Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Bill

I, too, would like to support the making of a LINk, if we are to have LINks in the way that has been suggested by the noble Earl, Lord Howe, and re-emphasised by my noble friend Lord Low. What really concerns us is that we have no real conception of what the future holds. The noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, has spelt it out extremely well. I have to admit that I have another worry. It seems extraordinary that this Bill has been going on for so long now in the background without coming to Parliament. The Commission for Patient and Public Involvement in Health has been extended about nine times since it began. That is a fairly extraordinary figure. We have heard from some of the earlier doctors that very good work has been going on with more or less the same members as exist in the forum. I find it really rather upsetting that, even if the time has come to say goodbye finally to the Commission for Patient and Public Involvement in Health, nobody has thanked it for the work that it has done. Considering it was set up and abolished almost at once, it was a pretty disturbing commission to have been in charge of and to have been on the staff of. I would like the Minister to take this opportunity to say something rather more positive than we have heard so far. There are obviously reasons for moving in this direction, particularly on the social care side, as I understand it, which cannot so easily be joined with the health side. I believe that the health side is rather bossy and dominant. It will take some persuading that we will have a sufficiently strong social care side for them to be on a par and in partnership; many other Bills put through by the Government rightly aimed to achieve partnerships at all social levels. I just wanted to say that, by way of a background to my concerns. I did not take part at Second Reading because of other commitments later in the day but I was there for most of the time and I have followed, as far as I can, what has been going on since.