of some sort and that is not mentioned in the Bill.
When investigating this in advance of the helpful reply of the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, I went back to Schedule 2 to the Housing Act 1996, which says, as the Minister implied, that the Housing Ombudsman may,
“order the member of a scheme against whom the complaint was made to pay compensation to the complainant”.
It is already in law that compensation of a monetary sum can be paid. I will make what is almost a drafting point. The laws of this country are so entwined and confused that it is wrong that one has to keep referring back to previous Bills to understand the Bill that one is looking at. We are not talking only of lawyers who will go back and say: “Ah, that is in the Housing Act 1996”. In this Bill one does not see any element of monetary repayment as compensation. I seek acknowledgement that, in whatever paper forms are produced, there will be a cross-reference to the 1996 Act so that people can see that there is a determination. I would be very happy if the Minister would confirm something on those lines. I beg to move.
Lord Beecham
My Lords, I will follow the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, on the question of compensation. Clearly, the ombudsman route provides the possibility of compensation. It is not certain whether that would apply to the alternative route, which we debated at some length earlier. Perhaps the noble Earl could indicate whether under the alternative method of the designated person—a councillor, Member of Parliament or tenant panel—there will be the opportunity for a compensation payment to be made by the designated person. If not, we would have two systems, one of which would afford the possibility of compensation while the other would not. I am sure that the noble Earl much appreciated that word in his shell-like ear. In the event that we will have two competing systems, will the Government ensure that guidance is given to tenants that that is the case—in other words, that under one system they may get compensation while under the other they will not? The matter could be discussed in the forum to which the Minister referred. Strange circumstances could arise if the situation were not clear.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, Amendment 74 highlights the Housing Ombudsman’s power to order a member landlord to pay compensation to a complainant. I understand that my noble friend would like there to be greater clarity on how the ombudsman calculates the level of compensation to be awarded and I am grateful to him for raising the issue. Our view is that it is not necessary to include any new specific requirements in the Bill. In practice the ombudsman already provides a breakdown of any compensation he has decided to award, which is done in the context of what the ombudsman considers to be fair and reasonable in all the circumstances of the case. This arrangement allows flexibility to address specific issues and to provide a useful level of information, depending on the circumstances of each case. Clearly it would be difficult to attain this flexibility in a legislative duty on the ombudsman.
The ombudsman is intending to consult early next year on a revised statutory scheme to reflect the proposed extension of his jurisdiction to include complaints about local authority landlords, in addition to housing associations. I have no doubt that there will be further opportunities through that consultation process to engage on these and other issues. In answer to the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, anything referred to the ombudsman means that compensation can be paid.
Lord Beecham
My question is in relation to the other routes that have been included in the Bill and which may be taken further in discussions before Third Reading. Would compensation be payable when the matter is dealt with by a local councillor, Member of Parliament or a tenants panel? If not, would that be made clear to the applicant, whereas the ombudsman would provide the possibility of compensation?
Earl Attlee
My Lords, in view of the complexity, a detailed letter would be appropriate.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, I thank the noble Earl for his reply and the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, for his comments. I am quite confident that the monetary compensation would apply to all reports to the ombudsman, in answer to the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, so I have no worries on that score. My only comment is that for the sake of clarity in the ongoing negotiations and discussions, it would be useful for non-QCs to see that there is monetary compensation without having to go back to the 1996 Act. I very much thank the Minister for his reply and the reply from the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Best
This amendment is about the new powers for the ombudsman to apply to a court to make its rulings legally enforceable—in other words, to insist, having made a judgment through the courts, that the landlord complies with the ombudsman’s decision. This is quite a big jump from the current scheme, which is based on informality. At the moment it is an inexpensive scheme. It is very accessible to complainants and people do not come with their lawyers. It is not part of the legal processes. It is feared that the new scheme will rather change the nature of the way in which the ombudsman works. It also carries the same risk that I have been harping on about today, that housing associations will slide into the public sector and become indistinguishable from public sector agencies, which has the effect thereafter that all of their borrowing will become part of the public sector debt, which I know the Government are very anxious to avoid. There is a risk that if housing associations are subject to legally enforceable decisions based on the opinion of a public authority—the ombudsman—they may not be regarded as being outside the public sector. That would be a calamity.
Once again, this is about trying to retain the independence and non-statutory nature of the sector. The removal of these new legal powers would be helpful in sustaining that independence and the success of the ombudsman’s scheme to date, without making the ombudsman’s rulings legally enforceable.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, I shall speak briefly to Amendments 75 and 76. They would ensure that the ombudsman’s service is not damaged by unintended consequences. What is wonderful about the ombudsman’s service is that compared with the courts, proceedings are informal, inexpensive and accessible. It is respected as its rulings are complied with by registered providers. The Government are proposing to solve a problem that noble Lords on this side of the House do not believe exists. We should be careful not to undermine the service. Will the Minister tell the House where the proposal has come from? Who has asked for it? How has it arrived here?
Earl Attlee
My Lords, the proposals relate to the proposed order-making power for the Secretary of State to enable the housing ombudsman to apply to a court or tribunal to enforce his determinations. One of our aims through our package of reforms to social housing regulation is to give a greater role to social housing tenants in the scrutiny of landlord performance. The Bill supports that by providing a clear role for tenant panels in the complaints process. In parallel, we are currently consulting on draft directions to the social housing regulator that will result in tenants having stronger tools with which to scrutinise landlords’ performance. The regulator’s consumer regulation role will be focused on setting clear standards and responding to failures that cause actual or potential serious detriment to tenants. Alongside these reforms we want to ensure that we continue to promise tenants an effective right of redress. The proposed power to enable the housing ombudsman to enforce his decisions through the courts—although I hope it is never needed—gives tenants confidence that effective redress will continue to be available.
The noble Lords, Lord Best and Lord Kennedy, give an accurate description of the current situation. There is not a problem. The Government would use this power only if levels of compliance with the housing ombudsman determinations declined significantly. At present compliance is high, as noble Lords have recognised. Only one recommendation has been rejected in the past seven years. We hope and expect that this will continue. If so, we have no intention of using this power.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
Am I right that the noble Lord is saying that the Government are taking a power that they believe they do not need?
Earl Attlee
My Lords, it is wise to make sure that we have the order-making power should we need it. It concentrates the mind. As I said, we have no intention of using it unless the situation deteriorates. I suspect that it will not, but it is always advisable to have something in your back pocket.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
That is a very interesting response. I have heard the exact opposite from the government Bench on many other proposals.
Lord Beecham
I remind the Minister of the thrust of the question of the noble Lord, Lord Best—the risk that because an order is enforceable, the RSL sector is regarded as being within the public sector, with consequential adverse effects on the financial status of its expenditure in relation to the Government’s expenditure requirement.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, I am confident that my department has properly considered those matters. It is obviously a very important issue and I have already undertaken to write to the noble Lord, Lord Best. Other noble Lords will of course get a copy, and there will be a copy in the Library.
Baroness Doocey
“Statutory overcrowding: reform of overcrowding standard
(1) Part X of the Housing Act 1985 is amended as follows.
(2) For sections 324 to 332 substitute—
“324 Statutory overcrowding
A dwelling is overcrowded for the purposes of this Part when the number of persons sleeping in the dwelling is such as to contravene the standard specified in section 325 (the overcrowding standard).
325 Overcrowding standard
(1) The overcrowding standard is contravened when the number of rooms in a dwelling which are available as sleeping accommodation is smaller than the number specified in subsection (3), having regard to the number and description of persons who are ordinarily resident in the dwelling.
(2) For the purpose of calculating the number of rooms available as sleeping accommodation, no account shall be taken of a room which is of a type normally used in the locality as a living room or of a kitchen.
(3) The permitted numbers are specified in the table below.
Description of persons | Number of rooms | |
|---|---|---|
Two persons who are spouses or civil partners of each other (or who live together as husband and wife or as if civil partners) | 1 | |
Each other person over the age of 21 | 1 | |
Any pair of children both aged under 10 | 1 | |
Any pair of children or young persons of the same sex both aged under 21 | 1 | |
Any child or young person under the age of 21 not included in any of the above categories. | 1 |
(a) no account shall be taken of a room having a floor area of less than 50 square feet;(b) a room measuring 50 square feet or more but less than 70 square feet shall not be taken to be available for anyone other than one child under 10;(c) a room measuring more than 70 square feet but less than 90 square feet shall not be taken to be available for anyone other than one person of any age or two children under 10;(d) a room measuring more than 90 square feet but less than 110 square feet shall not be taken to be available for anyone other than one person of any age or two persons of whom at least one must be a child under 10; and(e) a room measuring 110 square feet shall be taken to be available for two persons of any age.(5) The Secretary of State may by regulations prescribe the manner in which the floor area of a room is to be ascertained for the purposes of this section; and the regulations may provide for the exclusion from computation of floor space in a part of the room which is less than a specified height not exceeding eight feet.
326 Notice to abate overcrowding
(1) Where a dwelling is found to contravene the overcrowding standard, the local housing authority may serve on the owner or manager of the dwelling notice in writing requiring him to take reasonable steps to abate the overcrowding within 28 days from the date of service of the notice.
(2) For the purposes of subsection (1), a person shall be considered to have taken reasonable steps to abate the overcrowding if he takes such steps as are necessary in law to recover possession of the dwelling or to reduce the number of persons in occupation of the dwelling or if he does any other act which in the opinion of the authority amounts to a reasonable response to the abatement notice.
(3) If, within the period of 28 days following service of an abatement notice under subsection (1), or within such further period as the local housing authority shall in its discretion allow, the owner or manager has not taken reasonable steps to abate the overcrowding, the authority may apply for an order to the county court.
(4) On an application by the local housing authority under subsection (3), the court may order that vacant possession of the dwelling or part of the dwelling be given to the landlord within such period as the court may determine.
(5) An order under subsection (4) may be stayed or suspended for such period and on such conditions as the court shall decide.
(6) In exercising its powers under subsection (4), the court shall have regard to the interests of any tenant or occupier of the premises, and in particular to the security of tenure of any protected or statutory tenant under the Rent Act 1977 or any assured tenant under the Housing Act 1988.
(7) Expenses incurred by the local housing authority under this section in securing possession of a dwelling may be recovered from the landlord or manager by action.
(8) Service of an abatement notice under subsection (1) shall not prevent the authority from serving a prohibition order under section 20 of the Housing Act 2004.”
(3) Omit sections 335 to 344.”
Baroness Doocey
My Lords, I declare an interest as a member of the London Assembly and the Metropolitan Police Authority.
This amendment seeks to deal with the nature and extent of overcrowding and to highlight why the present law is inadequate and needs reform. Overcrowding is an invisible problem compared with homelessness and rough sleeping. Consequently, it tends to be viewed as less of a priority. But overcrowding has a serious impact on children, especially their health and educational attainment, and it disproportionately affects larger households.
Overcrowding is a major problem in London. In 2008 London had more than 200,000 overcrowded households, almost 7 per cent of London’s homes. That was an increase of one-third over the previous decade. About half of these overcrowded households are in the social rented sector; overcrowding is worse in that sector than in any other form of tenure. London has over 40 per cent of England’s overcrowded households in the social rented sector, and nearly 400,000 London children live in overcrowded conditions. The overcrowding rate for black and minority ethnic households in London is about four times that for white British households.
There is no doubt that overcrowding is largely a consequence of housing supply shortage. Therefore this amendment is not a complete solution to overcrowding. For that, we need to build many more homes and, in particular, larger family homes. But this amendment is intended to deal with the abuse of the existing housing stock.
Breaching legal overcrowding standards is a criminal offence, but the official definition of overcrowding has survived unchanged since 1935 and is seriously outdated. Relatively few households are legally overcrowded even though some people have to sleep in living rooms and kitchens. There is little incentive for local authorities to tackle the problem if the law is not actually being broken. This amendment meets the need to provide an updated definition of statutory overcrowding based on the bedroom standard. This would realign the law with the actual problem and would therefore provide local authorities with an incentive to reduce overcrowding. Once there is a serious legal incentive in place for local authorities to tackle overcrowding, it may force them to reorder their priorities when it comes to housing allocation policies.
