Health and Care Bill

Lord Beamish Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 14th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

I listened carefully to what the hon. Gentleman said. As I have said, no final decisions have been made, but if he would like a meeting with a Health Minister, we can arrange that so that the matter can be discussed further.

I am also very grateful to another of my predecessors, my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Surrey (Jeremy Hunt), first for his leadership of the Health Committee, whose valuable report and recommendations we have taken on board, and secondly for his tireless dedication to the cause of patient safety, which sees its culmination in the Bill’s creation of the Health Services Safety Investigations Body. We must continue, in his words, that quiet revolution in patient safety. I have asked my officials to consider whether the Care Quality Commission could look broadly across the integrated care systems in reviewing the way in which local authorities and providers of health, public health and social care services are working together to deliver safe, high-quality integrated care to the public.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State talks of patient safety. May I ask him why the Bill contains none of Sir Bruce Keogh‘s recommendations on the cosmetic surgery industry, which are now 10 years old? In response to questions that I have asked, Ministers keep saying that the recommendations are going to be implemented. Could this not be an opportunity to improve patient safety in that area?

[Sajid Javid]

The right hon. Gentleman has raised an important matter. There are issues surrounding the cosmetic surgery industry, and I know that he has spoken eloquently about them in the House before. I do not necessarily agree that this Bill has to be the vehicle for any change, but if he wishes to discuss the matter further, I should be happy to meet him in due course, because it is important and it does require a fresh look.

Whenever the NHS is subject to change, it is tempting for some, who should actually know better, to claim that it is the beginning of the end of public provision. We know that that is complete nonsense, and they know it is nonsense, but they say it anyway. So let me very clear: our integrated care boards will be made up of public sector bodies and those with a social purpose. They will not be driven by any private interests, and will constantly make use of the most innovative potential of non-NHS bodies.

The spirit of this Bill is about holding on to what is best about the NHS and removing what is holding it back. That is something that we all want, and I am looking forward to a mature debate—[Laughter.] Perhaps that is too much to ask in this Chamber with this Opposition Front Bench, but I hope for, and I think the public expect, a mature debate on the Bill and on how we can achieve these sensible changes together.

In that spirit, the second theme of the Bill is cutting bureaucracy. As we have been tested during these past months, we have looked at the rules and regulations through new eyes. It has become increasingly clear which of them are the cornerstone of safe, high-quality care, and which are stifling innovation and damaging morale. It is that second group of rules and regulations that the Bill strips away, removing the existing procurement regime and improving the way in which healthcare services are arranged. Yes, this is about how we deliver better value for the taxpayer, but fundamentally it is about how we can free up NHS colleagues to deliver better care. We know that patients are better served when experts are free to innovate unencumbered by unnecessary bureaucratic processes. That is why the Bill will repeal section 75 of the Health and Social Care Act 2012, giving the NHS the flexibility for which it has been asking. I know that this is a point of agreement with the Labour party—

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[Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab/Co-op)]

I beg to move an amendment, to leave out from “That” to the end of the Question and add:

“this House declines to give a Second Reading to the Health and Care Bill, notwithstanding the need for a plan for greater integration between health services and social care services and for restrictions on junk food advertising to improve population health outcomes, because the Bill represents a top down reorganisation in a pandemic leading to a loss of local accountability, fails to reform social care, allows further outsourcing permitting the private sector to sit on local boards and fails to reinstate the NHS as the default provider, fails to introduce a plan to bring down waiting lists for routine NHS treatment or tackle the growing backlog of care, fails to put forward plans to increase the size of the NHS workforce and see them better supported, and fails to put forward a plan that would give the NHS the resources it needs to invest in modern equipment, repair the crumbling NHS estate or ensure comprehensive, quality healthcare.”

Well, the Secretary of State talked a lot, but he did not say very much. Look at the context of where we are. Yesterday, we recorded 36,000 covid infections. Hospital admissions have increased to over 500 a day, up 50% in a week. Waiting lists are at the highest level on record, currently at 5.3 million. Some 336,733 people have been waiting over a year for treatment, over 76,583 people are waiting over 18 months, and over 7,000 people are waiting over two years. Some 25,889 people are waiting more than two weeks from urgent referral to a first consultant appointment for cancer. Emergency care is grappling with some of the highest summer demands ever seen. Two hundred and fifty thousand people are waiting for social care. NHS staff are exhausted, facing burnout. We went into this pandemic with 100,000 vacancies across the NHS and a further 112,000 vacancies across social care.

The answer from the Secretary of State is to embark on a top-down reorganisation when we are not even through the pandemic—a reorganisation that will not deliver the integration needed, because reforms to social care are delayed again; a reorganisation that will not deliver more care but in fact, in periods of stretched health funding, could well deliver less care; and a reorganisation that is, in effect, a Trojan horse to hide a power grab by the Secretary of State.

Let us be clear why this reorganisation is taking place. The Government have come forward with this Bill because of the mess of the last reorganisation—the mess that the Secretary of State supported and voted for, and the mess that he spoke out for in this House, saying that it would modernise the NHS and that the

“concept of GP commissioning has been widely supported by politicians from all parties for many years. May I urge my right hon. Friend to keep putting patients first by increasing GP involvement in the NHS?”—[Official Report, 4 April 2011; Vol. 526, c. 773.]

Why, if he believed that then, has he U-turned now? And it was a mess that we warned of. My hon. Friend the Member for Leicester West (Liz Kendall), who opposed that Bill in this House, warned the Government that it would increase bureaucracy and increase the fragmentation that the Secretary of State has just complained about from the Dispatch Box.

