Covid-19 Update
Lord Popat Excerpts(2 years, 11 months ago)
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Lord Popat (Con) [V]
My Lords, I thank my noble friend the Minister for his repeat of the Statement. It is indeed welcome news for people and the economy that we are able to move to step 3 in our road map. However, as the Health Secretary said,
“we must be humble in the face of this virus.”—[Official Report, Commons, 17/5/21; col. 424.]
While the UK has had the highest vaccination enthusiasm in the world, does the Minister agree that it is deeply worrying that many people eligible for a vaccine, particularly among vulnerable age groups, have still not had one? This was seen in Bolton, where the majority of the 19 patients admitted to hospital with the new Indian variant, especially people from ethnic-minority communities, have not had a vaccine. What further support can the Government give to promote the better uptake of vaccines among ethnic minorities?
Lord Bethell (Con)
My Lords, my noble friend refers to humility and he is right: we have all had to develop a stronger sense of humility in the face of this awful virus and this dreadful pandemic. It has taught us that, despite all our 21st-century healthcare systems, we are all vulnerable to its awful effects. His words are absolutely spot on. I repeat the statistic that 69.4% of adults across the UK have had the vaccine, because the overall story of the vaccine rollout has been one of incredible participation by the British public. Not only have I never been involved in anything quite so successful in my life but there are very few national projects anywhere in the world that have been as successful. I really applaud all communities in every part of Britain for the way in which they have stepped up to the vaccine. My noble friend is right that there are some communities in which those levels are not as high as they should be. That has led to higher transmission among younger people, and in a few cases that has led to severe disease among older people who, frankly, should have taken their vaccine. I urge everyone to step up to their opportunity.
Abortion
Lord Popat Excerpts(10 years ago)
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Lord Popat
It happens that way in the Chamber, where we give four minutes, but not in the Grand Committee Room.
Earl Howe
I shall copy all letters to all Peers who have spoken in the debate. My time is now running out but I know that concerns have been expressed, not least by the noble Lord, Lord Alton, about the way that foetal remains are sometimes disposed of. A recent investigation by the Channel 4 “Dispatches” programme examined this issue. The type of situations highlighted in the programme, where foetal remains were incinerated rather than buried or cremated in line with what the woman would have wanted, are totally unacceptable. Any such practices should cease immediately. A letter has gone to all trusts to make that point emphatically clear.
My noble friend Lady Bakewell asked about hospitals revealing the sex of the foetus at routine ultrasound scans. Disclosing the sex of a foetus is a local decision and should be based on clinical judgment about the certainty of the assessment and the individual circumstances of each case. It is not something that the Government can mandate from the centre.
My noble friend Lady Knight asked about the NHS not employing midwives who would not be willing to perform abortions. The Act allows professionals, including midwives, to opt out of participation in any treatment to which he or she has a conscientious objection. That conscientious objection should not be detrimental to the careers of health professionals. I think I am over my time.
Earl Howe
Sorry, I will carry on. The noble Lord, Lord Alton, made some powerful points about repeat abortions. We are working to reduce repeat abortions through promoting access to the most effective methods of contraception following abortion. Care pathways should be in place to contraceptive services following any abortion.
The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, asked about recording the sex of a foetus on the HSA4 form. We have no plans to record the sex of the foetus on the form. It is not usually possible to identify the sex of a baby until the second ultrasound scan, which takes place at around 18 to 21 weeks’ gestation. In 2012, nearly 98% of abortions were performed before 18 weeks’ gestation, so the gender of the foetus is not known for most abortions. I strongly agree with him that a challenge to attitudes and discrimination against women is a good thing. That is what our parliamentary system is based on. I will write to him further on that, as I will on the question of education.
I close by emphasising again that we are not complacent on these issues. We remain and will continue to be very vigilant.
Lord Popat
My Lords, I suggest we take a break for five minutes in view of the fact that we do not have all the speakers for the next debate.
Children and Families Bill
Lord Popat Excerpts(10 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Stevenson of Balmacara
My Lords, we had been led to believe that this session would finish at 8.15 pm but I have not been briefed about what will happen, so I am in something of a quandary. I wonder if the noble Lord would explain what the position is so that we can understand better what our responsibilities would be to the Bill, before I speak.