Overcrowding is a very serious issue. So if the Government are not minded to accept this amendment, perhaps my noble friend the Minister could outline what the Government propose to do to update the official definition of overcrowding, which has not changed for the last 75 years.
Lord Beecham
My Lords, even in your Lordships’ House there are not many of us who were around when these standards were laid down in 1935, as the noble Baroness has pointed out. Housing conditions in general have improved since those days, but she is quite right to draw attention to serious issues around overcrowding. They are not confined to London, although her figures show these issues are extremely problematic in the capital. She is also right to draw attention to the particular problems faced by some BME communities, many of whom have large families and find it difficult to secure accommodation which is adequate to house them.
I have every sympathy with the amendment. I note that the measurements are given in “old money”, when perhaps these days we should be looking at metric equivalents, but that is a trivial point. I am however somewhat at a loss as to how to respond to the Government’s response to the amendment. It seems to be based, to put it crudely, upon facile optimism about the effects of the measures that are being taken around the duties to deal with homelessness and, in particular, the use of flexible tenancies as a means by which, apparently by magic, accommodation of the appropriate size in the appropriate location will become available. The Minister for Housing assured us at a meeting a couple of days ago that he does not expect flexible tenancies to go much less than 10 years in duration, as opposed to the two years that was thought to be the benchmark. In his view—I hope he is correct—that will in fact constitute only a handful of cases. Given that, I cannot see how this measure is going to free up significant accommodation in general, let alone for this particular category.
It seems to us in the Opposition that the noble Baroness has touched on a key issue and the Government’s response thus far has not addressed it to any significant extent. Identifying the issue and improving the standards by which the question of overcrowding is to be judged does not in itself transform the situation, of course, but it would certainly allow housing authorities and the Government to have a better view of the reality of the situation.
I hope that the noble Baroness will not mind me quoting the example she gave in a conversation with me, of a recent case of a child sleeping in a bath which was deemed by the housing department to be acceptable because the child was in “a room”. It is extraordinary for this situation to be acceptable to a housing department in 2011. It could hardly have been acceptable in 1935. But statutorily it is acceptable, and she has other examples of that kind. This is extremely worrying and I am sure the Government would be horrified if there were found to be a significant number of such cases.
Strengthening the framework will allow a proper measurement to be taken of the degree to which this is an issue that needs to be addressed, and with a greater urgency than is likely to occur simply as a result of the other changes that the Government have made. I hope that the Minister will talk further with the noble Baroness to see how this can be improved and, beyond that, agree that this is an issue that should be pursued outside the context of this Bill as the Government look into housing policy generally.
Baroness Gardner of Parkes
My Lords, I am sympathetic to the idea of the need for action on this. I was very distressed this week to meet someone in a studio flat, or self-contained bedsit, who told me it is impossible for her to sleep. The private accommodation units where she resides are listed as being for one person, but immediately above her, accommodation of the same size is shared by five people. She finds it impossible to sleep, or even live there. She is trying to find somewhere to move to in any case, as her small accommodation is going up from £600 per month to £800 per month, but she works as a cleaner and is experiencing great difficulty.
What worries me is that this is an illegal overcrowding, from what the noble Baroness has said, and yet the tenants are frightened to do anything about it for fear of being put out. I asked her why she did not report it and she said she did not dare because she would be put out and would have nowhere, and until she could find somewhere to go to she could do nothing. This is what worries me about this amendment. It is marvellous to make all these proposals but where is the accommodation going to come from to house all these people?
I come from a very big family and we were fortunate enough to have a house, and space is not so limited in Australia, but if you have a big family would you not rather be somewhere safe and secure, even overcrowded, than nowhere at all? I am very concerned about the impact of being too precise about things. As I say, in theory it is absolutely marvellous but I would really like to know how it is going to work in practice.
Lord Taylor of Holbeach
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lady Doocey for bringing these amendments and indeed the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, and my noble friend Lady Gardner of Parkes for their contributions to this debate. It is an important issue and the Government view overcrowding as a matter of serious concern. My noble friend Lady Doocey mentions the impact it has on the lives of people, children in particular, and we have heard the evidence of my noble friend Lady Gardner.
Overcrowding adds to the stress of people, it damages health, it costs the community happiness and well-being, and interferes with children’s upbringing and education. Despite the previous Government investing, quite rightly, thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money in helping councils tackle overcrowding, the number of families in overcrowded housing remains unacceptably high. My noble friends have provided a very detailed revised standard in their amendment but I have to tell them that the Government do not believe that changing the statutory overcrowding standard is the answer to overcrowding. It would increase, by definition, the number of families deemed to be statutorily overcrowded but it would not make it any easier for councils to help them, as my noble friend Lady Gardner of Parkes said. We need to provide the right tools so that we can put in place strategies that reduce overcrowding.
I have to assure my noble friend Lord Beecham that the Government are convinced that the reforms we are making to social housing through this Bill will assist this process. Perhaps I can elaborate on them. By taking existing tenants who are not in need out of the allocation rules, councils will be able to help under-occupiers to find a more suitable property, freeing up more family-sized housing for overcrowded households. I am sure that is something that we would all wish to see. By strengthening mutual exchange through the introduction of a national home-swap scheme, it will be easier for under-occupying and overcrowded households to help each other. By enabling councils to make greater use of the private sector to support homeless households, they will have more scope to use social housing to help others in housing need, and by retaining the reasonable preference provisions in allocation legislation, we will ensure that overcrowded families continue to get priority for social housing.
Over the longer term, new flexible tenancies will help councils provide housing that meets households’ needs at the time they need it, but also just for as long as they need it. I am sure that this is the right way forward. We will be looking at the new statutory allocation guidance for local authorities and this will provide an opportunity to encourage all councils to adopt a more modern standard for assessing overcrowding when prioritising social housing. The Government believe that this would be a better way to ensure that families who live in cramped conditions get proper priority for appropriate social housing, rather than changing the statutory standard definition, because it would address the issue of social housing directly. That is the right way to reduce overcrowding and that is why I hope that my noble friends will withdraw their amendment.
Baroness Doocey
My Lords, I am quite disappointed with the Minister’s response. I find it astonishing that the Minister is arguing that a law that was put in place 75 years ago that allows people to sleep in kitchens and living rooms and still not legally be classed as overcrowded does not need reform. I find that very, very difficult to understand. I take note of the various things he has said about how the new system will work. I am perhaps not as convinced as he is that it will free up all of the accommodation, and one reason is that until councils have a legal duty to do something about families in overcrowded conditions, I cannot see that they are going to treat this as a priority. Would the Minister be willing to meet me to discuss this in a bit more detail? If that were the case I would be happy to withdraw the amendment at this stage.
Lord Taylor of Holbeach
Yes, I think we have made it quite clear that in our view this Bill is not the place to be putting this particular amendment. I have given an indication that new advice and guidelines are perhaps forthcoming. If my noble friend would find it useful to talk to officials about this matter before those guidelines are issued, I hope that she would be happy to participate in that discussion.
Earl Attlee
Earl Attlee
My Lords, I beg to move Amendment 78 and speak to Amendments 79, 80 and 243. These amendments are four minor and technical amendments to the new clause that we introduced in Committee. These combine to remove a lacuna in the clause as currently drafted. They would mean that Section 214(3A), which enables the court to order that the deposit be repaid in part or in full to the tenant, would apply if the tenancy had ended at the date of the application to the court but not if it had ended after that date. Clearly this is not the intention of the legislation and I ask noble Lords to support this amendment. I beg to move.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, the Opposition accept that these are minor technical amendments and are happy to support them on that basis.
Earl Attlee
“(6A) After subsection (2) insert—
“(2A) Subsections (3A) and (4) apply in the case of an application under subsection (1) if the tenancy has ended (whether before or after the making of the application) and the court—(a) is satisfied that section 213(3) or (6) has not been complied with in relation to the deposit, or(b) is not satisfied that the deposit is being held in accordance with an authorised scheme,as the case may be.””
“Exclusion of certain rural dwellings from the preserved right to buy
The preserved right to buy under section 171A of the Housing Act 1985 (cases in which right to buy is preserved) shall not be available in respect of a dwelling-house let by a registered provider of social housing in a rural area designated for the purposes of section 17(1)(b) of the Housing Act 1996 (right of tenant to acquire dwelling: supplementary provisions).”
Lord Best
My Lords, Amendment 81 is about the exclusion of some rural dwellings from the preserved right to buy. Quite a few tenants who were previously in the public sector have become tenants of a housing association, through large-scale voluntary transfers. Those tenants, and indeed others in social housing, have the preserved right to buy: the opportunity, if they move around, to buy the place to which they move if it is another social housing home. However, if they wish to move into a home that falls under a Section 106 planning agreement, which provides that the property must be retained in perpetuity as a rented social housing home—that is; it is a condition of planning that a certain number of homes are for renting—they will be unable to do so because the landlord would be in breach of the Section 106 agreement. The preserved right to buy is rather paradoxically preventing people moving out of the council house that they are in at the time and into a new property that has been built under a Section 106 agreement.
This amendment excludes certain rural dwellings from the preserved right to buy, allowing the people to move in and not then be able to exercise the right to buy that property because of the Section 106 agreement and the restrictions on that property. This amendment would be helpful to people moving around—to tenants. It is unfair at the moment that they have to be turned away, even though the case is good, because the properties are restricted and cannot be sold into home ownership on a permanent basis.
During the summer, I received a lot of helpful correspondence from Ministers and the civil servants have been very helpful. On this matter, I had a reply which I think indicated that the point had not been fully understood by the civil servants. They have been marvellous in every other respect, but with this one aberration I did not get a satisfactory response. I am not entirely sure that the point was fully understood, which must have been my fault when making it in the first place. If this small, unintended consequence of legislation could be cleared up in the Bill, it would be helpful to the mobility of people in rural areas and in places where there are restrictions in the properties that have been built, thus helping mobility. I beg to move.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
The noble Earl was a bit too quick for me. The Opposition gives its full support to the noble Lord, Lord Best, in moving his amendment on the exclusion of certain rural dwellings from the preserved right to buy. He is seeking to deal with an unintended consequence of the planning system. Many social homes in rural areas are built through Section 106 agreements. An issue can arise where housing is transferred from the local authority to housing associations. In these cases, existing tenants are given a preserved right to buy. When Section 106 agreements are used to build new social homes in rural areas, there is often a planning obligation which means that they must remain for social let. In those cases, tenants with a preserved right to buy are unable to move into these properties.
The amendment fixes an unintended consequence and the tenants would then have the right to acquire, which does not apply in rural areas. Therefore, the problem would not happen and the tenants in those situations can seek to move to social housing in rural areas if they wish. I hope that the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, can see that we are trying to be constructive and sort out a problem for everyone’s benefit.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Best, in moving his amendment suggested that his point was not fully understood. He alarmed me somewhat because he talked about Section 106 and its consequences. Unfortunately, my notes do not refer to Section 106 and nor do the Q and As. If my response does not fully answer his question, I will of course write to him with further details.
Tenants who have been involved in a stock transfer from a local authority to a registered provider would have agreed to this transfer on the basis that they would retain their right to buy. We do not think that it would be proper to remove this right from the tenant. Equally, we do not think that it is right that secure tenants who are part of a future stock transfer should have their longstanding right to buy taken away simply because they live in rural areas and their homes have been transferred to a new landlord.
However, while we wish to ensure that transferred tenants are not denied their existing rights, there is statutory provision to ensure that the new tenants of these properties do not get the right to purchase their homes in order that the properties remain available to those in need of social housing. There are existing measures in place to ensure that homes in rural areas, which are sold under the preserved right to buy, remain available to people at affordable prices.
Landlords can already impose restrictions requiring owners who wish to sell to either resell only to people who have lived or worked locally for at least three years, or first offer their home to the landlord, giving them the opportunity to return the property to their existing housing stock if they wish to do so. These restrictions on reselling are already in place in a very significant proportion of our countryside and remain in place in perpetuity. In our view, this is sufficient.
