Clause 1 - Health Protection Agency
Health Protection Agency Bill [Lords]
12:00 pm
Miss Melanie Johnson (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department of Health; Welwyn Hatfield, Labour)
The decision to carry out a review of the Department of Health's arm's length bodies was announced to the Select Committee on Health on 30 October 2003, four weeks before the Bill was introduced in the Lords. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health made it clear in his statement to the House on 20 May that we aimed to announce the conclusions of the ALB review before the summer recess, as the hon. Member for Westbury has acknowledged.
I cannot say more at this stage about the outcome of the arm's length body review; decisions on that obviously have yet to be finalised. Indeed, much of it is completely irrelevant to the Bill. However, I can repeat what I said on Second Reading—we do not expect to table amendments to the Bill in order to take forward the findings of the ALB review. I am obviously not ruling out the possibility that the agency might take on extra activities as a result of the review. We have always made clear our intention that the legislation should allow some flexibility over the functions that the agency performs. That is why the agency's functions are set out in such a way.
I can assure the hon. Gentleman that we have absolutely no intention to come back with amendments at some later stage in the Bill's progress through this place, nor on its return to another place.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 1 ordered to stand part of the Bill.