Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Bill

moved Amendment No. 239: 239: Clause 227, page 158, line 42, after ““State”” insert ““that may be in force at the time”” The noble Baroness said: I shall move and speak to the government amendments and to Amendment No. 239A. I will start with that, as the power for the Secretary of State to make directions about what a LINks annual report includes is important. The power will not mean that a LINk cannot include issues and matters that it thinks are important, as a LINk is an independent mechanism and can of course highlight areas that it thinks should be made public. Indeed, it could do so at any time—definitely not only in the annual report. The power enables the Secretary of State to seek the views of LINks on matters that may be of particular importance. For example, it may be that the Department of Health would welcome insights from LINks in developing policies on issues of access to services, or on the impact of legislation such as the Disability Discrimination Act. Similarly, the Secretary of State may well wish to be able to take a holistic view of specific aspects of LINks activities; for example, how many people from vulnerable groups have been involved in them. That insight could only be achieved by requiring all LINks to provide information on the same topic. Essentially, then, we are looking for the ability for LINks to populate their reports in a way that enables us to make comparison. I now turn to a number of technical amendments to Part 14 of the Bill. Since consideration of the Bill in the other place, its drafting has been reviewed to ensure that a consistent approach is adopted to any provisions relating to directions and guidance. As a result, some amendments are needed to Clause 227 to ensure consistency with the rest of the Bill. Clause 227 deals with LINks’ annual reports; subsection 3(a) enables the Secretary of State to give directions about the matters dealt with in a LINks annual report, and subsection 2(d) means that regard must be had to, "““guidance issued by the Secretary of State””," on how a LINks annual report is to be made ““publicly available””. Amendments Nos. 240, 241 and 242 therefore do two things between them. First, they remove the express requirement for directions and guidance under the clause to be in writing, which is to ensure consistency with the rest of the Bill. However, directions and guidance under the clause will still have to be in writing, since subsection (11) requires them to be published. Secondly, they remove the express power to vary or revoke guidance given for the purposes of the clause. That is also to ensure consistency with the rest of the Bill. Such an express power is considered unnecessary since guidance may generally be issued, varied or revoked without statutory authority. As a result, including such an express power under this clause might wrongly lead the reader to conclude that there was no power to vary or revoke guidance under other provisions of the Bill. Finally, Amendment No. 239 provides that the guidance to be referred to when preparing an annual report is the guidance, "““in force at that time””." This clarifies the obligation where guidance has been amended over the course of time. Without that clarification, a reader might at first think that the reference was to the guidance in force when the local authority made the arrangements with the LINks host. I beg to move.