General Medical Council (Fitness to Practise and Over-arching Objective) and the Professional Standards Authority for Health and Social Care (References to Court) Order 2015

Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Patel

Tuesday 17th March 2015 Grand Committee

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, I rise briefly to support the order. I declare an interest that, maybe for a short while only, I am a licensed practitioner and a registered practitioner, and the rules of the GMC may not be sufficient for me to revalidate.

However, the issue to which I want to refer is the separation of the functions, of which I approve—we have discussed that many times—but for the fact that the GMC can appeal against the decision made by the MPTS. Its role becomes that of an adjudicator as well. I would like the noble Earl to clarify that. I know that in the consultation process there were the same number of responses—39, as mentioned by the noble Earl.

Another issue that we have discussed before is that these changes are welcome, but there are other changes that the Law Commission identified in its report, published in April 2014, on the regulation of health and social care professionals Bill. The Government indicated that they would bring in legislation to deal with all the issues. This is obviously a piecemeal measure taken out of that Bill, so the noble Earl may want to comment on that.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Earl for introducing the order. I shall say at once that the Opposition support it. Like the noble Lord, Lord Patel, we are disappointed that it is yet another Section 60 order being considered in Committee. We should have had the Law Commission Bill, either in pre-legislative scrutiny or in its substantive form. It is disappointing that we are having to deal with these various professional regulation bodies in such a piecemeal fashion.

That said, on the question of the overarching objective, we very much support that and the three pursuits set out in Article 21(1B),

“to protect, promote and maintain the health, safety and well-being of the public … to promote and maintain public confidence in the medical profession, and … to promote and maintain proper professional standards and conduct for members of that profession”.

I want to pick up the point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, and the British Medical Association. I suppose it is an issue of proportionality. In its report, the Law Commission expressed concern about examples given, suggesting that regulators were inappropriately imposing moral judgments in essentially private matters under the guise of maintaining confidence. The BMA has raised the issue of whether the order might end up punishing doctors who pose no threat to the health and safety of the public, on the basis that failure to do so might incur the public’s disapproval. The Law Commission has urged regulators to look carefully at regulatory interventions that do not take some colour from the need to protect the public.

This is a very important point. I have been very impressed with the GMC and the way in which it has improved its procedures and processes—and certainly with its current leadership. However, there are other regulators, perhaps not so much in the health sector, which clearly lack confidence and which are very much influenced by the flow and ebb of media comment and potential political interventions. I think that we have to be very careful about regulators which, in a sense, lose confidence in their own ability to make common sense judgments, and then have knee-jerk reactions in the face of media storms. I hope that the noble Earl will agree that that is not the intention in the case of the health regulators, and like me, he will express confidence, particularly in the GMC to apply common sense judgments in response to the points raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay.

I now come to the question of the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service. The Minister referred to the fact that the consultation demonstrated strong support for enhancing the GMC’s investigative and adjudication roles, but that 52% of respondents took the view that creating an entirely independent body would be preferable, with only 27% supporting the proposal to put the MPTS on a statutory footing.

We must refer in particular to the evidence of the Professional Standards Authority. It,

“did not agree that the proposals to establish the MPTS as a statutory committee of the GMC would achieve the aim”,

of appropriate separation of function. It commented that,

“former and current members of GMC staff should be excluded from sitting on medical practitioner tribunals or interim orders tribunals … The PSA also asked about the ability of the GMC to make rules delegating functions from the MPTS committee to ‘officers of the Council’”,

and it,

“referred to the fact that case managers will be paid by the GMC, but case managers will be performing a statutory office”.

The PSA was obviously concerned that because those managers were paid by the GMC, they might come under undue influence. As the Explanatory Memorandum points out, the PSA,

“conducts annual performance reviews of each of the health and care professional regulatory bodies”.

I would like the noble Earl to explain why the views of the PSA, above all others, were ignored in relation to this issue.

To pick up the point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, about guidance, again, the Explanatory Memorandum says that:

“The Department does not intend to publish any guidance in respect of”,

this statutory instrument but that the GMC,

“will publish guidance as appropriate”.

Is the Minister in a position to respond to the noble Baroness about what kind of guidance will actually be produced?

However, overall I believe that the GMC has made great strides in recent years. It deserves to be supported for what it is doing. I accept that this will speed up processes to protect the public and provide more and better information about doctors on the register. It will improve doctors’ education and training and increase efficiency, and on that basis we are very glad to support the order.

Care Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Patel

Wednesday 7th May 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, I will speak to my Amendment 45D, although I may speak to the other two amendments, in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Owen and Lord Turnberg, as well, because they are relevant to the whole debate.

