Health and Care Bill

Lord Moynihan Excerpts

Lords Hansard - Part 2 & Report stage
Wednesday 16th March 2022 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Moynihan]

179: After Clause 164, insert the following new Clause—
“Office for Health Promotion
(1) The Office for Health Improvement and Disparities is to be re-established on a statutory footing, as the Office for Health Promotion (“the Office”).(2) The Office is an independent advisory board to the Department for Health and Social Care.(3) As part of its duties, the Office must publish a National Plan for Sport, Health and Wellbeing.(4) The aim of the National Plan for Sport, Health and Wellbeing is to—(a) tackle preventable factors causing death and ill health in the UK;(b) demonstrate ways in which sports can help to strengthen social ties;(c) direct funding for sport;(d) include measures to promote physical access to the countryside;(e) identify ways in which schools and colleges are to be encouraged to develop closer links with local sports clubs;(f) include a fully costed National Facilities Plan and specific efforts to tackle discrimination and ensure there is a safe environment for all participants;(g) instil a life-long habit of sport and physical activity throughout the education system;(h) include a comprehensive approach to welfare, care and safeguarding including reports on enforcement of welfare, care and safeguarding standards in sports governing bodies;(i) lead national efforts to improve people’s health by tackling obesity, improving mental health and promoting physical activity;(j) establish a Physical Activity Observatory to act as a centre for independent research and analysis of physical activity data to input into the design of the National Plan for Sport, Health and Wellbeing;(k) promote, encourage and raise awareness of the benefits of participation in sport for health, longevity, fitness, social interaction and wellbeing, and the other health benefits of exercise for all individuals, with the aim of preventing the onset of avoidable physical and mental illness and protecting people's health; and(l) promote clean athletes and the integrity of sport.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment implements recommendations 1, 2 and 3 of the House of Lords ‘National Plan for Sport and Recreation Committee’ report (session 2021-2022 HL Paper 113) which makes ‘The case for a national plan for sport, health and wellbeing’.

[Lord Moynihan (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for meeting yesterday with the noble Baronesses, Lady Morris of Yardley and Lady Grey-Thompson, the noble Lord, Lord Addington, and me to discuss this important amendment. We were all grateful for the sympathetic hearing we had. We are also grateful to the Bill team and particularly to Jamie Blackshaw, the lead of the physical activity team at OHID.

The Government immediately raised a number of concerns about our amendment. We readily accept the wishes of Ministers in the department that, instead of the office for health promotion, it should be called the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities. We completely understand the motivation behind that and totally accept it.

I will also respond to the second concern that the amendment could be read as if we were taking away the mandate of OHID, when we were talking about focusing on a national plan for sport and recreation and calling it the office for health promotion. That was never our intention, and it was good to have the opportunity to clarify that yesterday. The intention is that OHID should continue to undertake all its admirable functions in full. I hope it succeeds in that objective. Importantly, it should add to that accountability to Parliament for a national plan for sport, health and well-being.

The noble Lord, Lord Willis, chaired the National Plan for Sport and Recreation Committee, which recently reported on a national plan for sport, health and well-being. There was a good response to that from the Government and we were pleased when, yesterday, the Minister underlined his commitment to many of the recommendations we made. We certainly will not raise them again this evening.

We simply focus on the importance of hearing from the Minister about the health promotion task force. It may not be inaccurate to say that we have had, or appear to have had, a first win, as a result of the work of the Select Committee, in recognising that there needs to be a co-ordinating activity within government for sport, health and well-being to come together to tackle obesity, low levels of activity and the problems that so many children face coming out of Covid. We believe the health promotion task force may be able to achieve many of the objectives that we set out in the committee and that, ideally, should have ministerial responsibility. There should be somebody driving that.

Sport tends to be on the touchline of Whitehall when it comes to policy co-ordination. We must ensure that we have somebody of the calibre of, say, Tracey Crouch, who has done so much good work in bringing together sport, health and well-being, as New Zealand does with its Deputy Prime Minister. It would be an admirable benefit to Government if they considered somebody of her ability, experience and respect to draw the work of the health promotion taskforce together.

It is important tonight not to rehearse any of the arguments we made in earlier deliberations on this Bill. High levels of inactivity, especially among women, ethnic minorities and disabled people, is of epidemic proportions in the UK. Nobody believes we can avoid the importance of cross-departmental policy co-ordination. Virtually every department of state now has an interest in sport, health and well-being. Unlike when I was a Minister when it was on the fringes of government, 30 years ago, today it is central to government policy. It needs the full weight of government behind it and that push must include education—we need to enhance the value of PE and teacher training time devoted to PE—as well as health, in addressing the obesity epidemic. It has to back up the outstanding work of the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, in delivering a serious and robust approach to duty of care and safeguarding in sport.

I end by asking the Minister a number of questions. It looks as if the health promotion task force that is due to be established can achieve many of the objectives that the Select Committee and the four of us set out in earlier deliberations on the Bill. Is that the case? Does the Minister believe that the health promotion task force has the strength and remit to achieve those objectives?

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We are committed. All Governments have made mistakes. We have got to do this in a joined-up way. We believe that, with the Prime Minister at the top pushing this from No.10 across government, making sure that we can all work together, we have learnt the lessons. I also hope that noble Lords whom I spoke to yesterday and in this Chamber tonight who have shown an interest in staying for this debate will also hold us to account. For that reason, I ask my noble friend to consider withdrawing the amendment.

[Lord Moynihan (Con)]

My Lords, I have to say that that is the best statement that I have heard in support of sport, health and well-being from the Front Bench for many a decade from all parties. It is exceptionally welcome to hear from the Minister early in his response the importance of the agreement to an ambitious national plan. That is something that the Select Committee was very much looking to and, in fact, it was a central plank. To hear from my noble friend that the Prime Minister will be chairing the Health Promotion Taskforce and that its first meeting will be considering physical activity as a key aspect of the work of that task force is also exceptionally welcome. To hear from the Minister that the deliberations of the Select Committee and the comments made this evening in the debate from everyone, including members of the Select Committee and other who have contributed, will be passed to the task force for its consideration is also welcome.

We heard from the Minister that it was vital that, for this whole initiative to be successful as a catalyst for change in the sector, accountability is key. We push for accountability to Parliament because, if that can be done every year and Parliament can consider the outcomes of the work of the Health Promotion Taskforce and the other bodies that he mentioned, that accountability itself will be the much-needed catalyst for change. So I thank my noble friends in sport from across the House and the Minister for his response.

It was echoed, I might add, by many hundreds of responses from across the worlds of sport and recreation during the work of the Select Committee. The overwhelming majority were in favour of a national plan. I am very grateful to noble Lords who have stayed to this late hour to hear this debate. Given the assurances that the Minister has given, I beg leave to withdraw.

Amendment 179 withdrawn.