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Health and Social Care Bill

I welcome the opportunity to debate this group of amendments. I am sorry that we did not receive any clarification on the health in pregnancy grant in another place. I must express my concern about amendment No. 48, and by extension, amendment No. 49. On the previous group of amendments, the Minister chose not to make any response whatever to my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Anne Milton), who made an outstanding contribution. I am sorry if we are delaying his teatime, but we hope to get some responses on this matter, as this is our last opportunity to get the Bill right. All the amendments now being proposed were initiated by the Opposition, supported by other Opposition parties, even as far back as the Committee stage in the House of Commons, but we are only now debating the proposals, to which the Government have at last acceded. The Government therefore have a serious duty not only to account for their conduct on the Bill but to ensure that the necessary clarifications are in place. They will have no further opportunity to do so, as no ping-pong is anticipated with this Bill. Amendment Nos. 48 and 49 will, as the explanatory notes somewhat euphemistically put it, allow the Department for Work and Pensions and Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs"““to share information to help develop and refine policies for pregnant women.””" Can the Minister clarify what kind of data he envisages being shared? This proposal seems to add further confusion to the health in pregnancy grant. I will not detain the House by rehearsing the important and extensive arguments that we had in Committee—columns 455 and following—or in the other place, which showed clearly how little thought the Government appeared to have put into this measure, how little evidence it was based on, and how desperately Ministers seemed to be covering up for the Prime Minister's ignorance, after he told the House from the Dispatch Box that nutrition was most important in the last months of pregnancy—Government reports confirm that that is not the case—and that this measure would combat that, for which there is little evidence.