There is no question that the NHS has a rich reservoir of patient information. If we can exploit it to the full, its use could enhance care, aid early diagnosis and be a rich source of data for the development of new medicines and treatments. There is no argument at all here between the Opposition and the Government on this. The noble Earl reminded me that I took through legislation in 2002 that set the foundations for what we are now debating. He will recall that I was then arguing for us to use the potential of NHS information to the full. The noble Earl then, supported memorably by the noble Baroness, Lady Cumberlege, was a mite worried, I recall, about patient confidentiality. I think, however, that we reached a broad consensus that this is information to be brought together and used, but alongside safeguards that have public confidence. This is simply the issue that is before us at the moment.

Under the extension of the scheme, the Health and Social Care Information Centre can require GPs to upload patient data in an identifiable form from every GP practice in England. This will be linked to the Hospital Episode Statistics and other data sets. The information centre is a body corporate that can require a health and social care body to provide information—including confidential information. That is all well and good. The problem is that the centre and NHS England have botched its implementation, so much so that the scheme had to be withdrawn, originally for six months until the autumn, but my understanding is that the chief executive of the NHS, in evidence to the Health Select Committee, said that that date no longer applied. Perhaps the noble Earl could, when he winds up, comment on that.

My own view is that this is a dead duck. The Government will not be in a position to enable the scheme to go ahead any time before the election because so much public confidence has been lost. This is not surprising. Clearly, the information centre and NHS England took an inadequate approach in their public communications effort and there was a lack of effectiveness and accountability. It is clear that there are concerns about whether such information can be kept confidential in practice, and there is a worry that pseudonymised data could, in certain circumstances, be manipulated to identify a particular patient. There have also been concerns, referred to by my noble friend, about inappropriate use for commercial reasons, such as by insurance companies. I make a big distinction here: I would want the pharmaceutical industry to be able to use that information in research and development. That is absolutely legitimate.

There is also concern about general practitioners and their approach. Before the decision was made to suspend the scheme, there were worrying signs that a number of GP practices would not co-operate or would advise their patients to opt out of the system. It is important to recognise that we will automatically be part of the system as patients unless we opt out. Again, I agree with that principle. It is the only way to operate it. However, I am not convinced about having to go to my GP, if I can get an appointment, which is quite arguable at the moment, and having to talk to my GP—or, even worse, the receptionist—to say that I want to opt out of the scheme. There are real concerns about this system. Unless the GP body as a whole is confident that it is going to run with this, it will be destroyed because so many people will be encouraged to opt out that it will not achieve what it is meant to achieve.

I agree with the Royal Statistical Society which argues that we need a robust response to restore public confidence. Of course, I welcome the changes that the Government have made as a result of debates in the other place and in your Lordships’ House. The question, however, is: do they go far enough to restore public confidence? In my view, they do not. The Government have to make the bold statement that the system cannot be allowed to run under the people who are running it at the moment. They have lost people’s confidence. I cannot put this across strongly enough to the Minister: if you talk to organisations that know about the subject, you find that they are clear that they now do not have confidence in the people who are running the system.

That is why the Motion of the noble Lord, Lord Owen, is so important. He is basically saying that we need an external body that is independent and can give total oversight to the scheme. I support my noble friend’s amendment as well. I agree that it would be better in primary legislation than secondary, but there is no harm in having some secondary legislation to back up what we may agree in your Lordships’ House today.

In the Commons, the Government introduced amendments regarding the use of the term “promotion of health” for the purposes of the dissemination of information. Of course, “the promotion of health” could be a very open-ended definition. There was some fear in the other place that commercial companies—say, food and drink companies—could argue that they needed information for a public health campaign. My Amendment 45D seeks to provide reassurance by asking for regulations to be laid that are explicit about the circumstances in which information concerning the promotion of health can be used.

In supporting my own amendment, I say again to the Minister that there is no disagreement whatever about the importance of care.data, about the need for it to be successful or about the huge benefit to our country if it becomes successful. Success, though, is not guaranteed, and at the moment I believe it is unlikely unless the Government make changes. I hope that the House and the Minister will be sympathetic to these amendments.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak very briefly. I will not repeat everything that has been said but I support what was said by the noble Lord, Lord Turnberg, particularly about the use of data for biomedical and other medical research. I have been involved on several occasions with perinatal epidemiological research, and such data are vital for that. There is no doubt that we need to be certain that core data will be available for research purposes.

