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Health and Social Care Bill

I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Dartford (Dr. Stoate), who is the only practising member of the medical profession in the House. I congratulate him on his speed of delivery, which means that he gets through a vast amount in a short time, which is very welcome. I cannot promise to go as fast, but I shall not take much longer. I shall confine my remarks to parts 1 and 5 of the Bill. I shall not touch on the public health issues in part 3, because they are widely welcomed, nor on the regulation of the professions in part 2, because it has been widely covered and some of my concerns raised. Even though I am retired, I am still perhaps a little too close to the profession to avoid being accused of partisanship. Part 1 relates to regulation of health care organisations and the formation of the care quality commission. I have long been in favour of bringing together health care, social care and mental health care, so that is a welcome move. However, I have several worries. The first is that it is a huge task for one organisation to undertake. I am worried about the financial backing, the personnel and whether the resources will be available to make the body fully efficient. Secondly, the Bill is short on listing the actual duties of the new commission. The Picker Institute has produced a valuable briefing on the Bill, which states:"““The Picker Institute believes the principal duty of the regulator should be to promote the interests of patients, service users and the public with regard to the quality and safety of care services.””" That is vital. The Secretary of State used the words ““safety”” and ““quality of care”” in his introduction, and the commission must satisfy those requirements. I am also concerned about patient and public involvement. The Picker Institute suggests a user panel. The hon. Member for North-West Leicestershire (David Taylor) mentioned a citizens council and the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr. Lansley) was worried about the lack of a formal structure for patient and public involvement. Why is there no mention in the Bill of Local Involvement Networks—LINks—the organisation designed by the Government to take over from the community health councils and the patient forums that they abolished? LINks is the one body made up of ordinary individuals, patients and citizens that can translate their feelings to a regulating body. LINks should be at the heart of assessments of the quality and safety of care. It represents patients, and the NHS belongs to patients, so it is inexplicable that LINks is not mentioned in the Bill—I may have missed it, although I looked carefully.