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Health and Social Care Bill

I will happily consider that between now and Report, as indeed I will consider all the points that have been powerfully made in this debate. I have quite a lot more to say in answer to various questions that have been raised, and I hope that I will be given the opportunity to do so. The Government’s amendment, quite consciously, does not confer any new powers on the Secretary of State. It requires him to exercise his existing powers to provide an existing system. The duty means that he would have to intervene if the system was failing and ineffective. He has a range of powers, including the powers to provide or commission training under Section 63 of the 1968 Act, as referred to in subsection (2) of the Government’s amendment. However, the point is that future legislation may add further powers to those that the Secretary of State already has, and that is what I cannot pre-empt in my reply today.