Lord Popat (Con)
My Lords, I have spoken to the Chief Whip, and we need to complete the Bill today.
Lord Stevenson of Balmacara
I am glad to hear it, but what has that got to do with me?
Lord Stevenson of Balmacara
I find this very unsatisfactory. As the noble Baroness said, we are all losing our marbles, if not our words. Trying to get through the Bill at this late hour when there are still two very substantial amendments to go is not what was agreed through the usual channels and certainly was not the basis on which we came into this discussion. I continue, but I do so with the feeling that this is not in the spirit of the best use of our time, and your Lordships’ House will be the worse for having to debate late into the night issues that should have seen the fresh light of day—perhaps next Monday, when of course there will be time.
Clause 104 was in my mind when I started the debate earlier—it seems a long time ago now but was in fact earlier this afternoon—by saying that while the Opposition were broadly happy with the measures contained in Parts 6, 7 and 8 of the Bill, there were one or two bits of grit, and this is one of them. Amendments 267L and 267M and the clause stand part Motion are grouped together in one place so that we can have a debate about them. While they all bear on the same area, they obviously have different impacts. My preference would be for the clause to stand part because I believe that what the Government are trying to do here is antipathetic to the very spirit of British law, which has always recognised the need for a person with a legal case to have the chance to make that case in a court of first instance but, where there have been problems or difficulties with that, the person would then have the right of appeal against decisions taken in the first instance. However, the Bill as it is drafted removes the process by which an employer must respond to an employee’s flexible working request and replaces it with a requirement to respond in a reasonable manner and within a timeframe of three months. We had a debate earlier about the word “reasonable”, and on that occasion the Minister felt unable to accept that word because he felt it was not appropriate for the context in which we were discussing it, although it has come back several times since and he has been quite happy with it. We have a situation here where reasonableness, which in the earlier amendments was a burden on employers, is now okay for employers to use.
The current processes include the provision for an appeal by an employee, and this obviously provides a useful opportunity to discuss why things have not worked out in terms of the process, but the Bill removes that. The history to this is interesting. ACAS consulted on a draft code of practice for the extended right to request flexible working, and employer bodies such as the CBI, the FSB, recruiters, the TUC, EHRC, Opportunity Now and Working Families acted as advisers on the draft code. The group agreed, and the draft code recognised, that an appeal is important. The draft code said:
“If you reject the request you should allow your employee to appeal the decision. It can be helpful to allow an employee to speak with you about your decision as this may reveal new information or an omission in following a reasonable procedure when considering the application”.
Anybody reading that would recognise its antecedents in criminal law and civil law where clearly those who have cases—as I have said—can make them in the first instance and then, if there are difficulties, can appeal against some of the decisions in order that they can be better refined and reconsidered. We believe it is important that the Bill and the code are consistent to provide clarity to employers and certainty to employees that appeals are to be allowed. The amendment would make it clear on the face of the Bill that appeals remain an important part of the process of considering flexible working requests.
In Committee in the Commons, the Government argued that the amendment would mean that an employee always had a right of appeal, and that this would be burdensome and bureaucratic in a very small organisation. If it was an absolute right of appeal, that might be the case, but appeals are usually constrained by matters of fact or law and one would expect that normal processes would be applied. We argue that a very small organisation would be able to deal swiftly with an appeal, but allowing an appeal is important for procedural fairness and may reduce the use of grievance procedures instead. Sometimes employers do not give a statutory business reason for refusing a request, and that could give rise to an appeal. In addition, once the employee understands the employer’s business reasons for refusing a request to work flexibly, they may be more able to negotiate a solution, so it is a win-win all round.
I would ask the Minister to think again about this issue. It is important to retain what we normally expect as the right approach towards consideration of these quasi disciplinary matters. I beg to move.
Ageing: Public Services and Demographic Change Committee Report
Lord Popat Excerpts(10 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Filkin
That this House takes note of the Report of the Public Service and Demographic Change Committee Ready for Ageing? (Session 2012–13, HL Paper 140).
Lord Popat (Con)
My Lords, there are 21 speakers for the debate this evening. If the Back-Benchers stick to five minutes for each speaker, that should enable the House to adjourn by 7.15 pm.