I hope that I have met the noble Lord’s points. If I have not, I will urgently have a meeting with him and officials in order to further examine the issues.
Statement of Changes in Immigration Rules
(12 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath
To move that this House regrets that it is not clear from the Impact Assessment or Explanatory Memorandum of the Statement of Changes in Immigration Rules (HC 1148) how the findings from the consultation have fed into the development of the policy or the estimates of the costs and benefits of the changes.
Relevant document: 35th Report from the Merits Committee.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath
My Lords, this statement of changes in Immigration Rules makes a number of changes to those rules and sets out the second set of changes to the rules governing the student immigration system in tier 4 of the points-based system. The tier 4 changes include restricting permission to work during studies for students applying for entry clearance or leave to remain and a restriction in the entitlement to bring dependents, partners and children into the UK.
The statement has been brought to the special attention of the House by the Merits Select Committee in relation to the tier 4 rules. I wish to express my great thanks to that committee for its work in relation to this statement. The House may recall that the Government earlier published a statement of intent, setting out the full planned changes for the student immigration system. However, that statement was laid without the impact assessment for the changes and the committee identified significant gaps in the analysis of the consultation responses. The Government have now laid the impact assessment for the reform of tier 4 of the points-based system.
The impact assessment says that the Government intend to reduce abuse through the immigration system and to reduce net immigration significantly. The impact assessment sets out the policy objectives as being to,
“Reduce the areas of the student route that are prone to abuse … Reduce net migration overall by the end of the current Parliament … Improve selectivity of students to the UK, to ensure they are the brightest and the best … Restore public confidence in the immigration system … and … Ensure that the system is robust and practical to enforce”.
The Opposition have consistently set out their concerns about the impact of this policy. The UK has a worldwide reputation for providing quality education to overseas students. My understanding is that we are the second most popular student destination in the world after the US. Overall, the international student market is estimated to be worth £40 billion to the UK economy. There is very real concern about the impact of the Government’s actions on this very important economic sector and the reputation of the UK generally. I hardly think that the current state of the economy lends itself to being the Government being so cavalier with such an important part of it.
Baroness Hamwee
My Lords, I welcome this debate and I am glad that the noble Lord was able to table his Motion. I should say that I am a member of the Merits Committee. It seems to me that the sort of points that have been made in this report are just the sort of thing that the committee is there for. I welcome the debate, although I do not welcome the fact that it is necessary. With regard to the issue of the production of the impact assessment—I will come on to the substantive issue because I cannot resist it—it is not the first time that I will have talked about the importance of scrutiny. It is important both to those who are the proponents of a proposition and to the opponents. The first bunch wants to get it right and the second bunch wants to pick holes in it; there is a unity of purpose there. Making the point, as the Merits Committee has done and as the House is now asked to do, is worth while only if the culture changes and this sort of error or omission—call it what you like—is not repeated. This is the sort of point that the Merits Committee has often had to make by way of a warning shot. The sanction from the committee is to bring the matter to the House.
I recall reading the agenda item and, in order not to make the Hansard writers blush, I will not use the language that I used then when I saw the figures, which are startling. The noble Lord referred to many of them: the 232,000 estimated reduction against the 70,000 to 80,000 estimate given only six or seven months ago, and a net cost of more than £2.4 billion with the UK Border Agency estimated to receive about £160 million less in fee income on the basis of the option chosen against the “do nothing” option.
That takes me to my next point. The committee does not make this point but I will. The options given are not a range but simply the polarised options of “do nothing” or “do this one other thing which we, the Government, are proposing”. So there is a steer to what one might describe as the right answer. So although this was a consultation, it is more akin to some sort of choice. It is not easy or indeed even possible for Parliament to assess what it is being asked to agree in this way. The Merits Committee report was very measured, and I quote from Paragraph 10:
“The Committee recognises the difficulty in developing the estimations of the likely costs and benefits of the changes, particularly given some of the gaps in the data and the potentially complex range of impacts. However, it is not clear from the IA how the findings from the consultation have fed into these estimations”.
That is a pity because the questions asked in the consultation were interesting. Most of them asked for a “yes”, “no”, or “don’t know” answer but one of them asked:
“In the light of the proposals described in this document, what do you think will be the main advantages/disadvantages, including any financial impacts, to you, your business or your sector?”
That is just the sort of thing that should be made publicly available. That is the purpose of the consultation. The background questions which consultees were asked would also have been useful in informing the debate. They were asked:
“How many students (approximately) started new courses at your institution in the 2009/2010 academic year?”
and,
“What is your estimate of overseas students (non-EEA) as a proportion of your total student population?”
As I say, that is just the sort of thing that we should be able to see to put the changes into context.
In the end, of course, what matters is the policy. Many noble Lords across a number of debates, including many of my noble friends, have made very clear our real concerns with some of the policy objectives. Even if we support a reduction in net migration, we do not believe in clamping down on student visas. We do not believe that is in the long-term reputational interests of the UK, nor its social, political and wider economic interests. I am not convinced it is even coherent within its own terms. I have commented before on the term “the brightest and the best”. That begs an awful lot of questions. We cannot assess the success—a term I use deliberately—without knowing how many students leave at the end of their course, which we—I do not just mean Parliament—are not adequately equipped to do. There is an increase of one when an individual arrives in the country and when he leaves there is a decrease of one.
Lord Avebury
My Lords, I join my noble friend in welcoming the Motion that has been tabled by the noble Lord, Lord, Hunt, and I find myself in substantial and almost entire agreement with every single word that he spoke in support of it. I congratulate my noble friend Lady Hamwee on the sterling work that she does on the Merits Committee which has resulted in bringing this matter before the House, and not for the first time. I remind your Lordships that this is the second occasion in a row when the Merits Committee has commented on a statement of changes in the Immigration Rules. That indicates to me that all is not well in the direction of the UKBA. I often thought that the separate management of the UKBA was a mistake. At a time when the Government are looking for economies, they could perhaps do worse than to consider bringing it back under the umbrella of the Home Office.
The Motion of the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, uses the wording of the Merits Committee report and is none the worse for that. It regrets that it is not clear from the IA or the Explanatory Memorandum how the findings from the consultation have fed into the development of the policy or the estimate of the costs and benefits of the changes. As far as I can see, that is not an opinion, but a fact.
In the most glaring case of a discrepancy between the responses to the consultation questionnaire and the statement, 85 per cent of the respondents disagreed with the proposal further to restrict students’ paid work when there is no evidence that it has impaired their academic performance and when fee increases have made it much harder for students to pay their way. There are many other instances where significant minority responses have been overridden. The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, talked about the considerable uncertainties affecting student numbers and the costs and benefits laid out in the impact assessment, which I shall come to discuss in a few minutes.
As one would expect, more than three-quarters of English language school respondents disagreed with the proposal to require all tier 4 students to demonstrate level B2 English proficiency, a requirement which will be a major problem for many schools and private colleges of further education. The IA states that unless English language schools can attract either EU students or student visitor route applicants, they face going out of business. The replacement estimate of 80 per cent, to which the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, referred, is not only difficult to believe but pure guesswork. Schools say that a £1 billion industry is being put in jeopardy.
The Government have recognised the particular difficulties of the English language sector, however, by creating the extended student visa route, allowing applicants to come here for 11 months, which is non-renewable. They are not allowed to work or bring in dependants, or to switch into other routes including tier 4. When this was announced in December 2010, the Minister said that he would monitor it closely to ensure that it did not become a loophole and take a decision on whether to make it permanent in due course. I understand that it is working well so far. I should like the Minister to tell us when a decision will be taken on incorporating this route into the rules.
In the past, some English language and FE colleges have been used as a way of gaining entry to the UK with the intention of working illegally. It would be useful to know whether the Minister has details of the attendance records of those admitted under the extended student visa route since it came into force on January 10, and if not, how else he is monitoring the new route. I hope that the bogus colleges have been eliminated since it was provided that overseas students could apply only to those schools which are accredited and the list of schools was reduced by some 90 per cent to 1,500, all of which are registered with the UKBA. But there may still be a residual problem with individuals who apply to a genuine college simply to gain entry. If so, what obligations do the colleges have to report unexplained absences to the UKBA, and are any statistics available on those absences as an indication of the use of education as a continuing route to illegal entry? I ask this question believing that the loophole has been finally closed, but it would be useful to have that reassurance from the Minister.
An additional problem has been created for the English language sector in that the Government suddenly decided at the end of July, without any consultation, that it was going to be subject to a new inspection regime in substitution for the one that has been operated—as far as I am concerned, perfectly satisfactorily —by the British Council for many years. This will be a monopoly handed to the Independent Schools Inspectorate, which has no experience or knowledge of the sector and intends to charge four times as much as the British Council has in the past. Since the BC/Accreditation UK inspection scheme is fit for purpose, which I ask the Minister to acknowledge, the right answer as proposed by the schools is that BIS and DfE should jointly designate the private further education sector as subject to regulation and approve BC/Accreditation UK as an inspection body under the powers of the Education Act 2002. Would my noble friend the Minister be kind enough to comment on that proposal? I shall ask him to address the overall problems of the sector that English UK has drawn to my attention, which are too numerous, complex and potentially disastrous to be covered adequately in this debate.
The rationale for the statement is clearly set out in the impact assessment: that too many migrants have been allowed to enter the UK and that the Government's aim is to reduce the level of net migration to sustainable levels. As students make up the majority of non-EU immigrants, yet we do not propose putting a limit on their numbers, we have to make it harder for student applicants to enter and harder to sustain themselves by working part-time while they are studying if they are not the brightest and best. Deterring students from coming to Britain will certainly reduce the numbers, but on the Government’s own estimate it will do so at a cost of £2.4 billion a year to the economy—as mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, and my noble friend Lady Hamwee—and possibly even more in the long term. Of course it is necessary to ensure that every student who enters the UK is studying at a bona fide education institution towards a qualification that will enhance their prospects when they return home, as the IA emphasises, but the statement does nothing directly to eliminate bogus providers, which I presume, as I have said already, have been eliminated by the inspection regimes put in place over recent years. It concentrates entirely on making life harder for all students, the legitimate as well as those who in the past have used the education route as a means of entering the country with the intention of illegal working.
It has been said by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, and my noble friend that no impact assessment was published for the previous statement of changes. The one that we are looking at today, although it does not say so, covers both this and the previous statement. Will the Government give an undertaking that Parliament will never again be asked to consider changes to the Immigration Rules unless we are provided with an IA?
The IA states that we need to filter out those who contribute least and who pose the highest immigration risk. There may be good reasons for the accreditation by Ofsted and its devolved equivalents of all tier 4 sponsors and for making them all highly trusted sponsors, as suggested in the IA, but are these changes in the statement? I do not see them either in the statement or in the Explanatory Memorandum. HTS accreditation costs £14,000, and I am told that all colleges, including those offering only the extended student visitor courses of up to 11 months not covered by tier 4, need to obtain this status in order to be considered favourably by applicants and their agents overseas.
I do not see, either, the changes in the English Language requirement mentioned on page 11 of the impact assessment, demanding B2 for undergraduates and above, and B1 for lower-level courses. Perhaps the Minister could point out where this is mentioned in the statement. There is enough paperwork to be digested in assessing the statement without the inclusion of text that refers to some other provision.
The estimates given for the reduction in student numbers and the costs and benefits arising from the changes in this statement and its predecessor, taken together, are subject to huge margins of uncertainty, as the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, pointed out. Increases in the levels of fees are bound to put off many applicants as well and the danger is that the combined effect of these increases and the present changes, together with increased competition from overseas, will seriously damage an industry that, according to an independent study for BIS, produces something like £14 billion of annual exports, potentially increasing to £26 billion in 2025. Reductions in the fee income from overseas students may undermine the high standards that we have always maintained in both higher and further education, driving students into the arms of our competitors and producing negative feedback—a threat not taken into consideration in the IA. Nor has account been taken of the intangible loss of the tens of thousands of former students who have attended our universities and colleges of further education all over the world and the links that they have with the United Kingdom.
