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Health and Social Care Bill

I could not agree more with the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, in relation to change. Medicine is a very exciting field. Health and social care is an extremely exciting field, and change occurs not just daily, but weekly, monthly and yearly. I am sure she will agree that we need a provision that keeps up the momentum of that change. At the same time, if you have providers that maintain change and innovation, we need a regulator that maintains change and innovation. The example that we discussed is more care being delivered from the community, whether that is in a primary community setting or in social care and integrated services. That is something close to me. Many noble Lords will have heard that I do not believe that provision in a hospital setting is the future in meeting some of the challenges facing us in health and social care, given the ageing population, long-term conditions, the success of technology and the conversion of acute illnesses into chronic long-term conditions. We need robust systems out there in health and social care to deal with this integrated model, and the combined regulator is one of the enablers in allowing that to happen, rather than being an obstacle.