---

Welfare Reform Bill

I also strongly support this amendment. Perhaps I should declare my interest as chair of a mental health trust. It occurs to me that this amendment would be incredibly helpful for our staff—social workers and community psychiatric nurses—who spend an inordinate proportion of their time guiding our patients through the benefits system. If they had access to a charter that set out the rights and responsibilities of their patients and service users, everyone would get a far better service. The precious time of our staff may be saved in order to spend more time looking after the mental health of their service users instead of working around, through or with the benefits system. There is great merit in this amendment, which reflects the Prime Minister’s wish to have a more transparent situation with our government departments. On those grounds alone, I would hope very much that the Minister would support this amendment. If he has any doubts about it, I hope that we can add it to our long list of issues that we wish to discuss with him when we meet before Report.