The Government’s commitment to reducing immigration numbers, and their inability to attack other routes such as work or asylum, have led them to concentrate on education, relying on dodgy and unverifiable statistics and ignoring inconvenient responses to the consultation to arrive at conclusions already determined. I certainly hope that I am wrong in fearing the damage that may be caused by the measures that we are taking. I hope that my noble friend will be able to offer me an assurance that the Government will closely monitor the immediate effects of the changes in this and the previous statement on the higher and further education sector, and be prepared with remedial policies if it does turn out that we have impaired the contribution that they make to our economy by even more than the £2.4 billion we are already throwing away.
Lord Clement-Jones
My Lords, I should like briefly to add to the comments made by both my noble friends, with whom I am in total agreement. Indeed, I very much welcome today’s debate. I declare an interest as chairman of the Council of the School of Pharmacy, University of London.
It is already very clear through this debate that the process and outcome of the consultation, impact assessment and change in the rules have been grossly unsatisfactory. Although it was rather strange, I suppose that the qualified welcome given by some institutions to the March statement by the Home Secretary and the attendant statement of intent was explained by the fact that many in higher education were expecting worse. However, that does not mean that any of them are by any manner of means in agreement with the current state of play.
I want to talk, in particular, about the closure of the post-study work route visa, on which I have asked quite a number of questions over the past two years. The Government’s response to the Home Affairs Select Committee and correspondence to me from the immigration ministry are interesting in that they show that the Minister and the Home Office seem to have greatly underestimated the importance of the post-study work aspect of coming to a United Kingdom university.
As vice-chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary China Group, I have had a great deal of contact over the years with Chinese students in particular. I believe that some 80,000 to 100,000 students from China are here at any one time. The opportunity to undertake what is essentially an internship with a UK business after graduating, to prepare for a career back in China, has played a very important part in the decision by Chinese students to come here. In the response to the Home Affairs Select Committee report, the Minister said:
“We want to ensure students come for a limited period and to study not to work”.
In his letter to me of 27 July, the Minister put it rather differently:
“Tier 4 should be about coming to the UK to gain a high-quality education and not about finding a route to work in the UK through undertaking a course”.
However, that completely misunderstands the reason for the post-study work route visa. It is a route to having brief work experience here in the UK and thereafter to working long-term back in the home country with the skills acquired.
The tier 2 route visa will be granted only on a case-by-case basis. If we were able to unpack the responses to the consultation, which we are not, I am sure that a better solution could easily be found—certainly looking at the evidence to the Home Affairs Select Committee—to tighten up the PSWR mechanism under tier 4. That would be much more satisfactory. As it is, it will make our higher education institutions much less attractive to overseas students. As we know, and as has been mentioned by all speakers so far, the impact assessment for the new rules came out extremely late in a very unsatisfactory fashion. That, as we also know, was commented on by the Merits Committee on two occasions, and we now know that some £3.5 billion gross of income and economic activity could be at risk as a result. That potentially has a huge impact on our education sector and it puts that sector considerably at risk on the basis of little evidence of abuse of the post-study work route visa.
It is right to say, as the Merits Committee does, that it is not clear from the impact assessment or the Explanatory Memorandum to the June statement how the findings from the consultation have fed into the development of the policy or the estimates of the costs and benefits of the changes. I think that that is an entirely uncontroversial statement in the light of what we have heard today. That is despite the statement in paragraph 8.1 of the statement of changes. As we know, the consultation was rushed through in only a month, which itself was grossly unsatisfactory and, sadly, these new rules have taken effect in those circumstances. It is vital that the new rules are kept under review and I hope that the Minister can give an undertaking that that will happen after a very short period of operation. It would have been better if these rules had not gone through but, on the basis that they have, I very much hope that the Minister can give an undertaking that such a review will take place.
The experience of Australia is an extremely salutary lesson in these circumstances. When the Immigration Rules were changed, as the Home Affairs Select Committee reported, there was a slump in applications from overseas to Australian universities, from which they are still recovering.
Finally, the Home Affairs Select Committee report, which is an extremely good document, said that the committee members were not persuaded that students are migrants. The Minister, in his reply to the report, said that he disagreed, claiming that the definition was long-standing under UN measures. That does not make it right. It is high time that rationality prevailed and that students are not regarded as migrants unless they are here for the longer term after graduating.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, for the opportunity to debate this Motion. A large number of points have been raised. I am eager to deal with the issues to which they give rise but clearly I shall have to deal with most of them in writing, as noble Lords have been quite wide-ranging.
The Motion before us deals with changes to tier 4 of the immigration system covering international students. The issue at hand is how the findings from the consultation have fed into the development of the policy and the estimates of the costs and benefits of the changes.
When the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, started, he told us about the importance of overseas students. He is, of course, quite right and I absolutely agree with him, but only in respect of genuine students who have come here to study at our world-class academic institutions. That is why we are devoting our attention particularly to the private education sector, where there is much abuse, although we are doing well to reduce it. However, I am at one with the noble Lord regarding universities. He will know that they enjoy considerable advantages under our policies. For example, we have introduced flexibility into universities on the English language requirements, on the ability to work and on the ability to bring in dependants.
The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, talked about loss of income from the UKBA. Although there will be a reduction in fees paid to the UKBA, the agency has made allowance for this in its business planning. I hope that he agrees that the UKBA exists to keep our borders secure and not just to turn over visa fees. He claimed the credit for the previous action to deal with bogus students but the previous Government only started that and left this Government with considerable work to do.
The noble Lord referred to the 35th report from your Lordships’ Merits Committee, which states that:
“The Committee regrets that it is not clear from the IA or the Explanatory Memorandum how the findings from the consultation have fed into the development of the policy or the estimates of the costs and benefits of the changes”.
Your Lordships will recall that the House debated the first set of changes to the student route on 16 May. At that time, the impact assessment for the student changes had not been published. However, the impact assessment for the changes to the student route was published when we made the second set of changes on 13 June. I reiterate my previous reassurance that we are quite clear that it is right and proper to provide the Merits Committee with the information necessary for it to do its job.
However, the issue having been raised, it would be remiss of me not to put this again in the context of the previous practice in this area. While it is generally accepted as good practice, there is no legal obligation for the UKBA to consult on changes to the Immigration Rules. In March 2010, the previous Government made significant changes to tier 4—the student route—without a formal public consultation. Despite taking the views of key partners, they did not publish any formal explanation of the findings. Similarly, in March 2006, following consultation, the previous Government published their policy for a points-based system but did not publish the 517 consultations that they received.
I am satisfied that this Government have gone to great lengths to seek the views of the public and of the sector, and to take account of these views in developing our final policy. On 23 November 2010, the Home Secretary informed Parliament that she intended to hold a public consultation on reforming the student visa system. This process began on 7 December, when the Home Secretary announced our proposals and the consultation paper was published. The consultation ran until 31 January 2011—shorter than a standard 12 weeks but that was in order to announce decisions at a time that would allow the sector and students to plan for the following academic year.
Our consultation received over 30,000 responses—10 times as many as the consultation on economic routes—and officials spoke to representatives of over 200 institutions during the consultation period. On 22 March, the Home Secretary made a full statement in the other place setting out the detail of the Government’s decisions, and the public reaction and data that had informed those decisions. On 31 March, we published a detailed statement of intent describing the full policy package and lay changes to the Immigration Rules to implement the first changes resulting from the consultation, which came into effect on 21 April. On 13 June, we lay the second set of changes to the Immigration Rules and published the impact assessment.
It is true that, like the previous Government, we have not published every consultation response. As I mentioned, there were over 30,000 responses online and over 200 longer written responses. We published a summary of the online responses to all questions asked and answered in the consultation. We also indicated the level of support in relation to every response. We felt that this was helpful information for Parliament and interested parties to have. The government code of practice on consultations states that:
“Following a consultation exercise, the Government should provide a summary of who responded to the consultation exercise and a summary of the views expressed … Consideration should be given to publishing the individual responses received”,
but, in this instance, the volume of responses made that impracticable.
The level of response demonstrates a high level of public engagement with the policy development processes. The changes that we have made to our final policy show that we have genuinely listened to and taken account of the views expressed. For example, we initially proposed raising the minimum level of English to an upper immediate level and required secure English language tests for all students. This received a clear, negative response from institutions, who indicated that pre-university pathway courses provided a vital route for international students to access our world-class universities.
Baroness Hamwee
My Lords, I wonder if the noble Earl could clarify—if not now, then at a later time—the basis of the use of the responses to the consultation. I was not entirely clear whether he was saying that it was factual information that was not used, and that other sources were used, or whether it was something wider than that.
Earl Attlee
My main point was that the consultation was responding to the policy rather than giving us detailed data on the likely effect of the policy.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath
My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, who seems to be working very hard today.
First of all, I echo the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, about the work of the Merits Select Committee, of which she is a distinguished member. It is very difficult for noble Lords to go through all the statutory instruments and statements of changes, and without the Committee we would be in a very difficult position as far as parliamentary scrutiny is concerned. Essentially this debate is about two issues. One is parliamentary process and the information provided by the Home Office; and it is also about the policy. On the issue of parliamentary process, it is very important that the Home Office learns lessons from the way in which this statement and previous statements have been produced for when further changes in Immigration Rules are brought before your Lordships’ House.
The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, has said that this is not the first such occasion, and indeed it is not. We come back consistently to this House to debate these changes because of the inadequacy of the department’s approach. The noble Earl said that his department readily takes on board the points made by the Merits Select Committee, but so far it has not. We continuously come back to debate these issues because the Merits Select Committee has identified inadequacies in his department’s approach. I have very little confidence that we will not be back in another few weeks with further discussion on the same basis.
The noble Earl has kindly offered to write to noble Lords on points to which he has not responded—he always does and it is appreciated—and I hope that his department will take this to heart. I thought it was very interesting when the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, said that the problem with the IA was that it only had two options: the do-nothing option, or the option of taking what the Home Office wants to do. Rather surprisingly, the Government have come to the view that the Home Office got it right in the first place. I am sure that we are all reassured that, after rigorous consideration of the Home Office’s original proposals, they have indeed, through the IA, come to the view that that is the right approach. Normally on IAs, one seems to get a series of options where I think one can get a more considered view, and I would hope for that in the future.
I too would pay tribute to the ILPA. I thought that the briefing paper it produced for us was, as ever, very comprehensive. Very interesting were the examples that it gave of people who would be badly affected by these proposals and changes. I hope that the noble Earl will have some time to have a look at these examples, because I think that they bring home to us how these changes can have a real impact on people from other countries.
The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, spoke about the impact of English language schools, and I agreed with everything that he said. I thought that he put a very pertinent point to the noble Earl about the proposal to change from the accreditation scheme to the monopolistic provider that is now going to be provided in relation to inspection, which will be very expensive indeed. The noble Earl gave the reasoned response that he thought this was going to be a more effective and more rigorous scrutiny. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, might feel able to bring this back in some form because I think that it warrants further debate. I am particularly worried about the monopolistic issue and the cost, and I hope that there will be an opportunity to debate this further in due course.
I very much agreed with the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, who spoke from his experience of the School of Pharmacy. My experience is particularly in the health field. Throughout the world we have wonderful contacts with healthcare systems in other countries, and it is because we have always had this marvellous open door, with people from other countries who often come to help the NHS. My fear is that it is not just the change in the rules that will make a difference but the change in the atmosphere; people from other countries will get the feeling that they are no longer wanted here to study, and that is a major concern.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath
Yes, my Lords, but surely the point is to deal with the abuse in a holistic way and not stop legitimate people coming here. I fear that the changes will have that dampener impact. I really do.
On the question of consultation, I, like the noble Baroness, was rather confused by the Minister’s response. The Government seem to dismiss these responses because they commented on the policy or because they were unrepresentative. I do not know who decided that they were unrepresentative; it is almost as if the Government have decided that anyone who does not like the policy should not be listened to because they are unrepresentative. I just point out to him—and I am indebted to my noble friend Lord Rosser for referring to this—that the Merits Committee in paragraph 10 says that the committee very much regrets the lack of information and how the findings from the consultation fed into the conclusions and estimates that the Government have made. As the committee says,
“the estimation of costs to educational establishments would benefit from”,
consultees, and it is,
“regrettable as the Government presumably received some useful information given that the consultation specifically asked about the main advantages/disadvantages of the changes”.
