Schedule 1 - Schedule 7A to be inserted in the National Health Service Act 1977

Part of Health (Wales) Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 4:45 pm on 10 December 2002.

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Photo of Don Touhig Don Touhig Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Welsh Office, The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales 4:45, 10 December 2002

All of us want to maintain the independence of CHCs. It is essential to the work that they do that they should be seen to be, as far as possible, at arm's length in terms of their scrutiny and support for the health service. I do not dismiss the Opposition's amendments or the new clause because they have got it wrong; rather, I do not believe that they provide the right track to follow to achieve independence.

Amendment No. 17 would prevent the Assembly from making regulations about the membership of CHCs and would restrict the Assembly in its intention to move gradually to more open membership of CHCs. Those aims are strongly supported by CHCs in Wales, who have pressed for a more open approach to appointments to CHCs. The removal of the sub-paragraph specified in the amendment would prevent the Assembly from securing incremental change in membership to better reflect the needs and aspirations of local communities. That is what the Bill seeks to do.

It is important for the membership of a CHC to reflect the community that it serves; many local authority and voluntary sector members have made a tremendous contribution over the years. I witnessed that when I was a local authority member and the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling) reflected it when he referred to Meirionnydd. They play an important role in CHCs. It would be wrong to lose them—we want to retain their expertise, their background and their knowledge. I assure hon. Members that the Assembly is not seeking to control CHC membership. Because it wants to retain as many such people—where appropriate—as possible, it seeks to move to a more open method of recruitment in order to ensure that the members of CHCs fully represent their communities. He is right that CHC membership is now made up of one half local authority nominations, one third the voluntary sector and the remainder Assembly appointees.

Recruitment of Assembly-nominated members is set out in accordance with the Assembly's published code of practice for ministerial appointments to public bodies. Vacancies are advertised in the media, both locally and nationally. Applicants are interviewed by the Assembly's public appointments branch in accordance with the Nolan principles. It is easy to score party political points, but I am sure that the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell will agree that that is the right way to do things, rather than to continue as we did in the past, when many appointments were made exclusively by Ministers without any consultation and without the open application that is now preferred by the National Assembly for Wales.