Ministers said that that reorganisation under Lord Lansley would reduce bureaucracy, and Back Benchers told us that it would reduce bureaucracy, but what ended up happening? Billions were wasted and thousands of NHS staff were made redundant. That was the Government’s priority then, and now they are asking us to clean up their mess today. They also told us that that reorganisation would improve cancer survival rates, and where are we today? We are still lagging behind other countries on cancer survival rates. Perhaps the Secretary of State could have come to the Dispatch Box and apologised for that Lansley reorganisation and 10 wasted years.

The Secretary of State talked about NHS leaders, but the truth is that NHS leaders asked for a simple Bill to get rid of the worst of the Lansley restructuring and instead re-embed a sense of equity, collaboration and social justice in our NHS structures. That is not what this Bill is. Of course, the Secretary of State secretly agrees with me. According to The Times, he wrote to the Prime Minister saying that there were “significant areas of contention” that were yet to be resolved with the Bill, and that he wanted to delay it. The Secretary of State was only back five minutes and already Downing Street was overruling him. When it overrules him on his choice of spin doctors, he walks; when it overrules him on the future of the NHS, he puts his career first and stays in the Cabinet.

I listened carefully to the case made by the Secretary of State. He talked of the need for greater integration between health and social care and the need to provide better co-ordinated care, and he referred to an ageing population.

To be frank, that was a speech that Health Secretaries and their predecessor Social Services Secretaries have been making more or less since 1968, when Richard Crossman proposed the first set of NHS reorganisations. Indeed, there were echoes of the Secretary of State’s speech in that made by his predecessor Keith Joseph, when he came to this House in 1972 to set up the area health authorities, bringing together hospitals and community care and working more closely with local authorities because we needed seamless care. Those authorities were of such a size that, within a year, they were rearranged again into district health authorities. Given the size of some of the integrated care systems that the Secretary of State is proposing, I suspect that the seeds of the next reorganisation are being sown today.

Yesterday, the Secretary of State told the House that his

“three pressing priorities for these critical…months”

were

“getting us…out of this pandemic…busting the backlog”

of non-covid care, and

“putting social care on a sustainable footing for the future.”—[Official Report, 13 July 2021; Vol. 699, c. 163.]

But absent from his speech was any credible explanation of how this reorganisation will meet his objectives that he outlined to the House yesterday. In fact, in the last 30 years, we have seen around 20 reorganisations of the NHS. Have any of them delivered the outcomes that Health Secretaries have promised from the Dispatch Box? Well, not according to analysis in The BMJ, which observes:

“Past reorganisations have delivered little benefit”.

Why should this one be any different?

The question for me is: how will the 85-year-old with multiple care needs experience better whole-person care as a result of the restructuring that the Secretary of State is embarking upon? How will waiting times for elective surgery for cancer and mental health be improved by this reorganisation? How will health inequalities that have widened and life expectancy advances that have stalled be corrected by this reorganisation? To those questions, the Secretary of State had no answer today: the Bill fails those tests because it is a badly drafted Bill and could in fact even worsen health outcomes.

Let me outline our specific concerns. On the proposed integrated care boards, the Bill collapses the remaining 100 or so clinical commissioning groups into 32 integrated care systems differing in geographical size and with some covering populations up to 3 million or 4 million. In some parts of the country, the ICSs are not based on the NHS agreed boundaries, but currently on centrally drawn-up boundaries for political reasons. We know that Cheshire will be combined with Merseyside. Glossop is cut off from Greater Manchester and allocated to Derbyshire. Frimley is split up, leading the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), to complain in an Adjournment debate recently:

“Do not break up Frimley ICS. Just for once, let common sense prevail.”—[Official Report, 29 June 2021; Vol. 698, c. 238.]

These boundaries and the way in which they were proposed by the previous Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for West Suffolk (Matt Hancock), prompted NHS Providers to warn that the disruption could lead to

“a worsening of patient care”.

And then, of course, we have the design of the integrated care system, split across two committees—a partnership board containing people from local authorities, the third sector and others, and then an NHS board responsible for spending the money, for commissioning. The Secretary of State has moved away from GP commissioning, of course; he wants the NHS board to commission now. Those two boards will probably have different chairs, but the NHS board only has to have “regard” to the partnership board strategy. Nor is it clear how local authority seats—the one local authority seat—will be decided when they cover more than one council and possibly even councils of different political persuasions, so we will see how a consensus can be built then.

Other important voices are left out. Mental illness accounts for roughly a quarter of the total burden of illness, yet there is no guarantee that mental health providers will get the seats on these boards, when we know that mental health services are under pressure and the Secretary of State tells us that the mental health backlog is one of his personal priorities. The pandemic has also reminded us that the health and wellbeing of our community is not just in the hands of large hospitals or general practice. It is also in the hands of our directors of public health, who have shown exceptional local leadership throughout this crisis, standing on the shoulders of their forebears, who in the past confronted diseases such as cholera, smallpox and diphtheria. Test and Trace would have been far safer in their hands from the outset, by the way, and what is their reward? They are sidelined. Public health, again, should be properly represented on the NHS boards and we will table amendments to that effect.

[Mr Kevan Jones]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is not just about their being sidelined; it is actually about the budgets for public health, which have been pushed off into the autumn? If the consultation paper that went out last year is anything to go by, County Durham would lose 19% of its budget. How can we effect these changes without its being divorced from what will be provided in terms of cash?

[Jonathan Ashworth]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. I will come to the financial flows in a few moments. But how on earth can we have a triple aim of trying to improve health outcomes for a population and not even give public health a voice and a seat on the decision-making body that decides health plans for an area?

The Secretary of State talks about integrating health and social care. There is no seat for directors of adult social services on these committees, either. And what about patients? Patients were not mentioned very often by the Secretary of State in his speech. Patients will always come first for the Opposition. They have no mandated institutional representation, either—no guaranteed patient voice—so we have yet another reorganisation of the NHS whereby patients are treated like ghosts in the machine. It is utterly unacceptable. This is fragmentation, not integration, with a continued sidelining of social care.

