Health and Social Care Bill

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 13th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

I have here a letter to the Prime Minister from Dr Clare Highton and Dr Haren Patel, the chairs of City and Hackney clinical commissioning group, who say that they want

“to add our voice to the call for the Bill to be withdrawn.”

Does my right hon. Friend agree that that underlines his point about the wide range of people who want it to be dropped?

[Andy Burnham]

I think that Government Members are misjudging the mood of the country, and particularly of health professionals, who have not given a knee-jerk political response to the Bill but have given it careful consideration since it began as a White Paper and then proceeded on its tortuous path through Parliament. They have come to the conclusion that it is better, even now, to abandon it and work back through the existing legal structures of the NHS rather than proceed with the new legal structure and all the upheaval that that entails.