Lord Filkin (Lab)
My Lords, our ageing society is by far our biggest social change, bringing great benefits. Many people will live longer, much longer than might have been expected, and in doing so will contribute much to our society and economy, and will benefit personally from this longer life. This change is happening now. There will be 24% more people aged 65-plus in our present decade, and the change will persist for decades to come. By 2030, there will be over 100% more people aged 85-plus compared to 2010. Our report explored what we all need to do to maximise the benefits of this great social change. The House will be relieved to hear that I will be assuming that all Members have read it, given that it was only 10 pages long; I will pick out a few of the highlights.
First, I offer warm thanks to a talented and challenging committee. You could not get a better committee of Members to work with than we had. They were superb and their commitment and contribution was very great indeed. I also thank our two special advisers, Howard Glennerster and Jonathan Portes; it is particularly good to see Professor Glennerster with us today. I also thank our excellent staff, Bina Sudra, Tristan Stubbs, Tansy Hutchinson and our quite remarkable clerk, Susannah Street. I thank Philippa Tudor for the quiet support she gave in the background to this process. We had a remarkably pressured timetable, trying to deal with 70 witnesses in about three months, and she was very helpful indeed. Lastly, I thank the House itself for agreeing to the suggestion for this ad hoc Select Committee.
How, then, do all of us need to change to be ready for this ageing society? Clearly, first, as individuals, our prime responsibility is always to try to manage our own lives ourselves rather than to expect others to do it for us. Clearly, people need to understand the probabilities and risks consequent on ageing—that they may need to save more, to work for longer, to at least make provision for their social care and to think about how they care for others. Individuals also need to engage with the choices and behaviours that are likely to make for a healthier and happier longer life. We have control over quite a lot of things—at least, some of us do.
It may well be that many people need trusted, accessible, person-centred information and evidence to make these informed choices and, hopefully, the behaviour shifts that might go with them. Clearly, civil society itself will have to make changes in how it will need to engage with ageing and how it can better work to support the many more older people in our society. It would be naive to think that the state, either central or local government, was able to support all the increased numbers of people in our society. Yet there is enormous potential if civil society itself engages positively in this and the question, of course, is how we stimulate such a growth of civil action.
Clearly, civil society also needs to understand the choices that we all have to make collectively as a nation to address the changes and some of the pressures and choices consequent on them. Finally, we need to use the assets of many more older people as a resource that is able to contribute to meeting the needs of other older people. That is obvious to many of us and axiomatic. Again, we need to think about how we make it happen in practice.
There needs to be much greater engagement with ageing from businesses generally, large and small. Ageing affects our economic growth, our fiscal position and the supply of labour to businesses, which others may speak on later. Business needs to become much more positive about flexible working for older people, otherwise we will have labour supply problems, less economic growth and less fiscal contribution than we otherwise would. In other countries, particularly Germany, business is actively engaged in these debates. I look forward to hearing invitations to discuss these issues from some of our business leadership figures, not least the CBI.
Local government will clearly be at the fulcrum of ageing at local level. In some local authorities, the scale of the changes in their older population is quite remarkably greater even than the dramatic figures I have given already. Clearly, local government’s role has to go way beyond just the management of social care, although that is already an enormously taxing role for it. It has to address the failures of planning and housing supply for older people at a local level, which clearly cause greater problems for many people and clog up family housing that could be released. Local authorities will need to work with, and generate greater engagement from, the voluntary sector and civil society to increase volunteering, to support attempts to reduce loneliness and isolation, and to contribute towards informal social care. We will need a quite remarkable scale of increase in informal social care. Again, it would be naive to think that the state will deal with all those things by itself. There is, therefore, a very large range of roles for local authorities over and above their new public health role. One would expect to see thoughtful local authorities making estimates of the scale of demand that they will face, and starting to have dialogues with their communities about how they will plan for and address those great opportunities and pressures.
The voluntary sector—which I recognise does enormously good work—will itself want to consider, individually and collectively, how it will need to change to make a greater contribution to meeting the needs of an ageing society. I doubt that doing what it has done in the past, or even doing more of what it has done in the past, would be adequate or sufficient. Therefore, we have already started discussions with some of the key voluntary sector organisations about how they need to assess the scale of future need and how they will raise their game to meet the future needs that will be required of our society.
