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Health and Social Care Bill

The noble Lord may be surprised to hear me ask this question because, as he kindly said, I have been very determined that the provisions on accountability and parliamentary responsibility et cetera should be strengthened in the Bill. However, I listened to what my noble friend Lord Harris said about what he described as the ““increasing tentacles”” of these links between the various providers and the Secretary of State. Is the Minister not becoming concerned—as I would in his position—that all this new accountability and these links undermine the basic policy positions of the Bill? That is why, for example, my noble friend Lady Thornton suggested that it would be cleaner—if that is the word—to remove the whole of Clause 4 from the Bill. The complexities that are being set up and strengthened, as the Minister has agreed, make the whole thing so incredibly complicated and bureaucratic that the underlying policy positions are being totally distorted.