I had not thought that “the promotion of health” might be construed as applying to the food industry; I had interpreted the phrase to mean epidemiological and public health research. However, if the interpretation includes the promotion of health by the food industry, then of course I support it absolutely.

I would be content to have this in secondary legislation at this stage, as the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, mentioned. However, there is no doubt that the way in which the issue has been handled by Public Health England has lost confidence. It could have been handled better, and I hope that Public Health England has learnt lessons from it.

Health: Cardiology

Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Patel

Wednesday 6th March 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords—

[Lord Patel]

My Lords, will the Minister explain a little bit more about the proposed public consultation on screening? The evidence for the screening of families where a cardiac death has occurred, particularly in a young person—which is linked to a gene—is conclusive, so what is the public consultation about?

Health and Social Care Bill

Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Patel

Wednesday 8th February 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Patel]

My Lords, I pay tribute to the noble Earl for how he has met our concerns in the Committee debate on education and training. The noble Lord, Lord Walton, mentioned Amendments 13 and 16. To me, Amendment 13 is crucial. The reason I degrouped them is because Clause 6 addresses the Secretary of State's responsibility for education and training. I hope that we will have the debate about the issues that he raises when we debate Amendment 13. I agree with the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Turnberg—Amendment 16—which provides that universities need to take a greater part in education and training than they have hitherto.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, as this is a new stage of the Bill, I should declare a number of interests which are also listed in the register; I am chairman of the Heart of England NHS Foundation Trust, a consultant and trainer with Cumberlege Connections, president of the British Fluoridation Society and of the Royal Society for Public Health.

I put my name to Amendment 2, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, which has perhaps not received as much enthusiasm as I would have wished from noble Lords, who have pointed to Clause 6. Behind her amendment is real concern to ensure that we will train enough health professionals in the years ahead and that they will be of sufficiently high quality. There is some history here. I very much support devolving as much as possible decisions about the commissioning of training places to local NHS organisations. I warmly welcome the work of Dame Julie Moore and her team, who have produced the report. She is chief executive of the UHB Foundation Trust in Birmingham and brings a lot of expertise to that position. Some noble Lords will have been to a seminar where the report was debated. I have no argument with its general thrust, but we know from experience that when money is tight, the NHS reduces the number of people that it trains and its training budget. That always happens and, a number of years later, the NHS then pays the consequences. If we are to have a highly effective National Health Service in future, we need to recognise that the quality of our professional staff goes to the core of what we seek to do. Therefore, it is right that the Secretary of State should be seen to have major responsibilities enshrined in legislation. That is the essential point of Amendment 2, whatever the technical deficiencies to which noble Lords have kindly drawn our attention.

In that regard, let me say that I welcome the government amendments in this area and the work of the noble Earl, Lord Howe. Of course, he is also responsible for research in the department, and I think that he well understands how the education and training of our professionals very much ties in to the research agenda. I know that we will come to research later tonight.

In relation to the other amendments in this group, I have already welcomed the government amendments, but perhaps I may pick on Amendment 63. It is right that the national Commissioning Board should have regard to the promotion of training of clinical staff in any provider from which it commissions services. There is essentially a parallel amendment—Amendment 104—which applies to clinical commissioning groups. The whole point here is to ensure that there is a level playing field. If, regrettably, the Government persist with this lunatic idea of a competitive approach within the health service, it is essential that when it comes to commissioning decisions all qualified providers contribute to education and training. It would be an absolute disgrace if clinical commissioning groups and the national Commissioning Board started to commission services from organisations that did not play their full part in education and indeed research. I hope that the noble Earl, Lord Howe, will make it clear that that is what his Amendment 104 means when it says, in parliamentary counsel terminology, that clinical commissioning groups must,

“have regard to the need to promote education and training”.

I take that to mean that the amendment does not permit CCGs to place contracts with qualified providers who do not make a contribution to education and training.

Overall, I echo the words of the noble Lord, Lord Walton, regarding the work of postgraduate deans and his question about their future. Where are postgraduate deans going to lie in the future? Are they going to lie in the local branch offices of the national Commissioning Board; are they going to be aligned with the clinical senates; or are they going to float free? I think we should be told.

I also echo the words of the noble Lord, Lord Willis, regarding the role of universities. It should not be an option; they need to be round the table. It needs to be what I would describe as a “hard partnership”. I think we are all well aware of the issues and concerns surrounding the quality and outcome of nurse training. The noble Earl, Lord Howe, himself has often commented on issues such as dignity, nutrition and so on, where matters have been raised by patients and there is concern about whether today’s nurses are getting the kind of training that is required. It is very important that those who commission from universities do so in as vigorous a way as possible and hold those universities to account. However, equally there has to be a partnership. The noble Earl, Lord Howe, will know about the intention to expand academic clinical science networks. That is a very good example of universities and the health service coming together, and we need to encourage that in the future.

