Health and Care Bill

Chris Grayling Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 22nd November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Edward Argar]

I would like to make a little progress and then I will give way to the hon. Gentleman, who has been bobbing for some time.

We believe—this may not answer the hon. Gentleman’s point, but I will make a little progress and then if there is time—[Interruption.] Well, we will see. Hope springs eternal. A blanket ban on employees of private companies would also, we fear, be arbitrary. It would not cover the full range of people involved in non-NHS providers, some of whom may not be suitable candidates to sit on ICBs because of their involvement, but not employment, within the private healthcare sector. With the complex corporate structures that providers may have established, a narrow definition in the Bill could be unhelpful and risk not capturing the people we wish to capture.

[Chris Grayling (Epsom and Ewell) (Con)]

I support what my hon. Friend is saying. It would be crazy to exclude primary care because it is effectively a private healthcare business, and therefore what he is saying is enormously important. In support of my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne (Sir Charles Walker), I believe it would be absolutely wrong, looking at my own county, if the mental health trust did not have a presence in the governorship of the ICB. I hope that the Minister will ensure a presence not only for the conventional trusts in hospitals and in primary care but for the mental health trusts, because their role is vital and the integration of services is essential to the delivery of good mental health care.

[Edward Argar]

My right hon. Friend makes a point that came out in some of the oral evidence sessions on the Bill. Our aim was to create a minimum membership for the ICBs and ICPs, but it is not prescriptive—it can go beyond that—so there is scope for mental health trusts or other health trusts to have seats on those boards. Indeed, Dame Gill Morgan, who runs the integrated care system in Gloucestershire, said that that is exactly what she has done and that she would be surprised if any ICB did not wish to do it. But we wanted to set a de minimis membership to allow for local flexibility.