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Health and Social Care Bill

My Lords, I quake to disagree with my noble friends Lord Walton and Lady Finlay about Amendment 96 but I do so as someone who has been the chief executive of a very large health commissioning organisation. It is utterly crucial that rare conditions are considered individually and that the level at which they are commissioned is decided by the national Commissioning Board coming together with the clinical senates and the clinicians involved in the area. They are best placed to decide on the best level of commissioning based on epidemiology and public health expertise. In fact, this amendment would achieve the very opposite of what the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, wanted: to highlight some of these very important rare conditions which we do not want to forget. It is not helpful, however, to have rare conditions identified in this form in the Bill. We must leave it to the clinicians to make a judgment about how they are commissioned in groups. That will protect patients better, in my view, than any statutory guidance of this kind. I hope she will reconsider and not press this amendment.