Finally, the noble Lord, Lord Walton, raised a point about the duty on any willing provider regarding training or research. I think that I have covered that, but he also mentioned NHS foundation trusts. I am not aware of any situation in which NHS foundation trusts are ignoring their responsibilities but I certainly agree with him that, as they are more independent of the Secretary of State than other parts of the NHS, some assurances from the noble Earl in that regard would be welcome.

Health and Social Care Bill

Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Patel

Tuesday 22nd November 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, this is one of the most important groups of amendments that we are going to discuss, because, in a sense, it sets the whole relationship between the Secretary of State and the NHS Commissioning Board.

I have considerable sympathy with my noble friend Lord Warner’s Amendment 96, which seeks to avoid the Secretary of State essentially putting in a huge shopping list of demands by limiting the mandate to a maximum of five obligatory and five desirable functions.

I come back to the recent interventions by the Government in the affairs of the National Health Service. The most recent have been around waiting times, both in terms of what happens to patients who have passed the 18-week target and of the activities of some primary care trusts, which, in order to contain their expenditure, have set arbitrary waits for patients even though they are ultimately treated within the 18-week limit. I have said to the Minister that I have no complaint about the intervention of Secretary of State, which I thought was quite proper, but it is very difficult to see how this will happen under the new system. We have yet to receive a satisfactory answer to it. What in the new system will suddenly obviate the need for the Secretary of State to make such interventions?

The question then comes to the mandate. Is it, as my noble friend Lord Warner hopes, a high-level document which will focus on a very limited number of objectives, or will it be a shopping list? The noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, expressed it very well as in a sense legitimising “recent ministerial enthusiasms”. We were rather given the lie to this when we debated this matter last week, because the Minister suggested that if there was an issue such as primary care trusts lengthening waiting in order to meet the budget, the mandate could be used to prevent it. Indeed, that is the risk—that the Secretary of State will, quite properly, come under pressure to intervene in the health service. The Bill weakens the legal powers of the Secretary of State to do so. The risk is clearly that the mandate will be used instead, and it would be used retrospectively if it does not satisfy the intervention power. I believe that there is great reservation among noble Lords as to whether the intervention power is sufficient, because there has basically to be a failure by the NHS Commissioning Board to carry out the objective. If it is not sufficient for an intervention to take place during the year, my goodness me the shopping list will grow when the new mandate is written. So, there are some very important issues on which we have yet to receive any answer from the Minister.

There are, however, a number of other important amendments in this group. Perhaps I may ask the Minister to clarify three points. The first point is how long the mandate will last. My assumption, from what Ministers have said and what is in the Bill, is that it will last for a year. The Minister will be aware that the chairman of the NHS Commissioning Board expressed a wish to the Health Select Committee, which was vetting his appointment, that the mandate should last for three years. I wonder if the Minister could clear up that matter for your Lordships.

Will the Minister also clarify the intention behind the provision in proposed new Section 223D(7)(b), on page 27, which allows changes to total capital and revenue resource use after parliamentary general election takes place? I take it that this is simply to allow for a change of Government but I would be grateful if he could spell that out.

However, my substantive amendment, Amendment 100A, is concerned with parliamentary scrutiny. In Clause 20, proposed new Section 13A states:

“Before the start of each financial year, the Secretary of State must publish and lay before Parliament a document to be known as ‘the mandate’”.

Surely Parliament is entitled to a little more involvement than merely receiving the mandate as a fait accompli. My noble friend Lord Warner has already pushed the Government in their amendment to give Parliament information about any reservations the board may have expressed about meeting the mandate. I would certainly support that in the interests of transparency. There is also, in Amendment 100, reference to the requirement on the Secretary of State to consult the board, HealthWatch England and other persons, with the results of any consultation on the mandate to be published. That too seems reasonable.

However, I wonder if we ought not to go further in terms of parliamentary scrutiny. If we take Ministers at face value—and the Secretary of State has expressed a wish to step back from day-to-day involvement in the National Health Service—it is clear that the mandate assumes special importance. Why is Parliament not being given a proper opportunity to scrutinise the mandate before the Secretary of State finally sets it for the NHS Commissioning Board? If the Secretary of State is really going to tell Members of Parliament in particular that he is not going to intervene in a particular question because he considers that now to be the responsibility of the NHS Commissioning Board, in accordance with the mandate that the Secretary of State has set, then I think that Parliament should be entitled to some involvement in scrutiny of that mandate. My Amendment 100A suggests how that might be done. It is built on the system of scrutiny for national policy statements.

