Health Service Commissioner for England (Complaint Handling) Bill

Debate between Luciana Berger and Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom

Friday 27th February 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Arbuthnot]

It is worrying that my right hon. Friend is persuading me that I am wrong. It is very worrying, while one is on one’s feet, to be persuaded out of one’s own arguments. If he will allow me to cling on for just a few moments, I will get to the dregs of my argument.

The ombudsman might be the only champion of someone who is already vulnerable because they have been incapacitated to one extent or another by their health needs. Therefore, it would be a good idea to encourage the ombudsman to give as much information as possible to the complainant at the outset of the complaint, although my right hon. Friend is right, given his fourth or fifth Eric Forth principle on keeping laws as minimalist as possible, that we possibly should not put it into law.

As I said, 99% of complaints are completed within 12 months—that is, those that are taken on by the ombudsman. We will have to come back on Third Reading to whether the ombudsman takes on enough of the complaints that are made to them, because that issue arose in the evidence sessions of the inquiry of the Public Administration Committee into the ombudsman. If my new clauses were accepted and the ombudsman had to make an estimate of how long it would take, it is quite possible that they would simply have to tick a box to say that it would take less than 12 months. Therefore, the new clauses might, as my right hon. Friend might say, add very little but a formality. As I have said, I do not think that this reflects the way in which the health service commissioner operates. If there is an issue, she does as much as she can to keep people informed about what is happening.

The new clauses are probing amendments and, as I say, I will not die in the ditch for them. However, I look forward to hearing the views of my right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden, my hon. Friend the Minister and the Opposition spokesman about this minor attempt to be helpful.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

I will give a brief response on the two proposals of the right hon. Member for North East Hampshire (Mr Arbuthnot) in new clauses 1 and 2. On Third Reading we will perhaps talk at greater length about the merits of the Bill and why it is important that we are here today. I acknowledge that these are intended to be probing amendments to provoke discussion and debate.

New clause 2 is important. We know from many of our constituents who are going through this process that it often comes at a difficult time. Any more information that they can receive about how long they should expect to wait would be helpful. We are all familiar with the card that the ombudsman already provides to us on receipt of our applications to them, so any further information that we could provide to our constituents about how long they should expect to wait would be helpful.

I see no problem with new clause 2, which seeks to provide a complainant, at the outset of an investigation, with

“an estimate of the period within which the investigation is likely to be completed.”

The key point is that it is an estimate. My only concern, although I acknowledge that the overwhelming majority of cases are completed within a year, is that we must manage the expectations of anyone who submits a complaint to the ombudsman. I reiterate that cases often come at a difficult time for people, and the concern is about complainants having to wait for months beyond the time set out by the ombudsman.

We will talk more on Third Reading about why a complaint might be brought, but we often support constituents at a time when they have had a loss or gone through a difficult medical procedure, and we know that it is important to manage expectations. Anything that we can do to provide assurance will be positive, but I do not want any period that the health service commissioner sets out to give people a false sense of security that they will receive a response within a certain time, when it could be many months after that.

I look forward to the Minister’s response, but I do not think there is much to take issue with in new clause 2 if the right hon. Member for North East Hampshire decides to press it to a Division. As I said, my only concern is about the broader provision of information to the public. I would not want to place on the health service commissioner too onerous a duty to provide a wide audience with expectations of when complaints might be responded to. We know from the commissioner that there is already an expectation that complaints will be responded to within 12 months, which is helpful, but new clause 2 would help to give people who are bringing a complaint some expectation of when it might be responded to.