---

Health and Social Care Bill (Programme) (No. 4)

I have told the Minister that I am not giving way to him. These amendments are overwhelmingly outweighed by the huge change put forward by the Government in abolishing an effective statutory model for healthwatch bodies locally, which was supposed to give patients and the public a strong and independent voice in the NHS. Labour Members cannot accept the Government's removal of that statutory body, which they promised and have now betrayed. The amendments make a mockery of the Deputy Prime Minister's claim in the letter he wrote with Baroness Williams to Liberal Democrat Members that the Bill will ensure ““proper accountability”” to the public. It makes a mockery, too, of the Secretary of State and the Prime Minister's claims that this Bill will put real power into the hands of patients and the public, and that there will be ““No decision about me without me.”” And, as the national body that represents patients and public involvement in the NHS has said, it is"““a betrayal of public trust””." This is what has happened throughout the proceedings on a Bill for which the Government—Conservatives and Liberal Democrats—have no mandate, and for which they know they have no mandate. They promised that there would be no top-down reorganisation, but did not present any proposals for an independent regulator on the basis of the system that exists in the privatised utilities because they were worried about what people would say. Above all, on this fundamental issue, which concerns the say that the public and patients have in the NHS, the Government have—as the National Association of LINks Members said—betrayed people's trust in what they promised, and for that reason we will not support the amendments.