The House will be aware that the Planning Act 2008 introduced a new planning system for applications to build nationally significant infrastructure projects. They cover applications for major energy generation, railways, ports, roads, airports, water and hazardous waste infrastructure. Under this system, national policy on national infrastructure is set out in a series of national policy statements. Under Section 92 of the Planning Act 2008, each proposal for a national policy statement must be laid before Parliament. In so doing, the Secretary of State specifies a relevant period for parliamentary scrutiny.

If during that scrutiny period either House passes a resolution with regard to the proposal, or if a committee of either House makes recommendations regarding the proposal, the Secretary of State must lay before Parliament a Statement setting out his response to the resolution or recommendations. Following completion of parliamentary scrutiny, the Secretary of State may formally designate the proposal as a national policy statement. The final national policy statement is also laid before Parliament.

In the House of Lords, national policy statements are normally debated in Grand Committee, but that does not restrict the freedom of committees of the House or individual Members to make use of the statutory procedures. In the event of a Motion for resolution being tabled, the usual channels have undertaken to provide time for a debate in the Chamber within the scrutiny period.

When I was energy Minister, I had to bring through four energy policy statements. We had three four-hour debates in Grand Committee. They were very thorough. The Government took note of what took place in those debates. In the end, it is up to the Government to make the statement because it is a matter for the Executive. I do not challenge that the mandate, which I regard as important as a national policy statement, is ultimately for Ministers to make. It is rightfully an Executive responsibility. However, the process that I am suggesting in my Amendment 100A would allow Parliament to have much more involvement in the scrutiny. It would allow Ministers to take account of that and then make their minds up in relation to the mandate.

If the Government are determined to hand over such responsibility to a quango—and I remind the House that in this Bill the National Health Service Commissioning Board is given concurrent powers with the Secretary of State in relation to the crucial responsibility in Clause 1—there has to be a great parliamentary scrutiny of that mandate.

[Lord Patel]

My Lords, I added my name to the amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Warner. They were prompted by the lack of clarity in the nature of the mandate that the Secretary of State will issue to the Commissioning Board. There is also a lack of clarity in how he will consult the public, although the provision does say that the Secretary of State will consult HealthWatch England prior to issuing a mandate. Who else will be able to scrutinise the mandate?

On the basis that the Secretary of State will use the mandate to performance-manage the Commissioning Board, what will be the nature of the mandate that will allow him to do that? Will it have measurable outcomes against which the Secretary of State can performance-manage the Commissioning Board? What happens if the Commissioning Board does not agree with the mandate? How is that dispute settled? Will the financial aspects be a major part of it or will it be better outcomes for patients?

Health and Social Care Bill

Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Patel

Monday 14th November 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Patel]

My Lords, in the absence of the noble Lord, Lord Walton of Detchant, I am very pleased to move the amendment on his behalf. I wish I had a better idea of what his purpose might have been in tabling the amendment. None the less, it is a good opportunity to explore the Government’s thinking in establishing the clinical senate.

It is easier to understand the purpose of the professional networks, which I have spoken about before. I think they are a good idea, and there should be more clinical and professional networks embedded in the health system. The cancer and cardiac networks are two good examples. However, when it comes to the senate, I am less clear about the Government’s intentions. I know that the NHS Future Forum: Clinical Advice and Leadership report said that commissioning consortia—now called commissioning groups—and the NHS Commissioning Board,

“should establish multi-specialty clinical senates to provide ongoing advice and support for their respective commissioning functions”.

It also said that independent advice from public health professionals should be available at every level of the system, but that is by the way.

Therefore, we have a situation where the Future Forum suggested that clinical senates should be a way of getting advice to all the different new structures. In response to the Future Forum, the Government said that clinical senates will give advice to CCGs which they must follow in each area of the country. At the same time, Dr Kathy McLean, who led on the project, is leading another project and has issued a consultation letter to develop the role of clinical senates and clinical networks. Obviously the Government do not have a clear idea of what the clinical senates are for, otherwise why is Dr Kathy McLean leading the project and issuing a consultation letter?

