I will speak first to amendments 8 and 9 and then turn my attention to amendment 15. As the hon. Member for Lewisham East (Heidi Alexander) explained, amendments 8 and 9 would add a whole host of bodies—I think that I counted eight—that the Secretary of State must consult before making regulations under subsection (1). This relates to the conferring of functions on the Health and Social Care Information Centre in connection with the establishment, maintenance and operation of a database. The hon. Lady has talked articulately about why the two amendments should be made, but I have some concerns.
My main concern, despite everything the hon. Lady said, is that adding all these organisations that the Secretary of State must consult will just add to the complication of the database. The amendments not only ask the Secretary of State to consult, but ask that all these organisations approve the regulations. Adding these extra organisations will just add to the confusion about who is policing the system. Is the consent of all those organisations needed before a treatment can be removed, or can it be removed just by the Health and Social Care Information Centre? If a complaint is made about what is on the database, does it go to the Secretary of State, the NHS or the Health and Social Care Information Centre, or does it have to be put in front of all those organisations again?
I understand that the hon. Lady might not have all the answers to my questions and that these issues go deeper than just her amendments, but I do not think that adding extra layers of consultation will help to simplify the Bill or make it any easier to implement the database, which, if put together correctly, could do much good and help many people across the country and, potentially, the world. I do not support amendments 8 and 9, because I believe that they will add unnecessary complications to the database and impede the good work that it could well achieve.
Amendment 15 has been tabled by the Minister, who has spoken eloquently throughout these debates. Including references to treatments carried out for the purposes of medical research will enhance the database, because it will allow the inclusion of clinical trials and other forms of medical research. Including medical research in the Bill will hopefully help to address the UK DUETS database. Mr Deputy Speaker, you will be glad to hear that that is not a database of UK singers who perform
together; it is the database of uncertainties about the effects of treatment. It publishes treatment uncertainties from a wide range of people, including patients, clinicians and research recommendations, among others. By including medical research on the database, hopefully we can remove a few more treatment uncertainties from the database or, on the flip side, identify treatment uncertainties with greater ease and therefore tackle them head-on.
Clinical trials are vital if we are to put our NHS resources into the right treatments. They can help find out how to prevent illnesses, detect and diagnose illnesses or treat illnesses. The earlier we can do that, the more lives we can save, so I support any move to increase clinical trials, which I believe this amendment will do. It is my belief—I am sure that my hon. Friend the Minister will correct me if I am wrong—that his amendment will also increase knowledge of clinical trials amongst clinicians by adding them to the database. Sir Francis Bacon said that “knowledge is power”, and I do not believe that is any less true when it comes to medicine and saving lives. I fully support the Minister’s amendment.