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Health and Social Care Bill

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, for his intervention. I would be horrified if people outside this Room got the impression that we were in agreement most of the time. I accept the thrust of what he said but, as this is a matter of singular importance, I disagree with him for this reason. In the corporate world, sustainability has reached levels of importance such that it is one of the primary objectives of most major companies. I was sad enough to have read my way through Tesco’s corporate social responsibility report, the bulk of which is about environmental matters and not about charitable giving and so on. Clearly in the private sector there is a massive financial incentive to develop sustainable policies and practices; in the public sector there is no such driver. That is why the noble Lord is wrong to take exception to the amendment. I believe that regulation and regulators in the public services play a role in driving forward an important agenda. It may not appear important to people in their day-to-day working lives, but it is a growing necessity.