Health and Care Bill

Debate between Lord Patel and Baroness Harding of Winscombe

Lords Hansard - Part 1 & Committee stage
Monday 24th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, I am seriously concerned, for my sake, that I am invisible to the noble Baroness, Lady Harding—which I regret, but I will tease her about it.

[Baroness Harding of Winscombe (Con)]

My Lords, I fear that is my blindness and my problem, not his. I am very sorry.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, I am only teasing.

I declare an interest as a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and of the Academy of Medical Sciences, and as a professor emeritus at the University of Dundee, where I have spent all my life bar the first 18 years. I say this because we have lost something in the United Kingdom. A key strength of our academic clinical departments was a worldwide reputation for conducting health service-related research. We were second to none, and I mean that. We have lost that because we have changed the environment. People who work in clinical academic institutions—our so-called teaching hospitals—no longer have the environment to promote that. It was the duty of those of us who worked in clinical academic departments to grow the next generation of academics. It was important that we were all involved in conducting clinical research that produced innovation, better care for patients and a first-rate, first-class, internationally renowned next generation of academics. We do not have that any more, and anything we can do through this Bill to bring that back would be a major plus.

I will speak to the amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, and the noble Lord, Lord Sharkey. Much has been said, excellently, and I will try not to repeat it, but a strengthened research mandate through this Bill could support patients, clinicians, NHS organisations and research. The patient benefits from increased research activity have already been mentioned, but there is a significant variability across the UK in the opportunity for patients to engage in research. A strengthened mandate could support ensuring that all patients can access clinical trials and their associated benefits. Therefore, wider changes are needed to increase the competitiveness of the UK as a destination for research, particularly through the proposed changes to clinical trials legislation, and through increases in Department of Health and Social Care and NIHR funding.

This could include measures to support faster approval timelines and closer multiagency collaborations. Clinical research has clear benefits to patients, as has already been mentioned. NHS trusts with higher levels of research have a higher rating from the CQC and better outcomes, as have already been said. During Covid, the UK has demonstrated its potential with the success of Covid-19 research, with 68 commercial Covid trials launched in the UK in 2020—the third-highest globally, beating the United States and the rest of Europe.

How did we manage to do that? It is because, during the emergency, we set up methodologies that allow patients to be involved in trials more quickly by creating a voluntary registry, where patients themselves volunteer to take part in research. I also note the clinical recovery trials that we set up—some noble Lords might have seen the article in the Times, with Sir Martin Landray suggesting that we follow that process in the future to try to find treatments for other common diseases. If we do that, we will lead globally. The NHS has the capacity to do that, but it now requires the will and the leadership from the centre to drive that. The clinical academics will be up to it—they just want to be given a chance. Let us do that, because we have demonstrated that we can.

Health and Care Bill

Debate between Lord Patel and Baroness Harding of Winscombe

Committee stage & Lords Hansard - Part 1
Tuesday 11th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, I support the amendment in the name of the noble Baronesses, Lady Merron and Lady Walmsley. I speak in support of the principles behind the amendment, which were well articulated by both noble Baronesses. Is it wrong in principle to have board members who have experience of NHS England’s areas of work, which I agree includes finance? No, but that cannot be totally exclusive of one side of the experience and expertise required. One of the board members suggested in the amendment should be from a public health background; let me take that as an example. That could be a public health director; I do not mind whether it is a public health director or somebody with public health expertise.

The reforms in the Bill are far reaching, but they are underpinned by the integration of health services to deliver on population health. The Government’s ambition is to extend healthy life by five years by 2035 and to have a greater focus on health prevention. Public Health England has been abolished and replaced by the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities. It is interesting that the name has changed, but I do not mind that. The word “inequalities” has been used hitherto but, if you use the WHO definition, “disparities” has the same meaning. The aim is to address inequity. The UK Health Security Agency has now been brought into being. It is right that there is strong public health involvement at local and regional level, as defined in the Bill, although it is not clear to me at this stage how this will work at regional level—no doubt we will spend some hours debating that.

Public health directors should be involved in developing strategies for population health at the local and regional level. There is a strong argument for public health representation on all integrated care boards—again, we will discuss these in amendments to come. At national level, the Government need to be much more joined up. The Department of Health and Social Care and the triumvirate of NHS England, the UK Health Security Agency and the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities needs to demonstrate an integrated model that the rest of the service is expected to deliver on. The ICBs will be in a clear accountability relationship with NHS England and NHS Improvement for delivering on all aspects of population health, yet neither will be accountable for public health, except in a limited case where NHS England will have responsibility. NHS England needs strong representation from and involvement of public health expertise, including at board level, to be able to develop indicators that assess the performance of ICBs, including for population health.

Turning to the part of the amendment that relates to public involvement, while there may be a difficulty in identifying an individual who can focus on the needs of patients, there are ways of doing this. The principle is that a board member chosen as a representative of patients’ voices knows that it is that individual’s responsibility to speak on their behalf. Of course, I am biased; I would say that the chief executive or, more appropriately, the chairman of Healthwatch England should be represented on the NHS England board. I fought the battle and lost—the noble Earl, Lord Howe, well remembers the point about Healthwatch being an important aspect, but we will come to that debate at a later stage. This time, I hope I do not lose.

I strongly support this amendment and the principle that representation on the NHS England board needs to reflect its work.

[Baroness Harding of Winscombe (Con)]

My Lords, I begin by declaring my interest, having very recently stepped down as the chair of NHS Improvement, which included both the NHS Trust Development Authority and Monitor. I am very supportive of the spirit of these amendments, and I could not agree more with the way in which the noble Baroness, Lady Merron, set out the importance of propriety in the appointment process and the skills, attitude and culture that the directors on the board of the new NHS England need to have. It is essential, as she said, to have a spirit of collaboration, integration and patient focus.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, I would like to ask a question of the noble Baroness, Lady Harding, who has what is accepted as huge experience at board level, on boards of different sizes. If it is right, no matter the size of the board, to have representation selected on the basis of experience, can it be wrong, no matter the size of the board, to have as board members people with experience in, let us say, public health or local authorities—because they have experience specifically in that area—as opposed to people who might have wider experience, including in finance or whatever?

[Baroness Harding of Winscombe (Con)]

I do not think that the noble Lord and I have a substantive disagreement. My concern is about prescribing in the legislation the exact recipe for the team; I am mixing my metaphors. After what we have all been through as a country and as a world, I completely agree with him about the importance of putting public health absolutely at the front and centre of our health and care system. However, legislating for the specific skills of the individuals who make up the board would be a mistake, because we want to create a team where people’s experience, background, style and cognitive approach create the magic that we are looking for. This is only one dimension of that; that is all.