If you are commenting on the general policy, I would have thought that you were actually talking about the main advantages and disadvantages of the changes. That really gives the game away. The fact is that all those legitimate organisations involved in education know that this has been a disastrous change in policy; they told the Government that and the Government take no notice. No wonder they have not fed that into the results of this statement of changes.
This has been a thoroughly good debate. Once again, the Government have found themselves rather lonely on this policy. That is because this policy is wrong and highly damaging to this country. I of course withdraw the Motion, but I hope that the Government will listen to what noble Lords have said tonight.
Localism Bill
(12 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
“Community land trusts and leasehold enfranchisement
(1) The Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 is amended as follows.
(2) After section 302 insert—
“302A Community land trust and leasehold enfranchisement
(1) Regulations may make provision for securing that in prescribed circumstances—
(a) an enfranchisement right is not exercisable in relation to dwellings owned (whether freehold or leasehold) by a community land trust as defined in section 79 of this Act, or (b) the exercise of an enfranchisement right in relation to that land is subject to modifications provided for by the regulations.(2) Each of the following is an “enfranchisement right”—
(a) the right under Part 1 of the Leasehold Reform Act 1967 to acquire the freehold of a house (enfranchisement),(b) the right under Chapter 1 of Part 1 of the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 (collective enfranchisement in case of tenants of flats), and(c) the right under section 180 of the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 (right to acquire social housing).(3) The regulations may—
(a) confer discretionary powers on the Secretary of State, a community land trust or any other specified person, and(b) require notice to be given by a community land trust in any case where, as a result of the regulations, an enfranchisement right is not exercisable or is exercisable subject to modifications.””
Lord Best
My Lords, this amendment is about community land trusts and enfranchisement. Community land trusts acquire land from benevolent landowners or public bodies with a social concern free of charge or at a much reduced price. They then build homes for renting and shared ownership using the cheap or free land as the subsidy that makes the homes affordable. This means that they can keep the homes as affordable to those on modest incomes for present and future generations. They are very local, although they may use a housing association to help them; they work with the planners, the parish council, the landowner and volunteers. Very often they are self-help organisations in which future residents play a major part.
The community land trusts are real big society stuff. However, they have a problem in relation to the Leasehold Reform Act 1967, which entitles the occupier to acquire the freehold and remove thereby the opportunity for others in future to benefit from the initial gift or concession on the land price. Similarly, the right to acquire under the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 can remove the property from its original purpose. This amendment seeks to protect the homes built through community land trusts from legislation that can undermine the whole basis on which they are set up to operate. It is not a denial of rights of tenants or shared owners, because those moving in are very willingly, indeed enthusiastically, signing up to getting homes that they could not otherwise afford. They do so in the full knowledge that they will benefit from the excellent accommodation, but any capital gains that they might make will not include the appreciation of the land value.
The community land trust approach, which is being used in east London as part of the Olympic legacy measures, as well as in rural areas, where benevolent landlords are making land available on highly beneficial terms, deserves our support. Removal of the enfranchisement arrangements, which were never intended to cover circumstances of this kind, seems essential to secure their future. Homes developed under the community right to build, of which I am also very supportive, will have the benefit of an exemption from the leasehold enfranchisement arrangements. This amendment would give the same exemption to community land trusts. I understand that the National CLT Network Board, which seeks to promote local community land trusts, has been advised that the local projects could convert into community right to build organisations, which would solve their enfranchisement problem. The community right to build schemes require a majority of the governing body to be local residents. This might not be an insuperable problem for a community land trust, as they are often extremely local, but the community right to build route requires that the project must eventually go to a referendum before proceeding, even if the parish council and planning authority and everyone else is very happy with it. That can be very worrying for landowners, local volunteers, prospective residents and lenders to the project. It means uncertainty, delay and possible local conflict. It would seem far simpler, less bureaucratic and more likely to encourage gifts of land and engage those big society volunteers locally if community land trusts could be taken out of the enfranchisement legislation, as this amendment proposes.
I know that Ministers are supportive of the community land trust approach and I assure them that acceptance of an amendment along these lines would be enormously important and greatly appreciated by all the supporters of this excellent way of creating affordable housing and guaranteeing its affordability in perpetuity. I beg to move.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Best, for introducing this amendment and for his description of the Community Land Trusts approach. We have a good deal of sympathy with the thrust of this because we have seen the benefit of the Government’s reply to the amendment in the document they issued in August. Of course, this was one of the amendments that was withdrawn at the last stages of Committee.
As we have heard, these powers seek to replicate provisions already in the Bill relating to community right to build orders. The amendment seeks to remove enfranchisement rights in respect of dwellings owned by CLTs, and enfranchisement rights give leaseholders the right to acquire freeholds in certain circumstances—legislation, as the noble Lord referred to, that was started by the Leasehold Reform Act 1967, but I think those opportunities have been greatly extended since.
As I understand it, the gist of the Government’s position appears to be that CLTs do not necessarily have the same level of community engagement as bodies do under the community right to build provisions, which are proposed by the community, supported by the community, subject to a community referendum. However, where the CLT does satisfy the level of community engagement, it will be able to apply for a community right to build order and thereby obtain the benefit of disapplication of enfranchisement rights. But I am bound say, therefore, that I am not sure why, where there are circumstances that permit this, they could not be described in the prescribed circumstances that the noble Lord is seeking in his amendment. Proposed subsection (1) says,
“regulations may make provisions for securing that in prescribed circumstances, an enfranchisement right”—
et cetera. So why could what the noble Lord describes not be encompassed in that way?
I think that the noble Lord makes a good point about referendums in relation to community right to build orders. In circumstances where there is clearly a very high degree of support for a project, why indeed put the project through the process, cost and challenges that this entails? It does appear that one way or another there is a route to the result that the noble Lord is seeking, which is all well and good, and I agree that we should not be seeking to remove enfranchisement rights lightly—these are important rights. I think that he has described fully why they should be removed in these sorts of circumstances.
I therefore support the thrust of the noble Lord’s amendment. I believe that they should not be forced through the community right to build process just to achieve the outcome here and that it could be dealt with by regulations that, as his amendment suggests, fully cover the situation.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, enfranchisement rights are an established and significant right, and removing them must not be undertaken lightly. We expect to use the community right to build powers to ensure that the enfranchisement rights are only removed where the proposal is by the community, for the community and has the backing of the community through a community referendum, as identified by the noble Lord, Lord Best.
I understand that the regulation-making power provided for by the amendment is expected to be used to disapply enfranchisement rights simply where a CLT is the landlord of the property. There is, however, no requirement for a CLT to be made up of members of the community and there is no requirement for a community referendum. This means that a CLT development may not be proposed or supported by the community. I am afraid that the removal of these significant rights cannot be justified. The design of the community right to build will allow the majority of CLTs to apply for a community right to build order. As such, they will be able to benefit from the disapplication of enfranchisement rights under a community right to build order, again as explained by the noble Lord, Lord Best. With these reassurances, I hope that the noble Lord is willing to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Best
I am willing to withdraw the amendment but I am not entirely reassured. The removal of rights implies that the people moving in believe themselves to have earned new rights—the right to enfranchise and make capital gains—which is entirely contrary to the position that they in reality face. They know that they are entering this scheme, acquiring an affordable home that they could never possibly afford otherwise, and the terms are that they will not gain from the capital growth in the value of the property. That is a very fair deal for them to be part of, and I do not think that it is a removal of rights to say that they cannot enfranchise thereafter. It is a willingly-entered-into arrangement. So, although at this late hour I am very happy to withdraw this amendment, I am not entirely reassured by the noble Earl’s reply, for which I am grateful, as I am for the support from the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
“Homes and Communities Agency: annual report
In Schedule 1 to the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 (the Homes and Communities Agency), after sub-paragraph (1)(a) of paragraph 11 insert—“(aa) state within the report, in particular, the total number of new properties delivered during each year, also specifying, in respect of new properties in the area of each local housing authority—(i) how many are located within a settlement of fewer than 10,000, and fewer than 3,000, inhabitants;(ii) the number let on long leases, fixed-term shorthold tenancies, and periodic tenancies;(iii) levels of rent;(iv) the number designed for use as housing for older people;(v) the number designed for use as housing for other vulnerable groups;(vi) the size as defined by the number of bedrooms;(vii) information on such other categories as may appear to the HCA to be appropriate or may be specified by the Secretary of State.””
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, my amendment is quite simple and seeks to place an obligation on the Homes and Communities Agency to produce certain information in its annual report. All the information, I understand, is available, some I accept is already published at least every year, and in some cases at least every six months. Having said that, I do not accept that this would be an unmanageable burden or that it is unnecessary or inappropriate to require the agency to produce such information in its annual report. I would contend that this is just the sort of information that the HCA should be including in their annual report. It is also valuable in the review document for the organisation that they clearly detail the number of new properties they have delivered on, what the level of rents are and who they are serving.
This amendment was tabled in Committee but not taken. If the noble Earl is not minded to accept it, in what other ways will the Government ensure that this important information gets out there? While it is one thing to say that the information is already out there, if you are not sure where it is, how it is collected or where it is located in the first place—or whether it is in a number of different places—then getting all the information, making comparisons and being able to comment with an informed mind becomes much more difficult. I beg to move.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, the noble Lord described his amendment as simple; experience shows that simple amendments can sometimes be the most dangerous. The information that this amendment would require to be included within the annual report is either reported on already or is available to members of the public, should they request it. For example, information on the total number of homes delivered each year is provided in the HCA’s official statistics, which are published every six months. The HCA also collects information on the number of habitable rooms per property and reports this to my department. No doubt if other types of information became desirable to collect, they would be collected without the need for any legislation.
I do not believe that it is necessary to prescribe in statute that these specific information requirements are included in the HCA’s annual report when the information is either already being collected and reported on or can be made available through existing channels. For these reasons, I hope that the noble Lord will withdraw his amendment.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, I thank the noble Earl for his response. Again, we are not going to agree on this. I am very worried that sometimes if the information is out there but you cannot find it or do not know where it is, there is an issue. People should be able to use and comment on it. Having said that, in this case I am prepared to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Shipley
“Leases to which section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 applies: general rule
In section 13(1) Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 (leases to which the provisions about repairing obligations in section 11 of that Act apply) after subsection (1) insert—“(1A) Section 11 also applies to any lease of a dwelling house granted on or after the day on which section 173 of the Localism Act 2011 came into force, for a term of less than 21 years.(1B) Section 11 also applies to a right of occupation given by contract or any enactment and not amounting to a lease as if the right were a lease; and “lease” and cognate expressions shall be construed accordingly.””
Lord Shipley
My Lords, in moving Amendment 84 I shall also speak to Amendments 86 to 90. These all relate to the standards of accommodation and repairing obligations. Amendment 84 will ensure that all tenants and other occupiers of housing with short terms have the benefit of repairing obligations. The Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 provides that the implied repairing obligations set out in its Section 11 only apply to leases of less than seven years. This Bill proposes to apply that Section 11 to secure and assured fixed-term tenancies of more than seven years to take account of the fact that the new, flexible tenancies may be granted for longer than seven years. The proposed new clause in my Amendment 84 gives all the tenants of all short leases of less than 21 years the benefit of implied repairing obligations, so this amendment is important.
Amendment 86 relates to the same Act, which currently provides that those who have previously held a lease for more than seven years and who have not previously had the benefit of the repairing obligations by landlords will still not gain the benefit of such obligations if they renew their lease with one of less than seven years. There seems to be no justification for excluding any short leases from the repairing obligations, which should surely apply to new short leases, irrespective of what length the previous lease was. This amendment would achieve that result.
Amendment 87 would make landlords responsible for repairing furniture, fixtures, fittings and appliances in furnished lettings. Section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 implies repairing obligations into all leases of less than seven years in those granted since 24 October 1961. They are required to,
“repair the structure and exterior of the dwelling-house”,
and,
“to keep in repair and proper working order the installations in the dwelling-house for the supply of water, gas and electricity and for sanitation”.
