Clause 1 - NHS foundation trusts
Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Bill
9:15 am
Mr Simon Burns (West Chelmsford, Conservative)
As I am in such a generous mood, I will not treat that ridiculous intervention with the contempt that it rightly deserves. In many ways, the hon. Gentleman has a justified reputation as a Member of this House but, on occasions, he misses the plot and gets waylaid by introducing cheap, party political jibes that are without foundation.
Let me reassure the hon. Gentleman that, as I said on Second Reading, I believe, as does my party, that this country should have a national health service that is free at the point of delivery for all who are entitled to use it. That has been the policy of the Conservative party since it returned to office in 1951. It was definitely the policy of the Conservative party from 3 May 1979 until 1 May 1997, and it will remain our policy.
I must warn the hon. Gentleman that it does his intellectual reputation no good whatever to peddle ludicrous smears and inaccuracies that have no foundation. In a generous spirit, I hope I have reassured him, and I hope that between now and the 19 June we will not have to listen to any more ludicrous interventions like that made by the hon. Gentleman.
In his important speech to the New Health Network last year about his big idea, which is before us today, the Secretary of State said:
''The middle ground between state-run public and shareholder-led private structures is where there has been growing interest in recent years.''
He went on to say that people have been
''examining the case for new forms of organisation such as mutuals or public interest companies within rather than outside the public services and particularly the NHS''
That was picked up in the Department of Health publication of December 2002, ''A Guide to NHS Foundation Trusts''. In the foreword and elsewhere, the Secretary of State said:
''We will shortly be bringing forward legislation to establish NHS Foundation Trusts as independent public interest organisations modelled on co-operative societies and mutual organisations''.
All of that is straightforward and plain sailing. I understand—the Minister may be able to enlighten or correct me—that the phrase ''independent public organisations'' had been used as well as ''public interest companies''. That caused concern because of the association of the word ''company'' with private sector business. Now that the Bill is finally published, instead of any reference either to independent public interest organisations or to public interest companies, why do we see the phrase ''public benefit corporation'' in clause 1(1)? Subsection (2) goes on to say that
''A public benefit corporation is a body corporate which, in pursuance of an application under this Part, is constituted in accordance with Schedule 1.''
In its entirety, the clause is straightforward, but I should like the Minister to elaborate on how the original phrase became the ''public benefit corporation''. Is it literally and solely a change in language, or is there any subtle difference between a public interest company-cum-organisation and a public benefit corporation? Will the Minister explain the Government's thinking and the evolution from their original ideas—as put forward in their guide to foundation hospitals and in the Secretary of State's speeches—to what is in the Bill?