It is proposed that 15 senates will be housed by the NHS Commissioning Board. They will feed their advice back to the NHS Commissioning Board, although about what is not clear. In his two amendments my noble friend Lord Walton of Detchant wonders whether they might be useful in feeding the Commissioning Board and the commissioners advice about specialist commissioning. The senates will have a major say in advising CCGs on their commissioning plans, but their advice will be exactly that—advisory. Membership will consist of doctors, nurses and other health professionals, so it will be a large group. The senates are to be involved in quality aspects of clinical commissioning and an annual assessment of CCGs, and they will report on their annual reports and performance. They have serious work to do in monitoring CCGs, yet they are only advisory for CCGs.

Future Forum suggested that clinical senates should provide advice and support for a range of bodies, including CCGs, the NHS Commissioning Board, health and well-being boards and others. Are senates not likely to end up as just another layer of bureaucracy? Therefore, what is the real role of all 15 clinical senates? Will they be involved in advising the NHS Commissioning Board in its commissioning role? Are they to be advisory for CCGs and check on the quality of their commissioning? Why are the professionals on the senate going to be from outside the commissioning groups’ area of commissioning? The amendments are tabled to explore whether they will really have a role in commissioning specialist services.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, I also have an amendment in this group. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Patel, that he anticipated the remarks of his noble friend Lord Walton remarkably well.

Having argued against bureaucracy in the previous group of amendments, I am now about to argue in favour of putting senates on a statutory basis. I shall explain why. First, this was a very good outcome of the listening exercise. I think that because I am concerned at the Government’s decision to abolish the strategic health authorities. It is what I call the Hagley Road issue. In 1948, the Birmingham Regional Hospital Board was established; its offices were in Hagley Road and throughout 60 years there has always been something there. It may have been a regional health authority, a regional hospital board, a strategic health authority—call it what you will—but there has always been a regional outpost of the department acting essentially as a leader, with a positive role in looking at the region as a whole, ensuring that its services were cohesive and had proper direction and that, by and large, it was self-sufficient. That is to be removed and we are going to get large SHA clusters which will cover a much larger part of the country. Although we do not know the size of the clinical commissioning groups, they will clearly cover much smaller population areas.

I believe that there is still a need for a mechanism whereby strategic leadership can be given over a region, and I see the clinical senates as being the best approach to that. Noble Lords have spent at least two days debating reconfiguration and are concerned that these difficult decisions often have intervention from the centre. Clinical commissioning groups will be too small to take on the kind of strategic leadership that is required. When you are trying to establish in a region where the super specialty and tertiary services should be and trying to come to a view about how many A&E and emergency departments you need, you require a body that can take a strategic overview. The clinical commissioning groups are too small to do that. They could, of course, possibly come together in a kind of federated meeting to try to resolve those kinds of issues, but that could prove to be very difficult. Therefore, the senates could have an important role in setting some of the parameters and giving strategic leadership to a region.

However, as the Government intend them at the moment, these will be informal groups of people who could easily be ignored by the clinical commissioning groups, by the health and well-being boards, by the deaneries and by all the organisations that have an influence on the way in which the health service is going. My amendment is designed to set out a more structured approach to ensure that clinical senates are created as bodies corporate, that they are properly accountable to the national Commissioning Board and that they have the ability to give strategic leadership and have some oversight of the work of clinical commissioning groups.

I suspect that my amendment will not find favour with the noble Earl but the point about the need for strategic leadership in a region is important. I fear that the super SHA clusters will be too large to do that and the clinical commissioning groups will be too small.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, clinical commissioning groups are, of course, one of the main building blocks of the Government’s proposed changes to the National Health Service and I support my noble friend Lord Whitty when he argues for the need for population-based bodies at that essential local level. However, I will follow the noble Lord, Lord Kakkar, in looking at issues to do with corporate governance in clinical commissioning groups. I am concerned whether the corporate governance structure will be sufficiently robust. Will clinical commissioning groups be sufficiently accountable to the public? What safeguards will be put in place to ensure that clinical commissioning groups operate in the public interest?

Schedule 2 sets out the details of the governance structure. Clinical commissioning groups will be bodies corporate with a constitution and a procedure for decision-making; an accountable officer and audit and remuneration committees are to be appointed. That is fine as far as it goes but I hope the noble Earl will use this opportunity to clarify what effective corporate governance structure is to operate. My Amendments 175CA and 175CB seek to do just that.

On Amendment 175CB, I seek guidance and reassurance about the composition of the boards of clinical commissioning groups. On every other board in the NHS the non-executives are in a majority. Will the noble Earl confirm that that will be the case with clinical commissioning groups? If not, why not? I follow what the noble Lord, Lord Kakkar said: surely, by any definition, GPs are the least experienced in any form of corporate governance in the health service? Therefore, given that they are the least experienced, is it right that they should be subject to so much less scrutiny and challenge than those other organisations in the National Health Service which are hugely well versed in corporate governance? At the very least the chair and vice-chair of the clinical commissioning groups should surely be lay people to ensure that the public interest is represented.

