NHS Redress Bill [HL]

My Lords, I regret to say that I have not, but I am appalled if we in the health service are not learning from mistakes already. That suggests that we may need to employ a whole army of people to consider those mistakes and ensure that they are not made again. Has that cost being taken into account? If patients can receive redress in the form of care, who will perform the assessment? Will it be those who currently assess people for social care, care at home, care in the community, or whatever? Who will do that and will that be an extra cost to the scheme? The area which concerns me most, however, is the definition of ““negligence””, ““a mistake”” and ““an error of judgment””. Who will draw up the list for the Secretary of State of things that can be considered mistakes? What if a whole chain of command is involved, as it often is in the heath service? Whose fault is it if a doctor gives a patient a drug to which they are allergic because the patient’s notes have been lost? Who lost the notes? I wonder whether the dreaded MRSA infection will be on the list of mistakes and negligence in the NHS. As far as I am concerned, MRSA is certainly due to negligence by the health service. Whether it is by over-prescribing by medical professionals, lack of personal hygiene among nursing staff or incompetence of managers and the cleaning contracts which they have set up, I know that Florence Nightingale must be turning in her grave when she looks at the current state of the health service. MRSA infection is a disgrace. Will every patient who contracts it be able to claim under this scheme? There are many more questions I would like to ask, but I await the Minister’s response and, of course, the crucially important secondary legislation.