There is a loss of local accountability as well, because there is no explicit requirement that the boards meet in public or publish their board papers. Although NHS England has stated that that is its preference, it is not required; nor is there any commitment, despite the wide geographical spread of some ICSs, for meetings to be made accessible online. But, of course, the White Paper did indicate that the independent sector could have a seat on an ICS, and the explanatory notes to the Bill state that

“local areas will have the flexibility to determine any further representation.”

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

In opening this debate, the Secretary of State said that the Bill would improve patient safety. One area in which it does not do that is the area of cosmetic surgery. In April 2013, the Government commissioned Sir Bruce Keogh to do a review of this industry following the PIP—Poly Implant Prothèse—implants scandal. He came forward with some very sensible and clear recommendations to improve safety in the cosmetic surgery industry and to make sure that patients were protected. The review highlighted the fact that those buying a ballpoint pen have more protection than people having non-surgical procedures in this sector. These recommendations have sat on the shelf in the Department of Health since then. I have asked numerous times when they are going to be implemented, only to be told tomorrow, but tomorrow never seems to come.

We did see some change with the private Member’s Bill of the hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Laura Trott)—the Botulinum Toxin and Cosmetic Fillers (Children) Act 2021 —which, for example, limited botox for under-18s, but this business is a wild west when it comes to regulation. There is a missed opportunity in this Bill not only to get proper patient safety, but to implement Sir Bruce Keogh’s recommendations, which the Government say they support but somehow do not want to implement. This is a multibillion-pound industry, and patients are being put at risk. It is mainly women who, in this sector, need protection. I hope that the Government will implement the Keogh recommendations in this Bill, and I put the Minister on warning now that I will be tabling amendments for that. This is important, and I do not yet understand the reason why the Government are not doing it, because the royal colleges support this and a large number of Members of Parliament have backed these reforms. They do need to be implemented, and we are missing an opportunity to do so.

May I touch on one last thing about public health? I agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth) that public health, strangely enough, has been forgotten about in this crisis. If we had actually concentrated on putting the main focus on public health and supporting directors, I think we would have had a better outcome. This is not just about this Bill forgetting about public health; it is about the money that goes with it. Under the fair funding formula being touted last year, County Durham would have lost £19 million in public health funding, while Surrey would actually have increased its budget by £14 million a year. That cannot be right. Public health now needs to be at the centre of our healthcare locally, and the Government have to ensure not just that it gets a voice in this Bill, but that local directors of public health get the finance and support they desperately need.

Covid-19 Update

Lord Beamish Excerpts

Monday 12th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

On the app and the so-called pinging—my hon. Friend referred to an individual in his constituency who has perhaps been pinged too many times—it is right, as I have said, that we take a fresh look at any changes that we can make in the light of the success of the mass vaccination campaign. If my hon. Friend will bear with me, I think he will be pleased with our course of action.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

In response to my hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester (Christian Matheson), the Secretary of State said that the Government speak with one voice. Well, clearly on masks they change in response to whatever the latest YouGov poll says. He has been very clear today that people should wear a mask in confined spaces, so I ask him a direct question: what is his advice to retailers? Should they insist on their customers wearing masks when they enter their shops?

[Sajid Javid]

The guidance that we will publish today will be very clear on that.

Point of Order

Lord Beamish Excerpts

Tuesday 8th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Last month, I received from a constituent some serious allegations about the conduct of individuals in the cosmetic surgery industry. The allegations involved a surgeon who had been struck off the General Medical Council register in this country, but who was conducting consultations with UK patients via Zoom, from a private clinic overseas. A separate allegation was that a doctor in the UK continued to refer patients to the struck-off surgeon, and that his services were being advertised on UK-based websites.

On 20 May, I wrote to the Minister for Patient Safety, Suicide Prevention and Mental Health, the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Ms Dorries). On 3 June, I received a direct response to my letter. Lo and behold, it was not from the Minister, but from the CEO of Transform Hospital Group, a private company. I know that it was a direct response because the CEO actually states that he had received my letter directly from the Care Quality Commission.

I take an extremely dim view of my correspondence with the Minister being passed on to a private company without my knowledge or consent. I consider that a major breach not only of confidentiality, but of my trust and that of my constituent who made the complaint in the first place. I do not think a Minister’s correspondence should ever be shared with a private company, breaking the bond of trust that we have with our constituents. I seek your advice, Madam Deputy Speaker, on how I can rectify this and ensure that it does not happen again.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for having given me notice of his intention to raise this point of order. Mr Speaker shares his concern that sensitive correspondence appears to have been passed from the Department to a private company for a response, and Mr Speaker will be drawing this matter to the attention of the Leader of the House to ensure that these important issues are understood across Government and not only by the people who are paying attention to this particular point of order this afternoon.

The 2016 guidance produced by the Cabinet Office on the handling of parliamentarians’ correspondence goes into some detail, which I will not quote in full now, but the right hon. Gentleman is right in pointing out that that guidance says that

“departments should treat correspondence with great care to ensure that confidentiality is not broken.”

It also states that

“official replies to letters from MPs should only be authorised in exceptional circumstances”.

It would appear that guidance has possibly not been followed in this case.

I would have said to the right hon. Gentleman that I would make sure that the Minister gives an answer, but I am delighted to say that the Minister in question is here in the Chamber, so I shall call her to respond to the point made by the right hon. Gentleman.