Public health at national and local level is, I think it is obvious to all of us, a central issue in how we address ageing. I will give one simple illustration. If, over the next 15 years, we were able to shift the behaviours of many people in our society so that they made healthier lifestyle choices about diet, weight, exercise, smoking and drugs—and we all know ourselves how difficult some of those resistances are—the personal, fiscal and economic benefits would be remarkable. I argue, both to government and to civil society: think of what we have done on smoking, but also think of how we make these changes. They start to make coping for an ageing society more bearable in public policy terms, but they also make individuals’ lives that much happier and more fulfilled if they are able to enjoy them in that way.
On the NHS, I think we would all acknowledge that the fact that we are living longer is due in part to the great success of medical science and of the NHS itself, combined with many people making better lifestyle choices. That, therefore, is to be celebrated. Nevertheless, an ageing society is by far the biggest challenge that the NHS has faced since its foundation. I will give three reasons why that is the case. First, there will be an enormous increase in the number of long-term conditions in our society, consequent on many more older people, many more much older, older people, and the propensity that that causes to generate long-term conditions. In the past you died of certain conditions; now you live many years longer with those long-term conditions. That is a wonder, but it has challenges.
Secondly, there will obviously be very great increases in cost for the NHS and for social care, consequent on that increase in long-term conditions and social care needs itself, so we will see remarkable increases in cost hitting the system as well. Thirdly, every bit of evidence we received, and all the expert opinion—including the briefing noble Lords have received from the NHS Confederation—is of one mind that the system needs to go through quite a remarkable change so that it moves to the better management of long-term conditions in the community and away from what is essentially an acute and hospital-centric focus. Everybody broadly agrees with that diagnosis; the challenge is how it is going to be made to happen.
The problem—without wishing to be party-political for a second—is that politicians do not always give the impression that they are facing up to the scale of those three issues: the scale of increased demand, increased cost and how to bring about that system change. We all hope that NHS England, when it produces its strategy in the autumn, will set out a clear vision as to how that should be addressed, both assessing the demand and setting out how it thinks the system should change to do so. However, even if it does that well, it will not be able to do it without clear, strong, consistent political leadership, preferably supported by all political parties.
How has central government responded to our call for action? First, we all recognise that central government is not responsible for all these challenges. They are issues for all of us. However, many of us consider that central government is responsible for leading the debate and setting out the issues so that we as a society can face them rather than hide from them. It is also remarkable that there was no rebuttal in the Government’s response of the fundamental evidence and analysis that the committee set out in its paper. They did not say that we got it wrong; they were almost totally silent on that. Therefore, it is reasonable to assume that the diagnosis we presented was reasonably accurate. That has been the view of many experts, as well.
We were disappointed not to see from the Government a vision statement, or a commitment to produce some sort of vision, about what they think we should do for our older society in future, and some sort of outline of how, as a society collectively—central government and civil society—we should go about making that vision a reality. They have also resisted our request to set out an honest debate with the public about the opportunities, challenges and changes. We argued for a White Paper and a Green Paper to set out the issues so that we could all engage with them seriously. They did not respond to that. In part I know why, but it is a great shame, because that is what we all need.
In my final few minutes, I will say a little about what we have done to maximise engagement with the Government on this report. Our committee ceased to exist in March, but we chose to ignore that and to continue having very vigorous discussions among ourselves, and excellent meetings with Ministers and senior civil servants. We tended to go in twos, as is our way, whenever we could. I met five or six Ministers, virtually all the top civil servants relevant to this, and special advisers, and I thank them all. Without exception, the conversations were thoughtful, and with many officials we could discuss both policy and politics—realities—at the same time, because those things are real.
Next we should acknowledge that the Government have done some very good things in a difficult environment. They have made remarkable progress on pensions reform and on putting into practice the fundamentals of Turner. Steve Webb is to be commended on that, in an incredibly difficult fiscal context. That is good progress, but, as we said, it is the start, not the end of the story.
The situation is similar with Norman Lamb and social care. It is not the thing to mention this week, but we should recognise that Dilnot, even if you did not think that it was the perfect answer, was a brave and difficult thing to do, and was not always welcomed by the Treasury. Again, that is to be commended; it gives us a basis to move forward. We will have to get the details right as we work on it.