However, it makes no provision in relation to any furniture, fixtures, fittings or appliances provided by landlords in respect of furnished dwellings, such as beds, sofas, cookers, fridges and so on.
Although most people would expect landlords to be responsible for the furniture and fittings that they have supplied in furnished dwellings, few tenancy agreements—even those of social landlords—impose any specific repairing obligations in this respect. Most furnished lettings are granted by private landlords whose tenancy agreements often make no reference to repairing obligations at all. However, where there is any such reference it is usually only one to the terms implied by Section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985. In the absence of any specific term in the tenancy agreement covering furniture and so on, there is no obligation upon a landlord to repair or keep in working order the furniture or fittings that she or he has supplied. It is sometimes possible to argue for an implied term to make the landlord liable to repair in this situation, but this leaves the position uncertain and unnecessarily complicated in this regard.
The proposed amendment would ensure that the legal responsibility for furniture, fittings, fixtures and appliances in furnished tenancies falls where it should lie: namely, upon landlords. Given that furnished tenancies are usually short term, it is completely unrealistic to expect tenants to carry out such repairs themselves. These repairing obligations should fall on the landlord, not the tenant. This amendment would ensure that this was the case.
Amendment 88 would ensure that all tenants can live in housing that does not injure the occupier’s health. Again, it refers to the same Landlord and Tenant Act and the same obligations. The courts have decided that the obligation to repair arises only where there is disrepair—namely, where there has been deterioration from some former condition. As such, the obligation to repair does not usually cover design defects. However, sometimes unhealthy housing conditions arise not from disrepair but from design defects. The most common example is condensation dampness which occurs as a result of the construction of a dwelling house; namely, through inadequate insulation, ventilation and/or heating, and not because of any disrepair to the structure or the installations supplied. The point is extremely important because currently tenants living in unhealthy conditions which arise as a result of design defects are unable to take any civil action to ensure that these conditions are rectified. While it may be possible for tenants to take action in the magistrates’ courts under the Environmental Protection Act 1990, no public funding is available to take such cases. Local authorities can also bring proceedings under the 1990 Act but, of course, are unable to bring proceedings against themselves.
Amendment 88 would enable tenants to take civil proceedings in order to make their landlords rectify design defects which render the premises injurious to the health of the occupiers. It seems only right in the 21st century that tenants of residential accommodation should expect to live in accommodation that does not injure their health and should be able to take steps to rectify the defects giving rise to these conditions whatever the cause. In relation to the installations in a dwelling house, tenants are already able to take civil action to rectify design defects which result in the specified installations not being in proper working order. They should also be able to take action when the defects affect, or will affect, their health.
The public spending implications of this are not great because the decent homes standard has improved the public housing stock. The main benefit of this amendment would be private tenants of rogue landlords, where the worst of the housing stock now rests. Indeed, giving such tenants a private remedy could reduce public spending because it would take some of the pressure off hard-pressed local authorities, which have the job of enforcing the housing standards in the Housing Act 2004, and could also provide savings to the National Health Service. The current necessity to draw a distinction between disrepair and design defects, as opposed to simply concentrating on the effects on the occupier, makes the law in relation to repairs unnecessarily complicated and results in the need for expert evidence on the cause of the problems. Removal of the distinction would greatly simplify the law in relation to disrepair. This proposal would therefore benefit not just those tenants who are presently living in unhealthy housing conditions but the civil justice system as well.
Amendment 89 would make landlords responsible for the repair of installations for ventilation, particularly extractor fans. The Landlord and Tenant Act 1985, as currently enacted, makes no provision in relation to installations for ventilation, save in respect of windows. Lack of ventilation is a common cause of condensation dampness in dwelling houses and is often prejudicial to health. Over the years many properties have been fitted with extractor fans in order to combat this problem. However, there is presently no obligation on landlords to keep such installations in repair or proper working order unless this is expressly provided for in the tenancy agreement. Few tenancy agreements, even those of social landlords, make specific reference to extractor fans, with the result that tenants have no remedies when extractor fans break down or do not work properly. Given that extractor fans are usually fitted by landlords, the responsibility for repairing them should fall on the landlord, not the tenant. This amendment would ensure that this was the case.
Finally, Amendment 90 seeks to ensure that all tenants and other occupiers of housing can live in housing that is fit for its purpose. In 1996, the Law Commission recommended that, subject to certain exceptions, an implied term of fitness should be imposed on all tenancies of less than seven years. This proposed new clause goes a little further in that it would apply the term not only to tenancies but to licences. It seems only right that any occupant of residential accommodation should be able to expect accommodation that is free from damp and has natural lighting, ventilation, a water supply and other basic facilities for sanitation and the cooking of food. At present, the other main repairing obligation in Section 11 of the 1985 Act is confined to matters of disrepair. Therefore, if a property is unfit in the respects mentioned above because, for example, of design defects, the occupier has no remedy. That cannot be right. A house with no damp-proof course could be rendered so damp as to cause the tenant pneumonia but there would be nothing in the tenancy agreement to compel a landlord to install one. On the other hand, if there was a damp-proof course in place that had failed through disrepair the tenant would have a contractual remedy. That is an absurd anomaly.
Public spending implications again are not great because a decent home standard has improved the public housing stock. Again, the main benefit of this amendment will be private tenants of rogue landlords, where the worst of the housing stock now rests. Indeed, giving such tenants a private remedy could reduce public spending because it would take some of the pressure from local authorities who have the job of enforcing housing standards in the Housing Act 2004.
In the recess, my noble friend the Minister replied to me following Committee stage. I should like to pursue a sentence in the letter that I received because it caused me some concern. I am sure that that was unintended but we need to clarify the record. In terms of repairing obligations on landlords, the letter states that,
“where there is no evidence to the contrary I am not prepared to increase burdens on landlords with the attendant risks for growth in the sector”.
It is inevitable that the private rented sector will grow but I am puzzled by what I would regard as the basic standards of accommodation, with basic attention to repair and maintenance of properties and enabling people who are tenants to live in accommodation that is fit for purpose. I do not see that as a risk for the sector. People have a right to expect a basic standard of accommodation and I hope very much that my noble friend will put my mind at rest and confirm that there should be applied a basic standard that needs to be delivered through amendments to the law. At present, too many private sector rented accommodation units are falling through the legislation that currently exists because it has not been modernised—well, in the past 25 years—to a standard that would reflect current modern needs.
Lord Beecham
My Lords, Newcastle is once again united. We are even more united now than we were under the previous Administration. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, on tabling these amendments and equally congratulate those who have briefed him so thoroughly with the material that he has brought to your Lordships’ House today. He has highlighted an important area of the national housing debate which has been subordinated in recent times to the simple question of household numbers, housebuilding and the long queue of people denied access to accommodation, including first-time buyers and their problems. Much of the emphasis has been simply around numbers and the owner-occupied sector.
The real problems addressed by the noble Lord’s amendments are to be found essentially in the private rented sector, which has received insufficient attention for many years under Governments of both parties, with the result that, as the noble Lord pointed out, far too many people are living in unsatisfactory accommodation. We are living in a letters’ market, as it were. Demand for rented accommodation is going up all the time and obviously property numbers are not going up to match. Reputable organisations are anticipating additional problems when changes in housing benefit come in, and already there is some indication that private landlords are reluctant to let to housing benefit tenants. There is huge pressure within this sector. As the noble Lord pointed out, that sector has much the highest rate of disrepair and the least degree of modernisation through to decent home standards. Therefore, there is a huge need for concentration on these problems. The very basic matters to which the noble Lord referred must be an essential part of the responsibility of any landlord.
There will be a slight irony if the Government resist the amendment. If the exterior of a property was at issue, Town and Country Planning Acts would apply. Owners can be made to tidy up the outside of their property, and even paint it, whatever the length of tenure or even if it is owner-occupied; but when it comes to the inside, as the noble Lord pointed out, these powers do not exist for far too many properties. Therefore, there is nothing wrong in principle with imposing obligations on owners—in this case, renting owners—because they are applicable to all owners as far as concerns the property exterior. One might have thought that, from the point of view of safety and health, the interior is more important. It is perfectly logical that legislation should be amended in the way proposed by the noble Lord.
I will sound a cautionary note. The noble Lord referred to the availability of civil proceedings once the measures pass into law. Again, I remind noble Lords that access to the courts by this group of potential litigants is likely to be affected by the pending changes to legal aid. If current proposals go through, only under exceptional circumstances will legal aid be available to assist tenants in enforcing repair obligations of this kind. Perhaps that should be borne in mind in future debates. I hope that the noble Lord and his colleagues will join Members on all sides of your Lordships' House in investigating those steps very thoroughly, because these matters are not divisible. If we are looking at the housing situation holistically, we must look not only at obligations but also at methods of enforcement. The noble Lord touched on them. We must be sure that those methods remain available to the people who will need them.
I hope that the Minister will respond sympathetically to the suggestions contained in the amendments. I represent an area that has a significant private rented accommodation sector. There are a number of very poor landlords and a licensing scheme that is beginning to have some impact. I hope that that experience, which is reflected in many places, will be improved by the Government giving fair wind to the noble Lord's proposals.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, I will speak only very briefly in this debate as the Newcastle duo—the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, and my noble friend Lord Beecham—have covered the matter thoroughly. We support the thrust of the amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Shipley. They address real issues and I am grateful to him for raising them. I look forward to the response of the noble Lord, Lord Taylor.
Lord Taylor of Holbeach
Well, my Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, and I know that when the Toons are on the run we are in a bit of trouble. However, I welcome the chance to address my noble friend’s amendments, because the debate draws attention to the very important issue of the quality of our housing stock, in particular the rented sector. My noble friend's amendments are all interrelated. They argue a case that unfortunately the Government cannot accept. We believe that the current division of responsibilities and obligations between landlord and tenant is the right one. Having said that, we are not complacent on the issue.
The main focus of my noble friend's amendments is to allow tenants to take action through the civil courts against a landlord who fails to provide safe accommodation. His proposals draw attention to concerns about the condition of some of the housing offered for private rent. There is some evidence that the stock is improving, but we are all keen to see more improvements. However, a mechanism already exists by which tenants can be safeguarded. It has not been mentioned by any noble Lord contributing to the debate. The Housing Act 2004 introduced the housing health and safety rating system—HHSRS, as it is commonly known. The HHSRS applies to all private sector housing regardless of tenure. It provides a framework within which a local authority can inspect a home and assess it against 29 hazards. I shall not list them—I do not actually have them to hand—but they include exactly the sort of situation which my noble friend is talking about: damp and mould, dangerous fumes, hazards of falls and matters concerning the facilities for domestic and personal hygiene. It therefore largely covers the types of hazards which are of concern to my noble friend. Where a local authority discovers such a hazard in someone’s home, depending on its severity, it has a range of powers at its disposal. It can make a hazard safe and charge the landlord or require the landlord to make repairs. Where a landlord does not comply, he can receive a heavy fine and a criminal conviction can follow. All this can be triggered simply by a tenant complaining to the local authority, in contrast to the legislation which my noble friend seeks to amend which is dependent on the tenant taking the landlord to court. The noble Lord, Lord Beecham, referred to the cost, time and difficulty of any legal process. Given that these safeguards already exist as a result of the measure introduced by the previous Government, I ask my noble friend to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Shipley
My Lords, I am glad that the Minister is not complacent, but I think that this issue is not being taken seriously enough by the Government and that there will be increasing problems in coming months and years because of the rise in demand for private rented stock. With the law so inadequately defined in so many respects around things such as extractor fans, furniture, fittings, damp courses and so on, one of the consequences will be that conditions in the private rented sector are going to worsen. For that reason, I continue to believe it to be absolutely right that the Government have the responsibility to do something about it.
All these amendments are directed in part by a lack of clarity in the law. I entirely understand what the Minister is saying about the recourse people currently have to potential remedies, particularly through local councils, but the difficulty is that there are problems in the interpretation of the law—for example, between design defects and defects that occur because repairs need to be undertaken to an existing fitting. These are material considerations for a Government who are concerned, for example, about standards of public health. I shall withdraw the amendment, but I hope we can engage in further discussion about some of the issues that have been raised.
