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Health Bill

Those reassurances are welcome. I am grateful to the Minister for them, in particular for her reassurance that there is no intention to interfere with the day-to-day operations of the commission. That is what I expected her to say. The issue boils down to transparency. If there ever were any attempt by anybody, not necessarily Ministers, to interfere with what the commission was doing, there seems to be no mechanism to ensure that that fact became known. The problem with the reported incident involving Jane Kennedy was that it was one person’s word against another’s. It was all shrouded in mystery at the end of the day and nobody quite knows who said what to whom. It would be desirable in such circumstances for the commission to feel able to put its hand up, so to speak, and say, ““Well, we have had somebody trying to interfere with our work and this will not do””, whereas I am not sure from reading the Bill, and even from hearing what the Minister said, that the commission will have sufficient autonomy to say such a thing. However, a measure of transparency would provide additional public reassurance. The Minister covered the principal ground that I hoped she would. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. Clause 65 agreed to. Clauses 66 to 68 agreed to. Schedule 7 agreed to. Clauses 69 to 72 agreed to. [Amendment No. 100 not moved.] Clauses 73 and 74 agreed to. [Amendments Nos. 101 and 101A not moved.] Clauses 75 to 77 agreed to. Clause 78 [Orders and regulations]: