Health and Social Care Bill

Does my noble friend agree, however, that when I was putting forward the case, I said that we would not negate democracy but that this was a method whereby we could give the Secretary of State more discretion when he wished to interfere—or, rather, not to interfere but to let local people run the service? As a manager, I know that if you are going to achieve things you have to win the hearts as well as the minds of the people who are running the service. I sense that my noble friend is trying to ensure that I will be isolated in these arguments. When I proposed this, I said to your Lordships that I knew that the line I was taking would be unpopular in the Palace of Westminster. Of course it is, because the House is full of politicians. However, I would like to explain to my noble friend that it is not just my view. Kevin Barron, the Labour MP for Rother Valley, who is a previous chairman of the Health Select Committee, told his colleagues—this was at the Labour Party conference, which understandably I was not at but I read the report—that he recalled looking at statistics for the east of England, some years ago, which were worse than for the rest of the country. The region had retained more local units, which corresponded with marginal constituencies and he said that it was his belief that health experts’ advice, rather than party politics, should determine how and where facilities were provided. In addition, Paul Corrigan, adviser to No. 10 when Tony Blair was Prime Minister, said that ““the public want accountability””—we agree with that—““but are not very keen on the fact that the responsibility lies with elected politicians, who they do not altogether trust””. I serve on a lot of committees, have been on a lot of platforms and have talked to a lot of people over the years in the National Health Service. The question that is often put to me is, ““Can you not depoliticise the NHS?””, because it is seen as a very real problem. I accept that we cannot, with this democratic process that we are in, but, as I was saying, there is a balance to be struck. At the moment, unless we have something similar to Clause 4, I cannot see that balance being achieved.