Health and Social Care Bill

Debate between Baroness Thornton and Countess of Mar

Monday 7th November 2011 Lords Chamber

[The Countess of Mar]

My Lords, I support this amendment. If ever there was a case against inequality of treatment, it is for people with ME. I am saying ME rather than ME-CFS because that is too long. The postcode lottery for people with ME has been highlighted in two inquiries by the All-Party Parliamentary Group for ME over the last five years. People are constantly writing to Ministers complaining; the noble Earl himself knows, because I keep complaining about it. In 2002, the Chief Medical Officer announced an award of £8.5 million to set up specialist centres for ME. These have just fizzled out. Once the £8.5 million ring-fence money had been spent, the first thing that was cut was services for people with ME. The trouble is, they are blighted with the distinction of being yuppie flu sufferers—people who swing the lead. They are not: this is more and more often now being proven to be a physical disease with mental side effects, as cancer and MS and a whole lot of other chronic diseases are. It is time the inequality of treatment for people with ME-CFS was obliterated.

Perhaps the worst inequality is in services for children. There are virtually no ME services for children in the UK, particularly children who are bed-bound and housebound, and this is a disgrace on our society. These children—very often high-achieving children—are suddenly struck down; they can no longer have social relationships because they are too ill or too tired to cope; they cannot continue with their education and yet there is no medical attention for them. I am sorry—I am suffering myself at the moment, so I am not being very comprehensive in what I am saying—but it does need to be said that these people need to be looked after. I support the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Warner.

[Baroness Thornton]

Eight noble Lords have amendments down in this group about inequalities. Many of them seek to do the same kinds of thing. I intend to speak to Amendments 22, 25A, 27A—I mention in passing that my noble friend Lord Beecham has his name against Amendment 29—31, 32, 68A, 68B, 69B and 120A.

I will quickly run through these amendments. Amendments 21, 22, 23 and 25 strengthen the duty on the Secretary of State to reduce inequalities in the health service. The Bill currently requires the Secretary of State simply to “have regard to” this need. Amendment 21 says “is required”—the strongest of these amendments—followed by Amendment 22 with “seek”, and Amendment 23 with “act with a view”. Amendment 25A says it is the Secretary of State’s duty to reduce inequalities between people and “between communities” in England. I will return to that in a moment. In Amendment 27A, we on this side are seeking to add detail to the inequalities that the Secretary of State has a duty to reduce. We argue that,

“inequalities in health status, outcomes and experience, … the outcomes achieved … by … those services”,

and,

“ability to access such services”,

must be taken into consideration. My noble friend Lord Beecham has added his name to the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker. It adds a qualifier to the duty to reduce inequalities:

“to ensure that greater patient choice is not accorded a higher priority than tackling health inequalities”.

Amendment 31 says that, in an instance of a conflict of duties on commissioners or regulators, the duty to reduce inequalities is paramount. Amendment 32 says that, as part of this duty, the Secretary of State must publish comprehensive, publicly available data on the extent to which inequalities have been reduced across the NHS. Amendment 68A says that the duties of the NHS Commissioning Board as to the improvement of public health should be extended to cover the duty to reduce health inequalities. Amendment 68B concerns each local authority having to take steps to reduce health inequalities between people and between communities. Amendment 69B again relates to public health: the Secretary of State must also seek to reduce health inequalities between people and communities. Finally, Amendments 120A, 190A and 190B are about the national health Commissioning Board having a duty to reduce inequalities in health status. Noble Lords will get the theme that is running through here.

Clause 3 places a duty on the Secretary of State to have regard to health inequalities, and that is an aim and aspiration that we would, of course, support. However, the problem with this clause is that that duty is not capable of effective fulfilment. For example, public health analysis and needs assessment require comprehensive area-based population data. This is the basis of the current health system mechanisms for resource allocation and for the commissioning of public health measures designed to prevent or ameliorate systematic inequalities both between groups of residents in an area and across and among areas, with respect to the access of resources, services, and their use and outcomes. Census estimates, adjusted for factors such as age and deprivation, are used as the denominator for the population in such analyses. Our problem with this Bill is—and I would be grateful if the Minister would address this issue—that public health analysis will not be able to be carried out in this way in future because of the proposed shift from area-based PCTs to GP-listed clinical commissioning group structures. Therefore, denominators which allow GP registrations to promote reductions in inequalities might be inherently problematic because of continuous enrolment and disenrolment, which affect accuracy, as does patient selection. The denominator will not be representative of all the people in a geographically bounded area. Without a geographic population focus, it will not be possible to monitor inequalities. I realise that part of these issues is also addressed in amendments needed to Clauses 7 and 10, but they are points which we would like to have addressed here.

Amendments 120A and 190A address the argument that local authorities and clinical commissioning groups should have a duty to reduce inequalities not only in their areas, but also in England. We think this makes sense because, for example, somewhere like Lambeth or Bradford—where I come from—could make huge improvements within area inequalities but still lag miles behind the rest of the country. Amendment 25A calls on the Secretary of State to act to reduce inequalities between people and communities. The word “communities” is important in this context because it speaks to local authorities. Given that public health inequalities are going to be in their jurisdiction, it seems that this is an important matter. Therefore, we would like the Bill to address within-area geographical inequality because it refers to inequalities between groups and communities of groups, not just an individual’s access and receipt of services. We believe that the Government should set out how they intend to use non-legislative levers and incentives to translate the duties in the Bill into practical action and how the NHS will be accountable for progress in reducing health inequalities. Our Amendments 31 and 32 tie in with this. We think we need to understand where those levers will exist, how they will be used and how the Government will measure inequalities.

As noble Lords will realise, Amendments 120B and 190B also arise directly out of the Equality Act and concern individuals and discrimination in the receipt of services. I know the noble Baroness, Lady Greengross, will address Amendment 33, which is tabled in her name. We believe that Amendment 120B addresses the general duties of the national Commissioning Board, which are vital parts of the picture. If the duties to deliver and secure provision of the health service are split between the Secretary of State, the board and CCGs, corresponding duties to reduce inequalities must also be exercised by all three, and these amendments seek to put that in the Bill.