Covid-19 Update

Lord Beamish Excerpts

Monday 19th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

My right hon. Friend has asked about this many times, and he is quite right to, because it is not just about cleaning. We have learned a lot during the pandemic about the importance of good ventilation, and that is now embedded in infection prevention and control. As cases in hospitals come down, hospitals across the country are separating, as much as is possible, those who might or do have covid from people who are coming to hospital having been tested and knowing that they do not have covid. That is incredibly important to reassure people that if they are asked to come to hospital by a clinician, it is the best place for them.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

In response to my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth), the Secretary of State said that it was up to local NHS trusts to decide whether to take up the Greensill payday loan app, but The Sunday Times yesterday published an email between David Cameron and Matthew Gould, the head of NHSX, on 23 April. It reads:

“As you can imagine, Matt Hancock, David Prior [NHS England chairman], Simon Stevens [NHS chief executive], as well as the many trust CEOs, are extremely positive about this innovative offer.”

Is that email correct? Was the Secretary of State “extremely positive” about the Greensill app? Does he not think there is something morally wrong with using poorly paid and struggling NHS staff to allow a private company to construct a financial bond to be traded on the international money markets?

[Matt Hancock]

As I said to the right hon. Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth), my approach was and is that local NHS employers are best placed to decide.

Vaccine Roll-out

Lord Beamish Excerpts

Thursday 21st January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

The reassurance I can give to my hon. Friend and, more importantly, everybody living in North Devon, is that we will get there. We set the goal of 15 February for everybody in the four most vulnerable groups—the over-70s and others—to be vaccinated. They will have an offer of the vaccination arrive so that they can be vaccinated before 15 February. The reason we set that date is to make sure that everybody across the country gets it in a fair time. That is why we are putting more vaccine into the areas that have not made as much progress yet. However, across Devon, just under 100,000 people had been vaccinated by the 17th—a few days ago. By now, I am sure that more than 100,000 people have been vaccinated in Devon. That shows that the roll-out is happening, and we are absolutely determined to reach all parts.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

May I join my parliamentary neighbour, the hon. Member for North West Durham (Mr Holden), in thanking those working in primary care to roll out the vaccine in County Durham? They tell me that if they get the vaccine, they can get it out to those who need it. Last week, though, the primary care trust vaccine hub in Chester-le-Street had to be put on standby because there was no vaccine arrival. Today the Secretary of State has again announced new vaccine sites, and suggested that over-70s are going to get the vaccine. In my constituency, people over 80 are still waiting. Can I plead with the Secretary of State to stop the hype and spin, to just be honest with people and with primary care if there is a problem with supply, and to ensure that primary care has enough notice to be able to organise this process, because it is causing a huge deal of pressure on an already overworked system?

[Matt Hancock]

I am delighted to say that primary care—the GP surgeries across the country—are rising to the challenge brilliantly, especially in County Durham, which is doing an absolutely magnificent job. It is far ahead of the national averages in terms of the roll-out and is doing brilliantly. Of course there are challenges; as the supply comes in, we are getting it to the frontline as fast as we can, and that does mean some rapid turnaround times. I urge the right hon. Gentleman to cheer up and back his local team. Yes, it is difficult, but I know that we will get there.

National Security and Investment Bill

Lord Beamish Excerpts

Report stage & 3rd reading & 3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Wednesday 20th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

First, I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah), who has spoken very kindly about the work of the Committee that I am privileged to chair. I also pay huge tribute to the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, my hon. Friend the Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Nadhim Zahawi). He has been tireless—that word has been overused in this place, but he has been tireless—in reaching out to all Members to speak to them about the Bill and ensure that the amendments tabled are helpful and conducive to not only the public good but the national good. He has been doing that at the same time as he has been running a vaccination programme. I have to say that the Minister’s wife’s loss is the nation’s gain: she has been selfless in allowing him to slave away for our country on two very important subjects.

The reality is that this is a hugely important Bill, and because it is so important and such a big change for the United Kingdom, it raises huge questions that are very difficult to answer. The way that the Minister has approached this is exactly right. He started off by speaking to businesses, to our intelligence services and to our regulators to understand what exactly the threat is, how it is affecting our businesses and how it can be addressed. He has had, I hope, as much help as he possibly can from them, and I hope that the help being offered from the Select Committee that I am privileged to chair and the Committee that my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) is privileged to chair is helpful.

We are trying to improve what is already a good Bill and make it into an excellent one. We have had various conversations with not only the Minister but his Whips, who have been extremely helpful—I know that this is a very odd thing to say in the House—in ensuring that he is informed about the way in which we have conducted this discussion. It would not be right for me not to also thank Alice Lynch of our Committee and Nicole Kar of Linklaters, our specialist witness who has helped us through the process of writing this report.

I rise to speak to new clause 4, which is in my name and the names of fellow members of the Foreign Affairs Committee. We looked carefully at the Bill because, over the last two to three years that I have been chairing the Foreign Affairs Committee, much of our work has been on the threat of foreign interference in the UK. One of our earlier reports in May 2018 was entitled “Moscow’s Gold: Russian Corruption in the UK”; I believe the Minister was still on the Committee when we started that report, though he had already been promoted to greater things by the time we published it. The report touched on the way that dirty money plays into our systems and the way in which we must protect those systems.

Since then, we have looked at various aspects of how our foreign policy is fundamentally about keeping the British people safe. We have always focused on the interests of the UK and the interests of the people we are lucky enough to represent. We sit here representing our communities—not other communities, not business and not anybody else, but our communities and what is fundamentally in their interests. We built up, from that early report, into looking at the various ways in which money has moved around, influencing academic freedoms and changing the way in which businesses have acted. As the Minister knows, we have called out those who we feel needed to be called out. That is why I am so pleased that he is in his place and has produced this Bill, because it finally sets a process by which this Government—any Government—can look at decisions that are being taken and assess them properly.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman and his Committee on the excellent report they have produced, but this is about the scrutiny of decisions of mainly private companies and others. Does he share my concerns about some decisions taken by Departments, particularly in the light of the Ministry of Defence’s decision to buy E-7 Wedgetail aircraft from Boeing, which results in two of them coming from China?

