Medicines and Medical Devices Bill

Lord Balfe Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 11th November 2020 Grand Committee

Further extending prescribing responsibilities could help those people better to support vulnerable groups of patients who need to minimise contact with healthcare professionals, I believe that the arguments for the new clause are overwhelming. Much of the work to achieve its aim has already been undertaken, so there should be no delay. A commitment to bring back a proposal and a timetable for implementation is completely reasonable, so I hope that the Minister will respond favourably to the amendment, which proposes to insert a new clause in the Bill.

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to follow the four noble Lords who tabled this amendment, all of whom are working from exactly the same brief as I am—I can tell that from the quotes. First, I should declare an interest: I have not been present in Committee before, but am here as a former president of the British Dietetic Association, a TUC-affiliated union. The Bill was published during the dying days of my presidency and I undertook to speak in support of the proposed new clause.

I have nothing substantial to add to what has been already been so ably said by colleagues. I will just point out that dieticians are one of the groups seeking to extend this, and people often misunderstand what dieticians are for. The number of times I have been asked whether I am associated with Weight Watchers has rather driven me insane, but dieticians are actually more involved with undernutrition than overnutrition. Although people think of obesity and what are now the more popular things, the biggest challenge facing the average dietician is a person probably over 80 years old, almost certainly living alone and generally not caring for themselves. So the role of a dietician is often to get people to eat a balanced diet. They work in hospitals and in the community, and with other health professionals, particularly in developing clinical management plans. That effort would be reduced if this proposed clause were accepted.

Points about dieticians and others have been extensively made. I understand that

“within three months of this Act being passed”

is a big ask, but also that, unless we ask for something, we will probably not get anything at all. The noble Lord, Lord Bradley, has already quoted the Minister at Second Reading saying that they were

“considering across all non-medical groups … where there is a need to consider undertaking formal consultation on potential amendments to prescribing responsibilities”.—[Official Report, 2/9/20; col. 432.]

I realise that, at the time of Covid, there is a huge number of demands on the Minister’s department and the staff therein but, overall, if this can be made to work, it will benefit and increase the productivity of health professionals. So, in associating myself with the previous speeches, I also encourage the Minister to give as positive a response as he is able to. I am sure that, if we extend prescribing rights, we will be benefiting many patients and the medical profession. We will also be enabling many health workers to play a more effective role in the care of their patients.

[Baroness Jolly (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I support Amendment 49 in the names of the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, and the noble Lords, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, Lord Ramsbotham and Lord Bradley. It mandates the Secretary of State to publish proposals and a timetable for additional healthcare professionals to be given appropriately restricted prescribing rights. As other noble Lords have said, for well over 20 years, some appropriately trained nurses have been prescribing from a restricted list. I see no reason why, as the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, described, appropriately trained allied health professionals and others, working from a list of approved medicines commensurate with their profession, should not do the same.

This is entirely appropriate at the moment, when it is not always easy to access a GP. We have seen how successful giving prescribing rights to both community and practice nurses has proven to be. Patients are becoming more willing to have appointments with AHPs and nurses, rather than GPs, which frees doctors to concentrate on patients requiring more experience, such as those with unusual or complex conditions. This is a win-win amendment and I heartily commend it.