One of the problems that we have at the moment, being on Report on a matter that was not debated in Committee, is that we have not had the benefit of that further discussion. It has occurred here and in other amendments, and it may yet occur in one or two further amendments. That is a defect in our procedures because we have not had the time to do justice to some of the housing amendments. That having been said, and in the expectation that we can engage in further discussion on these matters, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Shipley
“Standards for private sector lettings and management agents
The Secretary of State may by regulations set the standards that private sector lettings agents and management agents must adhere to.”
Lord Shipley
My Lords, I shall also speak to Amendment 92. Amendment 91 would insert a new clause to give power to the Secretary of State to lay down in regulations the standards that private sector letting agents and management agents must adhere to. This would enable the Secretary of State, at a later date, to lay down statutory guidance to regulate private letting agents. A similar provision was passed recently in Scottish legislation. As there are currently no regulations governing the conduct of letting agents, such a clause would act as a starting point for a debate on what sort of regulation would be effective.
Both tenant and landlord organisations have long reported problems with private sector letting agencies, including the charging of exorbitant fees, failure to enforce basic health and safety standards in properties and inadequate client money protection provisions. The situation is such that the largest professional body for letting agents in the UK, the Association of Residential Letting Agents, which has been at the forefront of self-regulation, is strongly in favour of statutory regulation to tackle problems in the industry. This amendment is also supported by the British Property Federation, the National Landlords Association and housing charities.
The amendment would allow the Secretary of State, following further consideration and consultation, to specify new standards for the regulation of letting agents. It does not require guidance to be drafted immediately but ensures that the possibility is open, and will act as a starting point for a debate on how best to regulate the sector. There would of course have to be wide consultation on the scope and nature of any regulations, but the Bill is likely to be the best legislative opportunity to make progress on this issue for a significant period.
Around 60 per cent of private landlords use one of the estimated 8,000 letting agents or managing agents in England. However, half these agents do not belong to any of the professional trade bodies. Research has shown that tenant satisfaction levels are lower—reportedly 71 per cent—where the property is managed by an agent than where it is managed by a landlord directly, reported to be 81 per cent. In an online survey of 1,289 tenants who visited the Citizens Advice website over a three-month period, it was found that 73 per cent were dissatisfied with the service provided by their letting agent. Less than one-third of agents willingly provided full written details of their charges to CAB workers when asked. There are particular concerns in relation to letting and management agents having a lack of expertise and firms not having professional indemnity insurance or client money protection.
The current voluntary approach has significant drawbacks, with the worst agents being the least likely to submit to a voluntary scheme. Voluntary regulation, covering only an estimated half of all agents, is unfair, as it creates extra hurdles for the more reputable agents while not doing so for those who are most likely to be responsible for problems. The Association of Residential Letting Agents believes that the quickest and most effective method to eliminate unprofessional, unqualified and unethical agents from the rental market is through statutory provision via this amendment.
There is currently no mandatory licensing scheme for letting agents or landlords in the UK despite 95 per cent of consumers believing that there should be. The Association of Residential Letting Agents introduced a licensing scheme for its members in May 2009 which ensures the highest standards of service for those who use members of the scheme. Its introduction was supported by a wide variety of organisations including Trading Standards, Shelter and the National Landlords Association. The scheme delivers higher standards of service for tenants by ensuring that licensed members abide by the relevant codes of practice and rules of conduct, hold recognised qualifications and are covered by professional indemnity insurance, a recognised client money protection scheme and an independent redress scheme. The licensing scheme has many other facets to improve service, such as ensuring that all members undertake at least 12 hours of continuing professional development each year.
I do not regard this amendment as contentious. It seems eminently sensible because it is simply providing a means whereby statutory legislation can be introduced by giving the power to the Secretary of State to do so at some future date.
Finally, Amendment 92 relates to a slightly different issue but it extends the courts’ discretion to postpone or suspend the execution of possession orders in cases where there is no specific statutory power to do so. The problem is that Section 89 of the Housing Act 1980 severely restricted the power of the courts to suspend the effect of possession orders in cases where the courts had no specific statutory power to do so but had, to that point, relied on their general powers. The effect of this was that no possession order could ordinarily be suspended for longer than two weeks; in cases of exceptional hardship the court could suspend further, but only up to six weeks. The effect of this has been that an evicted tenant and his or her family are only permitted two, or at most six, weeks to find alternative accommodation whatever the circumstances of the family as regards, for example, size, medical or location needs or education.
Even if those restrictions were realistic in 1980, they are now out of date, in view of the continued pressure on the availability of affordable housing, the recent reductions in the provision of housing benefit and the increase in the types of tenancy to which Section 89 applies since it was enacted. To find alternative accommodation within the timescale provided by the 1980 Act is virtually impossible, and has been for some time, yet the courts have no power to order more. This amendment would simply enable a court to exercise greater flexibility in considering the suspension of possession orders and to allow the appropriate length in the circumstances of the case, balancing the hardship to the tenant caused by the eviction against the landlord’s need for the property. I beg to move.
Lord Whitty
My Lords, I support Amendment 92. Those of us who are looking at the housing market recognise that the role of the private rented sector is likely to increase and that there are serious problems with both quality and delivery within that sector. I am sorry I had to be out of the Chamber when Amendment 85, on the accreditation of private landlords, was debated. However, the vast majority of tenants and potential tenants will come across the property via an agent, and, as the noble Lord says, their actual arrangements for rent, repair and general customer service will be with the agent, not directly with the individual landlord. In those circumstances, the role of lettings agencies and management agencies is vital. Therefore, it is important that this Bill provides for some ability to set standards for them. As the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, said, it is very important that the professional trade bodies in that area—the National Landlords Association and the British Property Federation—support a degree of statutory intervention on this front for the very clear reason that good landlords, effective landlords and landlords concerned with service for tenants can get undercut by bodies that do not observe decent standards.
The amendment is permissive on the Minister and clearly will be subject to some assessment of need. However, as the noble Lord says, if we do not provide for some ability to issue regulations in this area, then a whole sector of housing provision will remain unregulated, with the better agents in that area being undermined by the worse. I hope that the Minister can at least give a positive response to this amendment.
Baroness Gardner of Parkes
My Lords, I apologise for my delay in getting back to the Chamber. I had jobs that I simply had to do in the House.
It is important to consider the impact of this in terms of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, of which I am a member. I wonder whether these are the sort of powers that that committee is very opposed to giving, because they are too wide and would mean that the Government could do pretty well whatever they wanted. I have clear memories of, I believe, the Wilson Government introducing rent controls, which had a disastrous effect. They appeared to work temporarily but were a terrible failure after that. Everyone found that their rents jumped up terribly, which was worse than if they had increased gradually. I have reservations on those two grounds and should like the Minister to take them into consideration.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 93 which, for the accountants here, follows Amendments 91 and 92. Most of the points relating to the tenancy relations services dovetail clearly with the other two amendments in the group. Amendment 93 requires all local housing authorities to provide a tenancy relations service. This proposed new clause would establish a statutory duty on each local housing authority to provide such a service, and its focus would be to foster good practice in the private rented sector.
The tenancy relations officer’s work will include taking steps to promote awareness of rights and responsibilities on the part of both landlords and tenants; conciliation and negotiation between the parties in the interests of resolving disputes; and, where necessary, assisting in the enforcement of duties and in the prosecution of landlords for the criminal offences of harassment and illegal eviction. I received a helpful reply from the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, about this point. The sum total from the Minister was that there is no need to legislate because local authorities already carry out such activities and duties.
I am sad to say that not all local authorities do that. With the cuts that are taking place in local authorities at the moment, they will perform these even less if there is no statutory duty so to do. Within the private sector, it may surprise some noble Lords that there is harassment and illegal eviction. There is a need to protect tenants from criminal offences. The legislation for homeless persons in properties without protection is very strong.
A tenancy relations service is needed. I shall give two examples from the past couple of weeks which occurred to me as a local councillor. A guy living in rented accommodation came to see me. He is being harassed by his landlord and it is a situation where one ethnic group is against another. He complained to the local authority and the police, both of whom told him to go away. There is no proof. I say to this man, “Go and find somewhere else to live. If it is that uncomfortable, it is probably insoluble”. The guy cannot find somewhere else to live because he needs a deposit and a guarantee.
The second case again took place in the past two weeks. A woman in this north-west London borough says that she cannot find a one-bedroom flat to rent because all landlords want a guarantee and a deposit, and they do not want her because she is on housing benefit. The idea that there is no need for a tenancy relations service is living in a bubble of Westminster which does not understand what happens in reality. Other legislation of this Parliament will put people into private accommodation without any choice and there will be a greater danger of tenants being put under intolerable pressure. Those people need a tenancy relations service which is statutory and not just voluntary. People go to their local housing association or local council but they are not helped if they are not a priority case and the council does not see a way to help them.
The noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, said that there are Citizens Advice and various other organisations. At the moment, they are under extreme pressure. People are queuing up. The bureaux are not answering the telephone. They have service level agreements with their local authority. They are well meaning and they help, but I find that there are many people who they do not help. Therefore, I hope that the Minister will find a means of incorporating a tenancy relations service within the amended legislation, which would dovetail well with the comments made by my noble friend Lord Shipley.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, perhaps I should start by declaring that I am a landlord of a property that is let through a letting agent in London, and it is in the register of interests. I shall take the amendments in reverse order.
I have a great deal of sympathy with the thrust of Amendment 93, spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, although I feel that it is overly prescriptive. No doubt in the private rented sector in particular there is enormous pressure, and we all know that that pressure is going to build and be exacerbated by what his Government are doing on housing benefit. It will put pressure on homelessness in that sector in particular. Of course there is bad practice, and we should support propositions which look to protect vulnerable tenants. He also made the excellent point that the organisations to which tenants traditionally may have looked, such as Citizens Advice, are under pressure because of funding.
Again, I have great sympathy with Amendment 92, but I would like to read the technicalities a bit better. The thrust of it is that it would give the courts some added leeway before actual possession is obtained. In the current climate, if people are being thrown out of their properties, that must be something which should gain our support.
On Amendment 91, I believe that just before we left Government, we did have proposals coming forward to do just what the amendment is seeking. The noble Lord may say that we took too long to get it done, but again I support regulation. It is interesting to note that good providers in the field, the good letting agents, also support this. They know that their reputations can be tarnished by bad practice out there and that they can be undercut by unscrupulous letting agents. We need some proper regulation in this sector.
I am therefore broadly supportive of the thrust of all these amendments. However, given where we are with the Bill, at the Report stage and just about to move out of the housing environment, it will not be until Third Reading that we get to this. I do not know what the Minister will be able to say in winding up the debate that will give us any assurance about progress, but along with the proposers of these amendments, we would like to see progress on all three fronts.
Lord Taylor of Goss Moor
I rise to speak very briefly. I suspect that for all sorts of reasons Ministers are going to be reluctant to go down the regulatory route and indeed that, while my memory may fail me on this, I had thought that the previous Government ultimately came to that conclusion as well, although they certainly investigated the possibility of taking it. However, I may be wrong. I just want to throw into the discussion that in the absence of regulation we must recognise the absolutely fundamental role the private sector will have in housing all sorts of vulnerable people because there are not enough houses in the social and affordable sectors. Furthermore, these people are often at the lowest end of the private sector market and, in those circumstances, they are very vulnerable. It seems that an opportunity has been consistently missed over the years to reward those landlords in the private sector who behave best and, indeed, to encourage landlords in the private sector to do some of the things associated with social housing.
