Public Bodies Bill [HL]

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Tuesday 9th November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Thornton]

My Lords, the Minister will not by now be surprised or unaware that many noble Lords and, indeed, many organisations, believe that there are some fundamental problems with the Bill. There are two main problems. One is the constitutional issues, which have been referred to by many noble Lords today. The Minister has to satisfy the House as to why the Government need such draconian powers to abolish or alter so many organisations that Parliament has spent time scrutinising at length over the years. The Bill allows any Minister to abolish or alter any arm’s-length body without proper recourse to Parliament. Secondly, apart from the constitutional limitations of such a course of action, there are very serious implications for the independence of many of those organisations.

If the Bill proceeds, I think that the Government will need to explain to the House with some evidence why—to use as examples—the HFEA and the HTA and other health and social care bodies are included on the lists in the schedules, particularly when we already know that at least one, if not two, health Bills are coming down the track in the next year. The HFEA and the HTA are very good examples of where the Bill fails. When the Human Tissue Authority was being discussed by the House, my noble friend Lord Warner said, when he opened the Second Reading debate:

“This Bill will provide a comprehensive statutory framework needed to ensure the appropriate use of human organs and tissue”.

The Bill was remedying and brought forward as a response to the scandals revealed by the Alder Hey and Bristol inquiries. The noble Earl, Lord Howe, who was then the Opposition health spokesman said:

“I have no hesitation in welcoming the Bill; and I welcome in particular its emphasis on informed consent and on unambiguous regulation of the uses of human tissue” —[Official Report, 22/7/04; cols. 366 and 422.]

The Bill spent almost 50 hours on the Floor of both Houses, and that does not involve pre-legislative scrutiny, Select Committee and other debates which we know took place around that emotive issue. The HTA was created to deal with hugely sensitive issues, and ones in which the public need to have confidence. What has changed since the Bill came into being?

The HFEA was mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Warnock, and others. The two Acts which created the human fertilisation and embryology framework clocked up between them a total of more than 100 hours on the Floor of both Houses of Parliament—again, not counting any pre-legislative scrutiny debates or Select Committees involved in that, and the most recent HFEA Act had pre-legislative scrutiny. In the Second Reading debate, the noble Earl, Lord Howe, said:

“While the opinions expressed by noble Lords have been wide-ranging, we can all agree that as a House of Parliament we have been tasked with addressing issues of the utmost gravity, which the British public rightly expect us to examine forensically and with due sensitivity”.—[Official Report, 21/11/07; col. 862.]

He was, of course, completely correct. In both these cases Parliament was doing its job properly. This Bill does not allow us to do our job. I agree with my noble friend Lady Pitkeathley that it is, indeed, an insult to this House.

Most recently I was involved in the Equality Act, and again we created extra time to discuss the Bill on the Floor of the House, with agreement across the House. As a result we gave the Equality and Human Rights Commission many new duties for the disabled, for women and for other groups. I cannot think how the Government can think it acceptable to try to alter or abolish parts of the UK equality framework by affirmative order which cannot be properly debated or discussed. I know the Minister has said that there will be consultation with interested parties on any of the proposed changes, but that is to be expected—that is a minimum. It is not a substitute for parliamentary scrutiny.

I realise that it is customary to welcome Bills and to look forward to discussing and improving them in their passage through your Lordships' House, and like other noble Lords I acknowledge the need to look at arm's-length bodies and to ensure that they are fit for purpose. But this Bill does not do that. If it did, we would not actually have a Bill; we would be having a series of reasoned discussions. Some of it might require legislation and some might not. Some of it might lead to changes or the cessation of work of some of these bodies. That is a sensible, democratic and reasonable way to proceed. Unfortunately, the Government have decided to take, as it were, the flamethrower approach.

Like other noble Lords I have every respect and affection for the Minister, but I regret that I do not welcome this Bill. It is deeply flawed. Along with other noble Lords, I shall be supporting the amendment to be moved by my noble friend Lord Hunt. When we get the Bill back from the committee, or indeed if we proceed to the next stage after this evening, I shall be joining others to challenge the principles in the Bill, and I shall be asking for a full discussion about all the arm's-length bodies about which I have a particular interest and knowledge.