Professional Qualifications Bill [HL]

Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 9th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)]

My Lords, I will dwell on Amendment 18 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. As he said, delays to services may not have anything to do with the workforce, although they may. I put my hands up: I live in a cladded building at the moment, and we feel strongly the lack of specialist fire surveyors to get things going. Therefore, one may have unmet demand for all sorts of reasons. Another one—save I would not want to say it to the ex-Secretary of State for Health—might be that the Government just do not spend enough money on the health service.

The issue that I really wanted to raise is not that one—I just cannot help teasing from time to time, as the Minister will well know—but the other point that the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, raised. In that letter sent by the noble Lord, Lord Grimstone, on 3 June to the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, which is in its report of Monday, the Minister said—it has already been quoted—that, in ascertaining whether there is an unmet demand for a particular profession, “delay” could be a factor. More surprising to me to hear from a Minister on that side of the House was his reference to “high charges” charged by the profession. Normally, that side of the House in particular would stray away from any government intervention in the setting of fees by professions or indeed any other service. As a consumer representative, I have often gone to the CMA or other regulators, saying, “We’re being ripped off”, and they say, “No; as long as the consumer knows what they’re paying beforehand and has the chance to take themselves out of the contract, we or the Government do not get involved in the fees charged to consumers”. As such, I find this unusual because it sounds like the Government are saying that if they felt that lawyers or surveyors, for example, were charging “high” fees—that was the word that the Minister used in the letter, not “excessive”—they could bring in regulation to open up the profession to outsiders. I hope that I have got that wrong, but it looks to me as if that is what this says, or it could be a way of defining it.

In a later group, we will come back to how we deal with skills shortages, and we will make comments at that point about the Government’s responsibility to fill any such shortages. However, at the moment, I ask for some explanation about whether it really is possible for the Government to put themselves in a position of defining whether a professional is charging excessive fees and, if so, being more sympathetic to bringing in overseas providers. Some clarity on that would be appreciated.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friends Lady Noakes and Lord Lansley for Amendments 9 and 18, which bring together two elements of the recognition framework proposed under the Bill. Noble Lords have raised some interesting points about the Bill’s potential impact on professionals and consumers of their services.

I turn first to Amendment 9, tabled by my noble friend Lady Noakes, which seeks to ensure that any cost or burden on UK regulators in helping individuals with overseas qualifications or experience to make up deficiencies in their knowledge or skills is reasonable. The amendment proposes that particular means of addressing these deficiencies should not be available if the costs or other burdens on UK regulators and existing UK professionals, including those who fund professional bodies, are not reasonable.

By way of background, I note that Clause 1 allows the regulator to specify a means for an individual with overseas qualifications or experience to make up for a shortfall in their knowledge and skills, compared to UK requirements. This is typically known as a compensatory measure, which could include aptitude tests, completion of an academic course or further experience. If Ministers in the UK Government or the devolved Administrations make regulations under Clause 1, the regulator will decide the means by which it assesses individuals with overseas qualifications and experience. It is for the regulator to specify any appropriate compensatory measures.

I agree with my noble friend that any compensatory measures to demonstrate that the professional has met this standard should not be unreasonable or burdensome on the regulator or the qualified professionals whom they regulate. This is why there is no requirement for the regulator to have to specify a means to make up shortfalls where it is not appropriate or not available. There is no requirement for the regulator itself to provide particular courses or experience to an individual to help them make up shortfalls.

In some cases, a regulator may, for example, simply specify that the individual must complete certain academic courses or obtain a certain amount of additional work experience. This would not place unreasonable costs on the regulator. I should add that compensatory measures are a commonly used approach in professional qualification recognition; it is not a new concept or practice for many regulators.

For example, if English language proficiency were required in order properly and safely to practise a profession, it would be reasonable for a regulator to require an individual with poor English to take a course and pass exams to show that their English had improved. It would not be necessary for the regulator itself to deliver that course. In conclusion, I hope that regulators would not consider that compensatory measures place unreasonable costs or burdens on them.

