Arm’s-Length Bodies (Accountability to Parliament) Bill

Martin Vickers Excerpts

Friday 14th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sir Christopher Chope]

I hear the hon. Gentleman’s cautionary tale, and I am not suggesting that anything will be a panacea. My Bill is just a tentative step to try to introduce a little more accountability.

[Martin Vickers (Brigg and Immingham) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful speech and I agree entirely with the points he is making. As I recall from the coalition days, one of the reasons for the Lansley reforms was to make the NHS more independent of Government, which clearly failed. My personal view is that all these arm’s length bodies, quangos and so on should be within the Departments. Then, as he says, we would be able to question Ministers on the issues. The idea that we should make them independent of their political masters is something we need to overturn.

[Sir Christopher Chope]

Absolutely; that is why, although the term “independent” sounds seductive to people outside, it quite often means a lack of control by elected representatives over the body in question.

I am not going to spend all my time talking about NHS Dorset, but I must offer one other illustration of my concerns. I have a letter here from the chief executive of NHS Dorset, who I think receives a lot more remuneration than even the Prime Minister. I wrote to her in November, and she wrote back at the end of January about an issue relating to dermatology services in Dorset. I wrote back to her saying, “What is being done to address this issue? You haven’t answered that in your letter.” It took until 5 March, with further queries following up on it, for me to receive an answer. The letter cites my question, which I first raised back in November, as:

“Concern over the ‘unacceptably long waiting list for dermatology services. What is being done to address this issue by the Integrated Care Board?’”

The answer given is:

“As part of a Commissioning for Sustainability programme, Dermatology is one of the services that is being focussed on. The aim of the programme is to recover services to the 18-week standard target, whilst maintaining sustainability. As part of this we are currently reviewing how the commissioning and delivery of services can best achieve this.”

That is after more than four months. There is no suggestion of when the review started, when it is likely to end or what will happen. I take that as an example of the Member of Parliament being fobbed off by officialdom for having the temerity to raise an important issue on behalf of his constituents.

I could go on with many other examples from NHS, but I will not do that. Instead, I will see whether, through this debate, I can encourage the Government to go further than just abolishing NHS England. I have had many dealings with the NHS Business Services Authority, another arm’s length body, apparently controlled by the Department of Health and Social Care, but essentially a law unto itself.

I have been in dealings with the NHSBSA on a number of different subjects, but particularly on the subject of the access and treatment of people who suffered vaccine damage and have applied for vaccine damage payments. The NHSBSA is responsible for organising and running that scheme, yet progress in dealing with applications is desperately slow. As at last November, it had more than 17,000 claims relating to covid-19 vaccines, but of those, more than 7,000 were awaiting resolution, and some had been waiting more than 18 months to be resolved.

Once a claim has been rejected, as it often is, the claimant has an opportunity to go for a mandatory reversal application before they can get access to a tribunal. Dissatisfied claimants can go for the mandatory reversal, but the NHSBSA can hold up that process. As at 27 February this year, 1,657 rejected claims had been subject to mandatory reversal. Some 600 of those are outstanding, and 81 have been outstanding for more than a year. That is intolerable, because it can take more than a year for someone to have their claim dismissed. They then get a mandatory reversal and need to go to tribunal. After three years, someone’s right to litigate on this subject is taken away by the limitation period. That is an example of what happens when Departments and arm’s length bodies start taking over and being thoroughly incompetent.