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Health and Social Care Bill

It is not often that I completely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, but when we were both on the listing to look at the issue of the care of older people by the Joint Committee on Human Rights, we heard about cases of bad homes. The reasons were absolutely crystal clear. There is increasing demand for places alongside a Treasury clampdown on costs. The wages paid to people working in these homes are not high, with many on the minimum wage, and a lot of them are foreigners. I can tell the noble Lord what light touch means. It is the exact opposite of being a recruit at Caterham Barracks and having your bed space inspected by a Grenadier Guards sergeant. He would look for every single speck of dust and check whether a touch of Blanco had been left behind. You were put on a charge if anything was the slightest bit wrong. That is the direct opposite of light touch. If there is a tendency for standards to slip because of the pressures I have outlined, inspection standards must be high and enforced more vigorously. We all know that we are facing a very serious problem of old age. People are living longer; people are, happily, being kept alive longer; as the noble Lord said, a large number of people have no one coming to see them and no one to look after them except the people in the care home. Obviously, there is an improvement on what happened 20 or 30 years ago, but it is still not satisfactory. The fear of inspection will maintain high standards. Light touch means doing practically nothing about it.