Amendment 18, tabled by my noble friend Lord Lansley, who speaks with some authority in this field, seeks to remove “unreasonable delays or charges” to consumers being taken into account under the condition in Clause 2 for making regulations under Clause 1. Instead, the condition would focus solely on whether regulations would enable demand for professional services to be met.

Clause 2 limits the scope of the power in Clause 1 to a specific set of circumstances where the appropriate national authority deems it necessary to enable the demand for services provided by that profession to be met without unreasonable delays or charges. By this, I mean that the consumers of those services in the UK are experiencing unreasonable delays or having to pay high charges. An illustrative example of an unreasonable charge might be where consumers or businesses face unreasonably high fees caused by a shortage of professionals. For example, this could be the NHS—a consumer of professional services—or the general public’s consumption of them, direct from a professional. An unreasonable delay might, for example, occur if a profession was unable to deliver its services quickly enough without more professionals in the workforce. This could include, for example, waiting times for social worker support—so unreasonable delay or cost can be made distinct from demand or shortage. Without this wording, the levers that we have to take action where there is a need are narrowed.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)]

The Minister has not answered my question. She seems to have continued to say that a national authority—that is, the Government or one of the devolved Governments—can decide when a professional is charging high fees. Can she be absolutely clear that she is saying that? I would like to know on what basis that would be and whether they would go to the CMA for advice. Whether it is a farrier or anything else—or an accountant, although I think they are not covered—on what basis is a Minister going to decide that a professional is charging a high fee? Will that be challengeable in court or via the CMA? What would be the mechanism for that decision?

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

I am sorry that I gave that impression, but I do not believe that I did give the impression that the Government would set the fees. There would be a mechanism for oversight, which would be the impact assessment route that I mentioned in my speech.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Faulkner of Worcester) (Lab)]

I have had a request to speak from the noble Lord, Lord Purvis of Tweed.

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

Could the Minister repeat what she said at the Dispatch Box? She said that the regulators do not have parliamentary oversight in setting their fees. The Health Department’s consultation at the moment says that four do not but the remaining ones do. They have to secure the approval of the Privy Council and, in some cases, the Scottish Parliament. So which is it, and will any of these regulations have any impact on the relationship with the Privy Council and the Scottish Parliament when it comes to the fact that they have to approve changes of fees?

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

Perhaps I can clarify what I said earlier. The Privy Council is the intermediary between independent regulators and the Government; it is essential to maintaining regulators’ independence, such that regulators are able to deliver their duties impartially. There is no relationship between the council and the Bill.

[Baroness Noakes (Con)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate for their contributions, an awful lot of which were on my amendment. Some important issues were raised by the noble Lord, Lord Purvis of Tweed, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, none of which have been very satisfactorily dealt with by the Minister.

I turn to my amendment. I thank my noble friend Lord Lansley for his support and accept his challenge to look at the positioning of my amendment if I decide to take it forward at a later stage. The Minister talked as if compensatory measures were just sitting in every regulator’s toolbox to deal with every situation that could possibly arise, but the truth is that compensatory measures will have been designed for the sort of applicants who have already been coming to the UK for assessment, and they are not going to cause any problem. We do not even need this Bill for those applicants.

We are most likely to encounter problems when other forms of overseas applicant arise, with less traditional professional qualifications and/or experience. It is that which is likely to cause the burdens on the individual regulated professions to cope with things that they are not already coping with. The question posed by my amendment was about how we avoid unreasonable burdens being placed on those regulators and, in particular, on existing members of those professional bodies who fund the regulators.

To be honest, I do not think that the Minister answered that question at all. There is a very real problem there. I can see that we are not going to progress it any further today, but I recommend to my Front Bench that all the issues raised in this debate are looked at again before we get to Report because there are some big unanswered questions arising from this debate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

The firm advice that I had from my officials was that it would.

Amendment 9 withdrawn.