My Lords, as this is my first contribution on Report, I begin by declaring my interest as the recently stepped-down chair of NHS Improvement and NHS Test and Trace.
I commend the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, and my noble friend the Minister and support Amendment 31. In Committee, we debated in considerable detail the constituent elements of the ICBs. I think it hugely important that integrated care boards have a loud, strong, forceful voice for mental health, public health and prevention in all its forms, but I also think it really important that we enable a board to be a proper board.
The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, questions whether a board would ever assess its own competence and members. Any really good, functioning board in the public and private sector views that as one of its primary obligations. The first line of defence to ensure that a board is performing well is whether it is actually doing an assessment every year of whether it has the appropriate skills. Yes, you should have second and third-line assessments through the CQC and NHS England, but it is the role of a board, and we should let them do that. I believe that Amendment 31 holds these boards to account to do that.
The amendments we have already debated today, enshrining the obligations around public health, health inequalities and mental health, ensure that that is the clear objective of those integrated care boards. I encourage my noble friend the Minister to hold firm and support his amendments and not the others.