[Tom Tugendhat]

The right hon. Gentleman tempts me, but I am not going to get drawn on the Wedgetail discussion, as that is a slightly separate conversation. He is right to say that this Bill affects not just private business, but the way in which the Government will also conduct their procurement, so it is absolutely right that in future decisions may be looked at in different ways. This Bill, however, is slightly different, because it looks at the purchase of British business and not at the UK purchasing others.

Let me come back to where I was before the right hon. Gentleman cunningly got in his complaint about an MOD decision. This Bill goes a long way to making sure that we are in the right place, but it raises a few concerns, which I will touch on. That is why we have introduced new clause 4, which is not supposed to be a definition of national security, because that would, as the Minister knows, constrain the ability of a Government to adapt this law as national security changes. It would in effect tie concepts from 2021 into the law as it progressed. Given the change we have seen in the past 10 or 15 years, that would frankly be unwise. After all, who could have known that some of the decisions we have taken, perfectly innocently and rationally, over the past decade are some of the worst that a Government have made?

I am referring to two decisions. First, the sale of DeepMind to Google was one of the worst strategic moves a UK Government have taken. I am not blaming anybody for it; it was a decision taken rationally at the time, without understanding the future power of artificial intelligence and the extraordinary strength of DeepMind. That is a huge credit to the team at DeepMind and to much of the investment Google has put in, but it is also a recognition that a change of ownership and geographic basing—even though the people do not change, the ownership changes—has undermined the UK. The second is the sale of Arm to SoftBank. Again, this is one friendly company being sold to a company of another friendly nation. These are not geographically specific points; they are entirely geographically neutral. My guess is that one of Arm’s products is in everybody’s pocket, because they are in 95% of computer products and so will be in almost everybody’s phone. This is one of those moments where we risked losing control of an absolutely fundamental technology that could in future promote Britain’s interests greatly. That moves us into a question about Nvidia that I will not get drawn into now; I am just putting into historical context decisions we made that we will live to regret.

This Bill allows us to look at those things and update with the times, which is why I agree that we should not have a fixed definition of national security—we should have a framework for it. Here I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight (Bob Seely) and others on the Committee, who came up with this proposal and were extremely rigorous in doing so. I pay particular tribute to Nicole Kar of Linklaters, who helped us with the drafting of it and to the Committee Clerks who got us through it. There is a real opportunity here to enable this framework to defend us.

Governments throughout the European Union and, indeed, around the world have already started to look at how their laws that are similar to ours will apply. If we do not give enough strength to our Government, there is a danger that we will be the only ones found to be naked when the day comes and the choices have to be made. That would be a huge mistake, because the world is changing; there is a lot more cash from state-owned enterprises going around than there has been for many years. Sadly, there is likely to be a prolonged period of economic difficulty as we come out of covid; those companies and countries that are willing to underwrite companies will have an advantage when they start to snap up businesses around the world. That is why we need this legislation now.

--- Later in debate ---

For me, protecting the realm and all of our people—all of them—requires flexibility as well as strong oversight and that is in no doubt, so I will not be supporting new clause 5 today.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

I supported the Bill on Second Reading and continue to do so, because, of course, in terms of putting on the statute book the protection that we need, it is a vital piece of legislation, but, as the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) said, it is possibly some seven years late. That highlights the conflict that takes place within not just this Government, but all Governments, between wanting national prosperity and national security. We had this during the coalition Government—the hon. Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat), I think, referred to it as the “golden age”, or, as the Australians would call it “a Government full of panda huggers”—but that has clearly changed. What has also changed since even 2013 is that we have a better understanding of how states are using their economic power not only for defence purposes, but to project their power to change the international world order.

It has come as a great shock to many people that, in the past few years, the international rules-based order, which we have all accepted since the second world war, has come under threat not only from hostile states, but from individuals who basically want to throw everything up in the air and see what lands.

Clearly, when it comes to China, to mention one nation, its investment strategy, including belt and road and other initiatives, is clearly being used not just in terms of projecting its economic power, but for geopolitical reasons. If we look at the long list of Chinese individuals on various standard-raising bodies—whether it be UN bodies or standard setters in the telecoms industry—we can see which areas they want to influence. The Bill is very important in ensuring that we protect that critical national infrastructure. There will be that debate—as Members will see if they read the ISC’s report, in 2013—between prosperity and security. For me, security has got to be the key cornerstone of this legislation, but it will, I think, lead to some very difficult decisions having to be taken.

As I say, I broadly welcome what is being put forward in this Bill, and I will come on to some of the new clauses in a minute, but can I first refer to new clause 7? It has already been spoken to by the Chair of the ISC, the right hon. Member for New Forest East, in terms of oversight. The ISC is not looking for work, I can tell hon. Members that. I have been a member of it for a few years now, and we have a lot on our plate. We do not actually want to be a regulator or in any way to have to decide what should go ahead and what should not—that is the role of Government—but I think it is crucial that those decisions, some of which will be very controversial but taken for perfectly good security reasons, do need to have oversight from outside the Executive.

As the right hon. Gentleman has outlined, that cannot be done by the BEIS Committee. Again, I would not want to take away from any of the work it is doing, but we are the only Committee of all the Committees we have that has the levels of security clearance—it has STRAP clearance—to look at the evidence that will have to be put forward for taking these decisions. I think this would give the public confidence in the Bill, and when such decisions are being taken in future, the public can actually have confidence that there is some oversight of the reasons why they are being taken. So I do support new clause 7, but I accept what my Chairman says about wanting some indication of the Government wishing to take this on board. May I also raise the fact that this is not just for this Bill? I am also serving currently on the Telecommunications (Security) Bill Committee, and it is an issue—exactly the same issue—there as well.

