Clause 4 - Functions: supplementary
Health Protection Agency Bill [Lords]
9:30 am
Miss Melanie Johnson (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department of Health; Welwyn Hatfield, Labour)
There are a number of differences. For example, some of the powers are paralleled in recent legislation, such as the Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Act 2003 provisions for CHAI and the CSCI. Subsection (2), for example, on which I believe the hon. Gentleman commented on Second Reading, certainly would not enable the agency to detain anyone or to enter specific premises. It would need specific powers to do that.
I have also looked at the arrangements for the FSA model. That is old legislation—perhaps that is a little unfair, but it is certainly more than five years old—and it created a non-ministerial department, not a non-departmental public body. There are a number of differences. The Food Standards Agency—which I assume is what the hon. Gentleman means by the FSA—has a fairly unusual set of arrangements across Government, which were made partly in response to the great concerns about the independence of food advice following the BSE scandal. That body has a different set of needs to the body that we are considering.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 4 ordered to stand part of the Bill.