We have had discussions with Mark Prisk, the Housing Minister, as well as with Norman Lamb. We had excellent discussions in closed seminars about what the report said, and there was a recognition in the Government’s response that there were significant failures in current policy and practice. The market in specialist housing for older people does not appear to be working, and there is a need to do something about that. Again, I commend the honesty and engagement that we have had there.
I wish I could be as positive everywhere, but, as noble Lords will sense, I am not going to be. What still amazes us as a committee is that we have not seen from the Department of Health any published data of its estimation of the increasing demand consequent on the absolutely certain increase in the number of older people. Perhaps we will get that from NHS England; let us hope so. It is fundamental to the situation. When you know that you will face massive increases in demand, you make some assessment of what that will look like and you then think about what it implies.
Secondly, there is still a doubt over the Government’s narrative that the massive systems changes that we all recognise need to happen will just come about organically in a bottom-up process. Clearly, the leadership of the NHS and the health service generally looks for clear, solid, consistent ministerial support for these changes. That is difficult, but they will not happen without it. Lastly, we need an honest conversation between politicians—hopefully of all parties—and the public about the changes that our NHS will face.
I am coming towards the end. I will now deal with the fiscal implications of this. As noble Lords will know, the dependency ratio is obviously worsening as a consequence of these demographics, and I will not go into detail on that. Many more older people, and older old people, will mean much more spending on pensions, health and social care. It is axiomatic that that will happen. The debate is about how much of that extra expenditure should be paid for by the state out of taxation and how much of it should be paid for by individuals themselves. However, it will have to be paid for one way or the other because our society will demand a level of care and healthcare befitting a civilised society. Therefore, we must face up to a discussion on that.
Apart from what the Nuffield Foundation and the IFS have produced, to date we have not seen much indication of the scale of that future cost. However, the material that has been produced is frightening enough. It signals a gap of at least £35 billion, and probably £54 billion, by 2021-22. The IFS told me that those figures had been reached just by looking at the 4% per annum historical trends; not by assessing the elemental increase in demand consequent on having more older people with long-term conditions, so I think the figures, are, if anything, likely to be an underestimate. We have to discuss as a society the implications of how we fund these increased public service costs. There are no right or simple answers to that, but thoughtful discussion, preferably across the party divide, would be helpful. Ideally, I think that some Turner-style process that commanded cross-party support would be a healthy approach.
We have not seen what we hoped for from the Government in terms of a Green Paper or even a ministerial subgroup to look at these issues. However, I hope that all is not lost. We are 18 months away from an election. Although I have been putting these questions to the Government, it seems to me they are equally questions for all three political parties. We hope that all three political parties engage seriously with these questions over the next 18 months, and, we hope, do so in a more transparent way so that there is a proper engagement by experts in their thinking about how we as a society address these challenges.
I am pleased to say that one of the consequences of our work is that eight major charities came together into the Ready for Ageing Alliance. They will work with our committee and maintain a constant dialogue with experts and politicians about these issues over the next 18 months. No doubt they will inspect the election manifestos, and the work behind them, of all the major parties.
As noble Lords sense, my committee members and I think that these are important issues. We will not let them go. We look forward to further discussions in the House and with wider and civil society about them. The benefits of getting this right are enormous, but if we are in denial on these issues we will massively underestimate those benefits.
Southern Cross Care Homes
Lord Popat Excerpts(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Earl Howe
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, makes a very good point. The advice I have been given is that during the restructuring process, the cost of care should not be a factor. While local authorities may have to revise their budgets, that should not result in disruption for residents.
Lord Popat
My Lords, does my noble friend agree that most of the landlords of these care homes were the former operators themselves, and therefore the transfer of registration by the CQC will be a very smooth process? However, we will end up with a few homes where the landlords might not want to take them back. Should we not have contingency plans for local authorities to rent such premises on a temporary basis until a permanent solution is found?
Earl Howe
My noble friend is quite right to say that it is indeed possible that landlords may not wish to take the properties back, but in that scenario it has been agreed that those landlords will look to partner with a reputable care home operator. So it might well be that a care home will join a consortium run by one of the major care home operators which is now in discussions.