I think the Minister is sympathetic to this, but I can tell him now—and I do not want him to admit it—that he will be getting a lot of pushback from the Cabinet Office, because the Cabinet Office somehow sees it as its role to prevent the ISC from seeing anything. As the right hon. Member for New Forest East said, it hides behind the Justice and Security Act 2013, but as he very eloquently outlined, there is already a mechanism to allow us to look at this. This is going to be an increasing problem. If hon. Members read the Act, they will see that it does not actually say that it is about actual Departments; it is about access to sensitive and secure information. That is going to be an increasing issue, whether for this Government or future Governments, because, as that is used by more Departments, it is important that Parliament and the public at least have some oversight of it.

I do not want to bash the Cabinet Office, but hon. Members will remember, if they look at the 2013 ISC report, that it is the same Department that, even though it was told by BT that BT was going to contract with Huawei, somehow conveniently forgot even to tell Ministers until much later. So, I think it is important to ensure that we have robust oversight. I look forward to the Minister’s response on whether he is going to agree to this letter. If he can give such an indication today, or even when it goes to the other place, that would be welcome, and if that is the case, I think it would be quite right not to press new clause 7. I think this is something that is missing from the Bill.

May I now refer to other new clauses? New clause 4 stands in the name of the hon. Member for Tonbridge and Malling and others, and I congratulate his Committee on its report. I accept what the hon. Member for South Ribble (Katherine Fletcher) has just said about defining national security. Putting that on the face of the Bill, as new clause 5 does, limits what can be done, although it is good to have a debate on this. New clause 4 is slightly different, however, because it sets out a framework within which these decisions can be taken.

The Bill does not define national security or the list, and I understand why: because we cannot list the entities, and, as the hon. Lady said, something might come up in the future that is critical national infrastructure but that we have not yet thought about. We need sufficient flexibility to be able to address such situations.

New clause 4 also covers the following important area:

“(g) the potential of the trigger event to involve or facilitate significant illicit or subversive activities, including terrorism, organised crime, money laundering and tax evasion; and

(h) whether the trigger event may adversely impact the safety and security of UK citizens or the UK.”

We see good examples of states that are making strategic investments for geopolitical or security reasons or in order to acquire technologies, but, as came out in the ISC Russia report, many states are increasingly using fronts and other individuals to acquire such assets, and, having not an exhaustive list, but a framework that covers this would also flag up such matters to the Department.

We talk about critical national infrastructure being things such as power stations, electricity grids, gas mains and telecoms, but might we also say that our food distribution network, for instance, is a part of critical national infrastructure? In the early 2000s we had the fuel delivery lorry drivers’ strike, which led to a critical situation, and control of such events could fall under this. These things might be done not by a state, but by individuals related to it, perhaps acquiring large property portfolios in certain areas. Although new clause 4 is not perfect, it covers these matters.

I accept what my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) is trying to achieve in amendment 7. She wants this unit to have the resources to ensure that it can do its job, and that is very important. However, we also need to ensure that there are no untimely delays, because we do not want this to be a hindrance to business.

Amendment 7 also raises the issue of the personnel who are going to perform this task. I have a huge concern, which I have raised already in terms of the Telecommunications (Security) Bill, about the type of individuals we are going to get in that unit. It is vital that we have people with not only the necessary security clearances but also the right security mindset. Some reassurance on that from the Minister would be welcome.

Overall, however, I welcome this Bill. It takes a huge step in the right direction. As my Chairman, the right hon. Member for New Forest East said, it is strange that we wait for seven years and then get two Bills very quickly, and I also look forward—I hope in the near future—to a further Bill, the hostile state actors Bill, which is another recommendation from our Russia report.

I thank the Minister for the constructive way he has taken this Bill forward—and I will be cheeky and just say to him that if he can deliver extra vaccines in Chester-le-Street this week, that will be very welcome.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

We now go over to Sam Tarry—oh no, he’s here!

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Kevan Jones]

I have no doubt that the Minister will aim to recruit the brightest and best. However, what assurance can he give that those individuals will have not only the necessary security clearance but the culture of thinking about security, as opposed to business and regulation?

[Nadhim Zahawi]

They will be able to draw on all the experience, culture and, of course, resources of Government to be able to do their job properly, I assure the right hon. Member of that.

The report sets out a fear, as we have heard elsewhere, that without a definition of national security in the Bill, interventions under the NSI regime will be politicised. I wholeheartedly agree that it is crucial for the success of the regime that decisions made are not political but rather technocratic, dispassionate and well judged. I repeat the words of my right hon. Friend the Member for Reading West (Alok Sharma), the former Business Secretary, who on Second Reading assured the House that:

“The Government will not be able to use these powers to intervene in business transactions for broader economic or public interest reasons, and we will not seek to interfere in deals on political grounds.”—[Official Report, 17 November 2020; Vol. 684, c. 210.]

Indeed, if the Secretary of State took into account political factors outside the remit of national security, the decision could not be upheld on judicial review. It is with this in mind, and our focus on protecting foreign direct investment, which so many colleagues are concerned about, especially as we come out of the covid challenge, that politicised decisions will not be possible under the NSI regime. I hope right hon. and hon. Members feel I have sufficiently explained the Government’s approach. We have sought to deliver what the Foreign Affairs Committee and the Opposition recommend.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful for my right hon. Friend’s intervention. What I was saying is that there are no restrictions. His Committee will be able to invite the Secretary of State to give evidence to it, and it will also be able to ask for further information, which the unit will be able to provide.

[Mr Kevan Jones]

The Minister is wrong when he talks about asking the Secretary of State, because his is not one of the Departments that we overlook, but it is already there that this information be provided. I do not know why he and the Government are resisting this, because it will give certain confidence in terms of ensuring that decisions are taken on national security grounds. If he thinks for one minute that the Cabinet Office will divulge information easily to us, I can assure him that it will not. It does not do so. We have to drag it out of them kicking and screaming every time. I am sorry, but this is very disappointing.

