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NHS Redress Bill [Lords]

I quite agree. It may be helpful to explain again the point that my right hon. Friend raises. In parts of the NHS, there is an unsatisfactory culture for the handling of complaints, so because patients do not receive a satisfactory response when they first make a complaint, they are pushed towards considering options such as a second stage complaint to the Healthcare Commission, or even legal action. However, as I have said before, I do not believe that anybody who makes a complaint does so with the intention of taking the NHS to the cleaners, or to make significant financial gain. In the overwhelming majority of cases, the reason people pursue complaints is ““to stop it happening to somebody else””, as they tell us in our surgeries—I am sure that my right hon. Friend has heard that in his surgeries, as I have in mine. If the NHS was better at engaging with the patient at the point when the complaint was made, the outcome would be better all round. It would certainly be a better outcome for the individual but, ironically, also for the NHS, in that it could learn from patients’ experience and try to improve it, from the point at which a complaint was received. However, I take entirely my right hon. Friend’s point that the process should be clearer and simpler for the patient.