Clause 38 - Local Optical Committees
Health Bill
5:15 pm
Andrew Murrison (Shadow Minister, Health; Westbury, Conservative)
Amendment No. 33 would add dispensing opticians who supply or repair glasses to the list of persons who will comprise the local optical committee. We are a little bewildered as to why they should be left off, particularly as the Minister has a clear understanding—as evidenced by her previous remarks—of the difference between the various professions that work in ophthalmic services in and around the NHS. However, dispensing opticians seem to be disfranchised in this case.
One cannot draw a line between such professions because they are interdependent and interrelated. Sometimes they can be one and the same thing: individuals working for the same organisation who are mutually dependent on each other's activities. Indeed, there is a cross-subsidy between the eyesight test and the dispensing of optical appliances. To use another smoking analogy, one cannot put a cigarette paper between the two.
It seems entirely appropriate that the dispensing optician arm should be reflected in the local optical committee. That said, I am a little in the dark about local optical committees, because the Bill is not entirely clear about what manner of beast they are or what they will do. The guidance notes are a summary to say the least. All they say is:
''Clause 38 inserts new section 45C in the 1977 Act''
to which one is invited to refer, but if hon. Members are like me, they do not have a great deal of time to plough through the Act. The notes continue:
''The new section relates to Local Optical Committees.''
I would have thought that that was extremely obvious. The notes are not particularly helpful.
I hope that the Minister will be able to describe the committees in depth because they will be important bodies. More particularly, I hope that she will say why dispensing opticians should be left off the list when they are obviously so integral to the system and the various professions in this field are so interdependent.