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his intervention. Let me repeat again: there are no restrictions on the Committee requesting further information from the unit or from the Secretary of State.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his intervention and his powerful argument, but I just repeat that there are no restrictions on his Committee requesting that information.

[Mr Kevan Jones]

rose—

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I will not give way. There is a lot to get through and time is short.

The Government will more generally monitor the operation of the regime and regularly review the contents of the annual reports, including in relation to academic research, spin-off enterprise or SMEs, and we will pay close attention to the resourcing and the timelines of the regime.

If, during any financial year, the assistance given under clause 30 totals £100 million or more, the Bill requires the Secretary of State to lay a report of the amount before the House. Requiring him to lay what would likely be a very similar report for every calendar year as well as for every financial year, which is in amendment 4, appears to be excessive in our view. He would likely have to give Parliament two very similar reports only a few months apart.

On amendment 5, I can reassure the House that, under clause 54, the Secretary of State would be subject to public law duties when deciding whether to share information with an overseas public authority. That includes a requirement to take all relevant considerations into account in making decisions. These are therefore considerations that the Secretary of State would already need to take into account in order to comply with public law duties.

Moving on to new clause 6, I want to be clear that we do not expect the regime to disproportionately affect SMEs, although we will of course closely monitor its impact. The Government have been happy to provide support to businesses both large and small through the contact address available on gov.uk. Furthermore, the factsheets make it clear what the measures in the proposed legislation are and to whom they apply, so there is real clarity on this. It would therefore not be necessary to provide the grace period for SMEs proposed under new clause 3 and neither would it be appropriate. Notifiable acquisitions by SMEs may well present national security concerns and this proposed new clause would, I am afraid, create a substantial loophole.

To conclude, although I am very grateful for the constructive and collegiate engagement from hon. and right hon. Members across the House, for the reasons that I have mentioned I cannot accept the amendments and new clauses tabled for this debate and therefore hope that they will agree to withdraw them.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

I start by congratulating the Secretary of State on his appointment; I wish him well in the years to come. I also thank the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Nadhim Zahawi), for how he has conducted himself during the Bill—I just say that Chester-le-Street would be a lot happier if extra vaccines arrived this week. I just wanted to get that plug in yet again.

I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah), who has led on this Bill for Her Majesty’s Opposition. Following the comments from the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) about the scrutiny of this Act, once the Bill becomes one, I welcome the recognition that the ISC has a role. The Minister, in response to me and the right hon. Gentleman, said that there is nothing to stop the ISC asking the Business Secretary to come before it or asking for information on the Bill. I do not for one minute doubt the integrity of the two Ministers, but they—like me and us all—are, to use a Robin Day phrase, “here today, gone tomorrow” politicians. Legislation has to stand for a length of time in terms of different Ministers and people who will look at it. The only way to do that is to formalise this.

If we were asking, in terms of the ISC, for an overcomplicated system or something that was completely alien to the culture of scrutiny, I could accept that, but we are not. As the right hon. Gentleman said, the mechanism is there already. All we have to do is enact it. That means that when the two Ministers and I have moved on, and when even the Chair of the ISC has gone on to greater and better things, there will be a mechanism in place to ensure that there is parliamentary scrutiny of those decisions, because some will be very controversial. As I said on Report, there is no way in which the ISC wants to act as a regulator or to have some veto over decisions—it is for Ministers to do that—but it is important to ensure that Parliament has oversight of those decisions. The only Committee that can do that is the ISC, because of its security classification.

I join the Chair of the ISC in saying to the Secretary of State: this is about standing up to the Cabinet Office. On the idea that the ISC can ask for information, sometimes getting information that, actually, we are entitled to see, is like getting blood out of a stone. If we formalised that, as suggested by the Chair of the ISC, it would give oversight of the decisions taken, which would strengthen the decision-making process and ensure that we could at least see what intelligence is there; no one else could see it, apart from the Ministers taking the decisions obviously. That would strengthen the entire process, so I ask the Secretary of State to reflect on the matter, as clearly it will come up again when the Bill goes to the other place.

There is a tendency, which I never liked when the Labour party was in government, for suggestions to be put forward in this place and the Government then to leave things to be changed in the other place, as though it is somehow a sign of failure on behalf of a governing party—I aim this not just at this Government but at any Government. It is as though, if a Bill is amended by a suggestion from the Opposition or anyone else, it is somehow, in this place, a sign of weakness and failure. It is not. That is what we are here to do. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband) said, this is a very important Bill, which has cross-party support. Anything that we can do to improve it is not being done from a point of criticism of the Government. We are trying to improve the Bill, and the suggestion from the right hon. Member for New Forest East would do that. It is simple, so I ask the Secretary of State seriously to reflect on it.

In conclusion, I finish where I began by welcoming the Secretary of State and wishing him well in the job that he has before him.

Mental Health Act Reform

Lord Beamish Excerpts

Wednesday 13th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

Ensuring that that sort of link-up is standard practice across the criminal justice system is critical, and that is one area that the Lord Chancellor and I are working on. Ultimately, so too is the provision of enough places, because we can only send somebody to a place if the place exists. That consists of two pieces of work. The first is building more mental health hospitals, and the second is ensuring that people leave mental health hospitals when they can be better cared for in the community. Often it is cheaper and better for a patient to be treated in the community, but provision of community services must be in place so that that discharge can take place. A significant amount of work is going on to try to improve that process.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab) [V]]

May I thank the Secretary of State for his statement, and welcome the publication of the White Paper? It is important in these reforms that the patient is at the centre of their treatment. The provision in the review to have mental health advocates for mental health patients is welcome, but may I suggest that the Secretary of State works closely with the community and voluntary sectors, and considers funding for those sectors so that they can provide the advocates that will be needed if the reforms go forward?

