Health and Social Care Bill

Andrew George Excerpts

Tuesday 20th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

rose—

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Frank Dobson]

No, I will not give way, even to the hon. Member for St Ives (Andrew George), who has made a very honourable contribution to these debates.

Across the board, we see the Government taking unjustified risks with our national health service. If they are not prepared to disclose to the rest of us what risks they have been advised they are bringing about, they are both cowardly and stupid. I do not think that the people of this country will ever forgive them for their reckless, chancy, dodgy, second-hand-car-salesman approach to the national health service.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Dorrell]

It is an interesting debate whether a risk register about a transition related to a policy is advice about policy or advice about management. The issue is that there is doubt. If the Government surrender this line without arguing the case to its conclusion, there is space for doubt about whether these risk registers will remain confidential or whether they will be published. The important principle is certainty.

[Andrew George]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Dorrell]

I will give way to my hon. Friend in a moment.

The important principle—it is always an important principle in the law—is certainty: the certainty that people can be clear whether the advice or the register that is being given to a Minister will remain confidential or whether it will be published. My concern is that this motion is seeking to move that line retrospectively, in a way that two distinguished former heads of the home civil service clearly believe would prejudice the space that the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne said was important.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrew George]

My right hon. Friend has argued the case on behalf of retired senior civil servants and Government Front Benchers. However, as the Chair of the Select Committee on Health, and therefore as someone who is deeply interested in effective scrutiny, does he not agree that if the Committee, of which I am a member, wishes properly to understand the potential impact of fragmentation, the conflicted nature of clinical commissioning groups, and so on, we need to find a way of getting behind the declaratory reassurances from the Front Bench?

[Mr Dorrell]

Of course I agree with the proposition in the way that my hon. Friend puts it. However, the proposition before the House is a rather more precise one: that a register drawn up in the expectation that it would remain private should retrospectively be put into the public space. The proposition that I am advancing to the House is that that is an area where we should proceed with care. We should embrace the principle that when advice is given to Ministers, it should be clear to those giving it whether it is being given confidentially or whether it will later be given over for publication. That is the simple principle that I wanted to set out.