For example, there is no recognition in the rents that are available through housing benefit if landlords are willing to give longer tenancies, and there is little likelihood of recognition of relative quality. I have never understood why we would allow payments through the state in terms of housing benefit to the worst landlords offering the meanest opportunities and yet do nothing to reward those who behave better. That reward could involve a voluntary system of signing up to charters. In particular there is an issue for tenants in this sector over lack of security. Tenants in the private sector may be elderly and have lived long periods in a house, or they may be people with young children, and yet they may not have any real security in the tenancy. It would encourage landlords to offer security if we were to reward longer periods of tenancy and if we were not to draw such a sharp line that says a brief tenancy gives the landlord the security of being able to get the property back or the tenants become secure and highly protected. Why cannot we have something in between and why cannot we reward landlords for such behaviour? I think the Minister is going to be averse to regulation but perhaps he will be a little bit more supportive of an approach that uses the carrot rather than the stick.
Lord Taylor of Holbeach
My Lords, my namesake reads the situation pretty well and makes a very thoughtful contribution, as he always does on housing matters, rural housing in particular. It has been a very useful debate. In principle we have discovered the difficulties of an imperfect world where not everybody behaves as they should. I am delighted that the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, did not get hissed at when he declared his interest as a landlord because it is important that landlords are recognised as having an important part to play. Many of the amendments introduced by my noble friend are directed at encouraging landlords to maintain high standards. The question is whether regulation is the way to deal with this problem, particularly given the need not only to deal with the current situation but to plan and develop this sector for the future, because we all know that it is an area which will need considerable investment.
Amendment 91 makes proposals for the regulation of letting and management agencies. The noble Lord, Lord Whitty, said he was going to speak to Amendment 92 but he meant Amendment 91 because that is what he spoke to. Around two-thirds of landlords let and manage their property through an agent so it is important that they can rely on a good service. We are aware of poor practice within the letting and management agent sector but regulation already exists in this area. Between a third and a half of all agents belong to voluntary schemes which set standards and offer redress when things go wrong, including client money protection. Unfortunately, far too few consumers of the agency system—both landlords and tenants—are aware of the risks of using an unregulated agent. I am delighted that the Government have been able to endorse the Safe Agent Fully Endorsed scheme—SAFE—recently launched by the industry which highlights a key risk around clients’ money. We want to explore these voluntary approaches further before a move to statutory regulation but we do not rule this out in the longer term. However, we cannot support the introduction of enabling powers where we have no plans for their use.
Amendment 92 in this group would extend the court’s discretion to postpone awarding possession of dwellings. We do not think this is necessary. We estimate that, even using an accelerated procedure available under the legislation, gaining possession through the courts takes at least six months. That is more than enough time for a tenant to find alternative accommodation and it already places a significant burden on landlords, particularly in cases where rent arrears are accumulating.
On Amendment 93, my noble friend Lord Palmer joined my noble friend Lord Shipley in presenting the argument for local authorities’ tenancy relations services. We agree that both landlords and tenants in the private sector should have access to advice and support, but local authorities already provide such advice through their housing options services. This advice is supplemented by existing powers to deal with poor practices by landlords. We therefore see no need to legislate further. New legislation would have the effect of restricting local authorities in their existing work and quite possibly add burdens simply in order to reinforce what is already there.
All the amendments pursue a proper ambition: to raise the standard in the industry. In the case of letting and management agents, we acknowledge that some bad practice exists. I have considerable sympathy with those who have been caught out by bad practice, but for the reasons that I have set out we do not think that regulation now is the right answer. Therefore, I ask my noble friends not to press their amendments.
Lord Shipley
I thank my noble friend the Minister for his response. In respect of Amendment 93 and tenancy relations services, the situation is getting more difficult. There are reductions in spending on tenancy relations. The Minister is right that the amendments are part of a general picture of trying to maintain standards. Where do people who have problems in the private rented sector go? If tenancy relations services are closed down or reduced in scale, and if the CAB has increasing problems in delivering the standards and levels of support that it would like to deliver, it makes it difficult to see how people will get the support they need. That means then that the Government’s objective of ensuring fit accommodation is also more difficult to achieve.
I have noted what the Minister said about Amendment 92. We will look further at that and may raise the issue again. As he rightly identified, it is an issue for the courts.
The intention of Amendment 91 was to enable the Government to do something about it. However, if we are going to explore making the voluntary approaches better, and if we have not ruled out introducing statutory powers, I am content for the moment to work with that, but we are likely to find an increasing need to move down the statutory regulatory route. With those provisos, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
“Establishment of London Housing and Regeneration Board
(1) The authority must establish a London Housing and Regeneration Board (“the Board“).
(2) The Board is to consist of such numbers (being not less than six) as the authority may from time to time appoint.
(3) The authority must appoint one of the members as the chair of the Board.
(4) In appointing a person to be a member the authority—
(a) must have regard to the desirability of appointing a person who has experience of, and shown some capacity in, a matter relevant to the exercise of the functions set out in this Chapter,(b) must be satisfied that the person will have no financial or other interest likely to affect prejudicially the exercise of the person’s functions as a member, and(c) must ensure that an appropriate number of members on the Board are appointed representatives of London boroughs.(5) In exercising its housing and regeneration functions and powers subsequent to the enactment of this Chapter, the authority must consult and obtain agreement from the Board.”
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
The amendment is about establishing a strategic board in London. Noble Lords may say that there is already such a proposal and there is no need, but it is not in statute.
Ahead of the Localism Bill being drafted last year, London Councils and the GLA submitted a joint document to the DCLG clearly stating issues where there was an agreement between the two organisations. One such area of agreement between them was on how housing and regeneration should be run and managed efficiently and effectively. The agreement very sensibly stated that,
“There should be a decision-making board comprising the Mayor, three borough representatives and three Mayoral appointees”.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, pointed out to me, this is indeed what has happened. However, the expectation—certainly from London Councils and, I assume, the GLA—was that this would be included in the Bill before us, and we do not know why it is not. I feel that it is important that the housing and regeneration board is set up in statute. Accepting the current agreed workings between London Councils and the GLA, I think that people want the security of knowing that a future Mayor of London, of whatever colour, will abide by something which is enshrined in statute and is not just in place through mutual friendly agreement.
One such recent example is the London Waste and Recycling Board, which was set up under primary legislation. The setting up of this board was prescribed in the Greater London Authority Act 2007 and was supported, as is the current example, by both London Councils and the GLA. This Government also supported that provision in the GLA Act just four years ago.
The two authorities with responsibility in this area have stated what they want, and they want it in primary legislation. The Government are quite happy for there to be such a board, although off the face of the balance sheet, but why should it not be set out in primary legislation? The Bill is about localism, and the localism element here is that all 32 London boroughs feel that their representation on the London strategic board should be set out in primary legislation and not be there through the good will of the mayor, whoever he or she may be.
Lord Jenkin of Roding
My Lords, this is the first time that I have addressed the House at the Report stage of this Bill. I have not taken part on the housing part of the Bill hitherto for one very good reason. It is exactly 50 years since I became the chairman of the housing committee of Hornsey Borough Council, and there has been an astonishing amount of change in that 50 years. Over the past two days I have learnt a very great deal about the current state of housing and the institutional framework in which housing in this country is currently run and managed. We all know that there is a huge shortage—perhaps more in London than in other parts of the country—and of course measures are in hand to deal with that.
I should immediately declare an interest, as I did in Committee. I am a president of London Councils and a vice-president of the Local Government Association.
The noble Lord, Lord Palmer, has made the case for putting the housing and regeneration board for London on to a statutory basis. The question here is of the long-term security of the existence of an institution. As my noble friend said in response on this matter, and as was set out in the Government’s response to the amendments that were withdrawn at the end of Committee, the question is why you need to put this on a statutory basis when the Greater London Assembly, the mayor and London Councils have been able to agree it without a statutory basis. They say that putting it on a statutory basis would make it less flexible. However, the central point is that they asked for this. The mayor, the Assembly and London Councils all asked for it to be put on a statutory basis. Everything else that they asked for when they wrote to my right honourable friend last year—the end of the London Development Agency, the setting up of the Homes and Communities Agency and so on—has all happened; that is in the Bill. One thing that has not happened is putting this housing and regeneration board on to a statutory basis.
When really responsible democratic bodies such as the mayor, the Assembly and London Councils ask the Government to provide some stability and security for the arrangement that they have made, it is a little impertinent—if I may put it that way—for the Government to say, “No, we are not going to do this. We don’t think you should have it. You don’t know what you want”, or whatever it is. There is a strong case here for putting this on an effective statutory basis.
The amendment has been supported by Members of all parties in the House. All right, I am on record as having said that we must have much less bureaucracy etc. in the Bill. Happily, we are on the path to getting some of that. I had a nice birthday present of an e-mail from one of my noble friend’s officials this evening and I am extremely hopeful. This is not adding new bureaucracy. It makes an existing arrangement, set up voluntarily by democratic bodies, a statutory body and gives it and all those who will work with it the security that that would imply.
My noble friend Lord Palmer of Childs Hill has made a strong case, supported by the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, and, from the government Back Benches, me. I hope that my noble friends will now be able to think again.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I can be extremely brief. As the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, indicated, we have put our name to the amendment and support it for the reasons that have been advanced by the noble Lords, Lord Palmer and Lord Jenkin. It is about getting long-term security of what has been agreed and what is seemingly in place into primary legislation. I am bound to say that we do not expect that Ken would overturn these arrangements any time soon. I can well understand that people may want security just in case it might cross his mind.
It is good to hear the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, again in our debates. His long-standing engagement with housing in Luton under the old system was seen as one of the more important committees. It was 10 years before I was allowed on it. He has a great deal more experience than I do. I support the amendments and urge the Government to take them forward. We do not need to be apart on this. There is agreement on what is happening. It is the right thing to do.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Baroness Hanham)
My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have participated in this. One of the most enlightening things that we have heard today is that the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, took up the Housing Committee at the age of 35, as he has admitted that it was exactly 50 years ago and we know that today is his birthday. On behalf of the House we wish him a very happy birthday. Patrick, thank you for all that you do and the contribution that you make.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, this is important. We do not believe that it is necessary to prescribe in statute the requirement on the Greater London Authority to establish a London housing and regeneration board. The letter of July 2010, to which others have referred, assumed a decision-making board. However, there were concerns over accountability. I will come further on to that.
The noble Lord, Lord Palmer, put the case very well. For the benefit of noble Lords who might not have picked up the letter that I wrote following the withdrawal of the amendments last time, I should say that we believe that setting a board in statute would give London minimal flexibility in determining its own arrangements for governing housing and regeneration activities. We want to keep prescription by central government to a minimum and ensure that the Greater London Authority is free to respond to changing times and circumstances without having to resort to changing primary legislation to do so.
The Mayor of London, the Assembly and London Councils are already deciding how they want to run things. They are already in the process of change, without any input from the Government. They are able to set up a board structure such as the amendment suggests—should they want to. They do not have to wait for us to tell them how to do it, they can do it themselves. I think that is one of the main reasons why we do not particularly want to put this on to the statute book. They can do it, they are able to do it, so there is no reason to tell them to do it, and they do do it.
A decision-making board will ultimately determine the GLA’s housing and regeneration activities, but the GLA was created on a model of a democratically elected executive mayor to provide strong leadership and do things on behalf of London. Therefore it is important that the mayor has the final decision on housing and regeneration matters, but he has to take into account the views of the boroughs as well. Of course, the checks and balances on the mayor should remain with the London Assembly, which is there to hold the mayor to account.
We do not think that it is a good thing to put the mayor in the position of having to have a board. We are absolutely clear that he is working very co-operatively with London Councils and the local government group. Therefore I think that we would resist very much putting that on to the face of the Bill. In light of what I said in my letter and what I have said today, I ask the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, to withdraw his Amendment.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, my noble friend Lady Hanham makes my points for me. She points out that the GLA and the mayor will evolve; things will happen. That is exactly what frightens me. Under whichever mayor, of whichever colour, whether it is next year, four years hence or eight years hence, as the Minister says, the GLA can evolve and change, and that is its virtue. In fact, it is the opposite. What we are trying to do is to enshrine in primary legislation a protection for the 32 London boroughs and for the GLA, a partnership of which we all approve, rather than rely on the good will and resolve of the mayor of the time, whenever that may be. The idea that it should evolve, put forward by the Minister, makes the case for it being in primary legislation. However, at this stage, with the mass of people in this place having tested the water, I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.