There would be considerable merit in ensuring an external appointments process. I have suggested here the NHS Commissioning Board but there may be other suggestions. All experience with public bodies shows that if boards are responsible for deciding on their membership you will often run into trouble. We have seen this in the education sector, with corporations of colleges simply deciding themselves who should be appointed and who should replace those who retire. Simply leaving clinical commissioning groups to decide on their membership is a recipe for deep trouble, particularly when the temptation for CCGs will be to spend resources on themselves, on their constituent GPs. The issue around public interest and conflict of interest will become a keen problem and, without strong, effective corporate governance, we may well run into great difficulty in the future.

There are probing amendments around membership but, in relation to Amendment 175CA, I would like to know whether the noble Earl feels it is appropriate that local authorities should have some kind of representation on the boards of clinical commissioning groups. Amendment 175CA in particular draws attention to the role of district councils in two-tier areas. That is because clearly the principal local authority will be the host of the health and well-being boards. There will be concern, particularly in rural areas, if the non-metropolitan district councils do not have some involvement. I at least pose the question as to whether they may have some involvement at the clinical commissioning group level.

My principal amendment is Amendment 175D which concerns the accountability of clinical commissioning groups. I do not understand how those groups will account to their patients. As a patient, what do I do if I do not agree with the decisions of the clinical commissioning group? What if I think the decisions made by my clinical commissioning group put me at a disadvantage compared to the decisions made by a clinical commissioning group in a nearby area? What if I think my clinical commissioning group, by its decisions, might affect the viability of my local general hospital? What if I think it is putting too many contracts with itself, bringing up this issue of conflict of interest? There is real concern about the conflict of interest issues around placing contracts with the GPs who form the constituent members of the clinical commissioning groups.

How do members of the public hold the clinical commissioning groups to account? As far as I can see, the Bill is completely silent on that. The noble Earl may say that it is contained in the doctor-patient relationship, but I do not think that is true at all. My relationship with the GP is not about commissioning: it is about essential care. Frankly, there is already a risk that, because GPs are collectively going to commission, the doctor-patient relationship might be undermined in any case. That is because the moment we place commissioning decisions with GPs, there will always be a suspicion among patients that decisions they are making clinically will be governed by the needs of the clinical commissioning group and the need to ration resources. Clearly, the Secretary of State has said, and has been saying consistently, that the reason the budget has been put with GPs is to give control over the budget overall.

I have put forward a model essentially based on the foundation trust model, which says that the members of clinical commissioning groups should be the patients who are on the lists of the GPs within that group. The membership should then vote for a governing body and the governing body should then appoint the non-executives on a clinical commissioning group. I am not completely wedded to that model: I just lifted a model that is currently in operation in the health service. My main point is that I do not believe that it is right and proper that a public body should simply be composed of one profession that is given enormous power—if you are lucky, there may be one or two non-execs on the board as well—accountable to nobody at all at the local level. There is no mechanism at all whereby I as an individual patient have any way of challenging the commissioning decisions of those clinical commissioning groups. This is a very important issue to which I am sure we will return. We have to make CCGs properly accountable.

[Lord Patel]

My Lords, I will be brief in supporting the amendment of my noble friend Lord Kakkar. I also support the comments just made by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt. I think it vital that local commissioning groups are accountable and conduct themselves according to the highest principles of public life. CCGs are legally responsible for the quality of their decision-making processes. Therefore, they need to be able to stand up to judicial review. The individuals making those decisions should be required to adhere to the highest standards of conduct for public officials.

I know that, to a degree, the Government recognise this by raising the structures of CCGs—namely, the inclusion of lay and other professional members on governing bodies, the requirement for compliance, the principles of good governance and the pledges about public access to documents and meetings. While this work is being carried out, however, we need clarification about the methods of identifying and selecting lay and professional members of governing boards.

The Bill also states that CCGs may pay members of the governing body such remuneration and allowances as it considers appropriate. Full autonomy may not be appropriate as it might undermine public confidence in the ability of members of CCG governing bodies to act in the public interest. Some degree of national guidance about fee scales might also be valuable.

