Clause 41 - Standards set by Secretary of State
Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Bill
3:30 pm
Dr Evan Harris (Oxford West and Abingdon, Liberal Democrat)
The hon. Member for West Chelmsford is right that we are seeking the same thing. The order of the amendments on the amendment paper suggests that ours were tabled a little before the hon. Gentleman's. However, they would achieve similar things. His amendment talks about stating that CHAI should be the principal guardian of standards in the NHS, and I am more than willing—indeed, keen—to support that proposition, but that needs to be backed up with some specific measures that are found throughout amendments tabled by the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives to subsequent clauses to make it clear how the intention behind amendment No. 189 should be implemented.
Amendments Nos. 108 to 113 are the beginnings of some of those measures and are crucial to the proposition made by the hon. Member for West Chelmsford that there needs to be an inspectorate-led guardianship of standards in the NHS, and that politicians need to be kept out of that as far as possible, except for when establishing the framework.
I am determined to make my remarks positive, so I will repeat what I have said on many occasions: this Government deserve praise for the quality framework that they have introduced. They have run the risk of
being attacked for alphabet soup for the creation of many of the organisations that they have established, such as the National Clinical Assessment Authority, the National Patient Safety Agency, CHAI, and the National Care Standards Commission. There have been specific criticisms that we might have brought some of those issues together earlier. Nevertheless, the focus that the Government have put on mechanisms and inspectorates to safeguard quality is important.