[Matt Hancock]

I am very happy to do that. One of the most striking and out-of-date things about the current legislation is that if somebody who is unmarried is incapacitated through illness, decisions on their behalf are automatically, in the first instance, taken by their father, rather than by their choice of who might take those decisions. That is one of the things we want to change, along with the wider point about support for the community and voluntary services that the right hon. Gentleman rightly suggests.

Covid-19 Update

Lord Beamish Excerpts

Wednesday 30th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

I am absolutely delighted to be able to agree with every single word that my right hon. Friend says. He and I have not always agreed on every dot and cross of the policy on how to handle this pandemic but, regarding how we get out of it from here, it sounds like we are aligned on needing to roll out this vaccine as fast as possible.

The NHS can deliver at the pace my right hon. Friend mentions if we can get the manufacturing up to that speed. Of course, we are working with AstraZeneca to make that happen. I was on the radio at the same time as the chief executive this morning, and I was delighted to hear his commitments. AstraZeneca has worked so hard to make this happen and, crucially, we have to protect the most vulnerable. The fact that only one dose is needed to give protection is incredibly helpful, and that way we can get rid of these blasted restrictions as soon as possible.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab) [V]]

It is very welcome news that the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine has been approved, but many of my elderly North Durham constituents, such as 94-year-old Joyce Ridley from Tanfield who contacted me yesterday, are still waiting for the vaccine. The Government promised before Christmas that they would prioritise those aged 80-plus to get the vaccine. Can I ask the Secretary of State, as I did when he made his statement before Christmas, when my elderly residents in North Durham will receive the vaccine? I do not want spin or flannel; a straight answer will do. If he does not know the answer, could he at least write to me so that I can reassure those who are worried that they have been forgotten?

[Matt Hancock]

I will absolutely arrange a meeting between the vaccine roll-out Minister, the Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, my hon. Friend the Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Nadhim Zahawi), and the right hon. Gentleman to look into that case in particular. Around seven in 10 of the vaccines deployed so far have gone to those over 80. The rest have gone to NHS and care home staff, and to some residents in older persons’ care homes who are under the age of 80. We are deploying the Pfizer jab to older people right now, and we have to do that as fast as possible to make sure that, when there are cases such as the one he raises, we get it sorted.

Covid-19 Update

Lord Beamish Excerpts

Thursday 17th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, of course I will talk to the Chancellor about the point that my right hon. Friend raises. Of course, we do already have a significant amount of support for hospitality businesses, but I understand how difficult this is.

On the point about looking at local areas, we will absolutely do so, as we have demonstrated in the decisions taken today. For instance, just over the border in East Sussex, we have unfortunately had to put Hastings and Rother into tier 3. Tunbridge Wells today has a case rate of 288 per 100,000, and I would say to everybody right across Kent that we really need to act with serious responsibility. No matter which part of Kent a person is in, we have a very serious problem in Kent, and the only way in which we can get it under control is for people in Kent to essentially behave as if they have the virus and are trying not to pass it on to somebody else. Be really cautious in Kent: it is the area of the country that has the biggest problem in terms case rates, and therefore there are huge pressures on the NHS in Kent. I thank everyone who works in the NHS in Kent for what they are doing.

We are putting in as much support as we can, and I look forward to working with my right hon. Friend, all colleagues from across Kent and of course the county council and district councils to try to get this under control. Other parts of the country have done it and brought the case rate down, and we have been able to take some into tier 2. I am sure that we can get there in Kent, but we have to work hard to make that happen.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

On Monday, I asked the Secretary of State when care home residents in County Durham would get the vaccine and he did not answer the question. I have now been contacted by GPs in Chester-le-Street in my constituency who were first promised the vaccine on 16 December. That was put back to 21 December. Having done all the work to set up the hub, they have now been told that the vaccine will not be available till the new year. So when will residents in Chester-le-Street get the vaccine? I do not want hype or generalisations; I just want a straightforward answer for those constituents.

[Matt Hancock]

We are opening more and more GP vaccination hubs each day. The answer specifically on Chester-le-Street is as soon as we practically can, but it has to be done in a safe way. That is out my hands and out of the right hon. Gentleman’s hands. An important operational set of procedures needs to be gone through to open the hubs. It is complicated. I will look into the right hon. Gentleman’s example and write to him with details, but he will understand, as I am sure the people of Chester-le-Street will, that we are trying to get the vaccine rolled out as quickly and as safely as possible, but “safely” is an important part of that.

Covid-19 Update

Lord Beamish Excerpts

Monday 14th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

My right hon. Friend makes the case strongly not only for him but for the Treasurer of Her Majesty’s Household, my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew), who as a Whip cannot speak. However, believe me, behind the scenes he makes the case for Pudsey more strongly than anyone in this House makes the case for anywhere—almost. [Laughter.] It is a team effort. The specific answer to his question is that the decision made on Wednesday will be published on Thursday and come into effect in the early hours of Saturday morning.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

The announcement of the vaccine was very welcome, but like a lot of things with the Government, there is a big difference between what has been promised and spun and what is actually happening on the ground. I was contacted this morning by Mrs Lesley Rhodes from Chester-le-Street in my constituency concerning her mother, Mrs Gowland, who is a resident of the Picktree care home in Chester-le-Street. She has been told that the vaccine will not be available to them and other care homes in County Durham until into the new year. Can the Secretary of State tell her and other residents of care homes in County Durham when they will start receiving the vaccine?

[Matt Hancock]

The right hon. Gentleman is quite wrong. We have been very clear with the roll-out of the vaccine on the pace at which we can start it—in fact, we started it ahead of when we committed to—and the uncertainties over the timing of the roll-out, as he will have seen from my answer to the previous but one question. When it comes to the care home roll-out, I have been absolutely clear that we aim to have it started in England before Christmas, and I am delighted it has been able to be started in Scotland today.