Health and Social Care Bill

Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Patel

Monday 7th November 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Patel]

My Lords, there is no conflict when I use the word “clinical” in recognising that it would encompass the totality of clinical and social care. The problem will arise that while the evidence exists to be able to write clinical quality standards, the evidence to write social standards is lacking, and we may have to develop those. That is why a distinction is made between the two. In terms of immediate outcomes for patients that are seen for medical care, the clinical quality standards will make the difference. That does not mean that I do not recognise clinical and well-being together—and I think that all doctors would recognise that. It is not medicalisation that I am after by using the term “clinically”.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, this has been an interesting series of amendments. The noble Lord, Lord Patel, made a very important point about the influence that legislators can have in drafting legislation on the culture of the NHS. He speaks with great experience because of his work in Scotland on the development of clinical standards, and I am sure he is right to emphasise the words “health” and “clinical” in adding to our understanding of what we seek from the National Health Service.

The point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, is very interesting. This is meant to be a health and social care Bill, although there is very little about social care in it. Indeed, the only provisions ranging around social care are bad provisions. Remarkably, we are proposing to abolish the General Social Care Council, which ought to be an uplifter of standards among social workers. I give notice that I intend to thoroughly oppose these provisions and place the regulation of social workers into a health body. I look forward to the support of the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, on that when we come to it. I would have thought that the way through is either to add well-being to this part of the Bill or to say “health, clinical and other outcomes” to meet the valid point raised by noble Baroness.

My noble friend Lady Bakewell is very keen in her Amendment 18B to ensure that in securing the outcomes set out in the Bill, we,

“should not exclude sections of the population”,

on grounds of age. We look to the Minister to give us some reassurance on my noble friend’s point about the overarching indicators used extensively in the department and the health service, which go up to only the age of 75. It is not good enough to say that the data are still under development and therefore we will not worry about statistics on the over-75s. One would like to think that those indicators will be revised to embrace people over 75.

Amendment 16A, which is my own amendment, relates to the efficiency of the service. It seeks to add “efficiency” to the criteria that need to be considered. I would be interested to know from the noble Earl why efficiency is not mentioned in line 23 on page 2 of the Bill. My argument would be that a measurement of a service’s effectiveness may be of only limited value. One example might be the fraught question of new drugs and treatment being developed by industry and marketed indirectly to patients, for example through the sponsorship of charities that promote the case for the provision of new treatments in the NHS, and there is a strong case to make those treatments improve the effectiveness, safety and quality of experience. However, if you do not also have to consider efficiency, is there not a risk that you will not look at value for money or productivity and, in the end, not give a rounded analysis of a particular new treatment or technology?

Amendment 19, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Patel, deals with the standards prepared by NICE under Clause 231. I hope that the noble Earl can clarify the status of NICE standards and guidelines. I have a later amendment on this matter, as do my noble friend Lord Warner and the noble Lord, Lord Patel. We have been concerned by suggestions that the Government are seeking to downplay the role of NICE and the statutory nature of its guidance on technology appraisals. I would be very grateful if the noble Earl could reassure me on that.

I remind the noble Earl that NICE was established because of the traditional delay in the health service when a treatment has been proven to be cost-efficient and effective. There was always reckoned to be a long delay from the time when it was proven to be cost-effective, efficient and clinically effective to the time when it generally available in the National Health Service. NICE guidance was designed to speed up the adoption of such proven new treatments, technologies and drugs. I am concerned about any suggestion of returning to the bad old ways when it was up to each clinical commissioning group simply to decide on a new technology and the group not having to follow the guidance set out in the NICE technology appraisals—if that is what they are called; I think we have probably moved on from that terminology. We will of course return to that later on in the Bill, but some assurance would be welcome.

I turn to my noble friend Lord Warner’s Amendment 109. I never understood the Opposition’s opposition to waiting time targets in the NHS. I remind the Minister that when his Government last left office they had the patients’ charter, which had a waiting time target of 18 months that they did not achieve. We got it down to 18 weeks, which had a hugely beneficial impact on patients. There is no doubt, if you look at regular polling, that the NHS was in very good condition in 2010 because to all intents and purposes the dreadful waiting that had been such a product of the NHS over many decades had been radically reduced.

We know that there is a sense in the health service that the Government are no longer worried about waiting times. I have no doubt whatever that if the pressure is taken off, waiting times will start to rise again. That might suit the Government because of the funding issues that they are confronting the NHS with, and it would certainly suit the private sector, which we know does well out of long NHS waiting times, but it will do patients no good at all. I do not know how far my noble friend Lord Warner intends to take this, either now or at a later stage, but it is important that we say in the Bill that we are concerned about the speed of access to services.