Health and Social Care Bill (Programme) (No. 2)

Lord Watts Excerpts

Tuesday 21st June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Burns]

I will give way once more, to the hon. Member for St Helens North (Mr Watts), and then I will make progress.

[Mr Dave Watts (St Helens North) (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for giving way.

So far today, the Minister has used the precedent of 1983. Will he confirm that when a similar Bill came back in 1983, the whole Bill was recommitted to the House?

[Mr Burns]

The hon. Gentleman seems a little confused. He is talking about 1983, but if he had been listening he would know that I have already said that two Bills were recommitted in 2003. I also said that if Opposition Members wait, I will explain the context of those Bills vis-à-vis the current situation. I therefore urge them to show patience, as they will then learn something.

--- Later in debate ---

[John Healey]

The Minister, his colleagues and the Prime Minister have broken their word so often so far on the NHS that we cannot take at face value what the Minister says. We will wait to see and we will judge what he does when we see the detail of the amendments that he tables.

[Mr Dave Watts (St Helens North) (Lab)]

Does not this go to the root cause of the way the Government are dealing with the NHS? They are dealing with it piecemeal. At present we have an integrated health service. Does not their approach show that they want to break that NHS up?

[John Healey]

My hon. Friend is right. What the Government are doing is reckless and rushed. The NHS is still intact, but what they are doing will break it up as a national service, as we know it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Bone]

The hon. Lady asks another important question on which we as parliamentarians have to decide today. As I have said, I am against programme motions that include end dates; I am against programme motions anyway. We could recommit the Bill without including a timetable on when it must leave Committee, but unfortunately we live in this world and that tactic was invented not by my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Treasury Bench, but by the previous Government—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for West Ham (Lyn Brown), the Opposition Whip, who of course did not actually say anything, makes the point that two wrongs do not make a right, and I agree.

I know other Members want to speak, but I wish to return to my previous point. If Committee members, at least those on the Government side, vote according to their conscience and are not whipped, we will have a much better Bill. Of course, that is what the Prime Minister said in his famous speech on 26 May 2009, but I encourage such behaviour, because, if the Government do not like any amendments that are carried, they can always reverse them when the Bill returns to the House on Report.

[Mr Watts]

Does the hon. Gentleman really believe that his own Whips are going to stand aside regarding this Bill? Frankly, he is living in a dream world if he thinks they are going to choose people who will not toe the party line and will vote for every amendment that they want.

[Mr Bone]

If I am put on the Committee, I shall certainly make up my own mind. I know that that concept is foreign to Labour Members, who have always done what they are told and voted how they are told. Conservative Members are different—we vote according to conscience.