Health and Social Care Bill

Karl Turner Excerpts

Tuesday 20th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Tony Baldry]

I can assure my hon. Friend that what I am saying is true. All he has to do is walk a few feet to the Vote Office and pick up a copy of Lords Hansard and read for himself the speeches of Lord Wilson of Dinton and Lord Armstrong of Ilminster. All I am saying to my hon. Friend—

[Karl Turner (Kingston upon Hull East) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Tony Baldry]

No.

All I am saying to my hon. Friend is that this is a debate about the relationship between civil servants and Ministers, a relationship that has worked very well and very effectively in this country.

Here we have heads of the civil service advising Parliament that this move, which the Opposition would seek to force upon us, is not in the best interests of the relationship between civil servants and Ministers and is not in the best interests of the good running of government.

--- Later in debate ---

[John Pugh (Southport) (LD)]

It is a sure sign of a deranged mind when one starts to repeat oneself. I have said previously that the Bill is a huge mistake, that not releasing the risk register merely creates further alarm, and that abandoning the Bill could be the safer option. I have also said that the Secretary of State’s intentions are noble and that the Opposition’s objections are—in part, at any rate—considered and compelling. However, I have clearly failed to persuade many of my parliamentary colleagues to share that point of view, as last night’s voting showed.

[Karl Turner]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. He says that he has been opposed to the Bill from the outset. As he knows, I served on the Public Bill Committee with him. Why did he not vote against it? He had ample opportunity to make the Government drop the Bill.

[John Pugh]

If the hon. Gentleman checks Hansard carefully, he will find that there were occasions when I did. We must all agree, whether sadly or happily, that the vote in the Lords last night was conclusive, even if some, like Baroness Williams, were voting for legislation that they said they did not particularly like. That is in part because of the modifying genius—I put it as strongly as that—of Earl Howe.

There are risks attached to the legislation. The risks that I face are small in comparison with those faced by the Secretary of State. I risk being found out for having fears that are misplaced. I risk having my forebodings exposed. He risks a great deal more than that. The House does not need a risk register to find out what those risks are. If he proceeds rapidly at a time of huge upheaval in the NHS, he will actually promote that upheaval. If he goes ahead, he will be doing so at a time of austerity, in the teeth of wholesale professional opposition and in a climate of genuine legal uncertainty, with legislation that has, in part, been cobbled together. We will soon find out what has been scaremongering and what is plain scary. Crucial to mitigating the risks will be the pace and the extent of enactment and implementation. There will be a mopping-up phase. It will be crucial for the Government to woo back professional opinion. The risk register would have told us, to some extent, how easy or difficult that will be.

Already we hear that the Government are struggling with the central plank of the legislation: GP commissioning. We wait with interest to see the regulations on that. It is hard to see how GPs can commission basic out-of-hospital services in primary care, which is a central thrust of the Government’s legislation, and not be seen, as small businesses or associations of undertakings, to be benefiting themselves with public money. In the legislation, we have made the biggest provider the biggest commissioner as well. GPs will have no problem commissioning hospital services without any legal obstacle, but they will lack the expertise to do so. That is what primary care trusts found when they did the commissioning. The risk is that we will end up with GPs not being able to commission what they do understand, and being asked to commission what they do not understand. We therefore await the regulations with considerable interest.

I suggest that although Cabinet members have been banging the table today, they may well be banging their heads against the wall in the years to come.