Health and Social Care Bill (Programme) (No. 3)

This is a crucial part of the debate that we will have over the next couple of days. Parts 3 and 4 of the Bill are at the heart of the Government's proposals for the NHS and of the concerns that professional bodies, patient groups, members of the public and Members—at least on this side of the House—have about those proposals. These parts will introduce a new economic regulator for the NHS, modelled on the same lines as those for gas, electricity and railways. They also enshrine UK and EU competition law into primary legislation on the NHS for the first time. We have also been discussing crucial new amendments which, despite what the Secretary of State says, have not been scrutinised by the Future Forum, about the Government's new failure regime. That essentially addresses which local services and hospitals—such as we all have in our constituencies—will be allowed to fail. Each of these subjects should be subject to separate and far longer debates, because they are of such importance to our constituents, our local NHS staff and our local services. However, because the House has been given so little time and the Government have tabled so many amendments, we have been forced to take these huge issues together—[Interruption.] As always, the Minister of State groans from a sedentary position, but Members have a right to question the Government on their proposals for local hospitals and services, and three or four hours is not sufficient. I hope that the other place will take that into account. The Bill establishes Monitor as an economic regulator, modelled on the same lines as those for gas, electricity and railways. The explanatory notes make this explicit. Page 85 states that clauses in part 3 are based"““upon precedents from the utilities, rail and telecoms industries””." Indeed, in an interview with The Times earlier this year, David Bennett, the new chairman of Monitor, confirmed that that was the Government's plan, saying that Monitor's role would be comparable with the regulators of the gas, electricity and telecoms markets. Labour Members have consistently argued that such a model is entirely wrong for our NHS. People's need for health care is not the same as their need for gas, water or telecoms. There is a fundamental difference between needs, ability to benefit, the complexity of services and the fact that they are far more interlinked. The NHS is not a normal market. It is not like a supermarket, or like gas or the railways. There are much more important issues at stake. The Government have made some minor amendments to Monitor's duties, but they will not ensure the integration and collaboration that many hon. Members recognise is vital to improving health, especially for patients with long-term and chronic conditions. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) said, the duties still rig Monitor in favour of competition. It is not only Monitor's duties that do that. Chapter 2 of part 3 contains 12 clauses that explicitly introduce competition law into primary legislation on the NHS for the first time. The clauses give Monitor sweeping powers to conduct investigations into NHS services; to disqualify senior staff in hospitals and other NHS services; and to impose penalties for breaches of competition law, including the power to fine services that are found to have broken the law up to 10% of their turnover. Not only that, but third parties, including competitors, can bring damage claims against those services. The Government claim, as the Secretary of State did earlier, that somehow those provisions will not change anything. In that case, why bother to have the clauses in the Bill? As the hon. Member for Southport (John Pugh) said, Labour Members have argued not that the Bill extends the scope of competition law, but that it extends the applicability of competition law to the NHS. It is not just the clauses on Monitor and competition law that do this, but others such as those that abolish the private patient cap on foundation trusts, and other Government policies, such as that of ““any qualified provider””.