Time to stoke the coals to grow the flames of the British economy

Blog / November 2, 2011 / 1665Comment nowhttp://grahamemorris.com/2011/11/time-to-stoke-the-coals-to-grow-the-flames-of-the-british-economy/Time+to+stoke+the+coals+to+grow+the+flames+of+the+British+economy2011-11-02+12%3A49%3A46grahame

David Cameron has this week sought to blame the recent eurozone crisis for the many growing economic woes facing the UK whilst also using this opportunity to signal changes to his failing economic policies at home. He talks about creating an economy that is stronger and fundamentally fairer based on paying down our national debt over this parliament; strengthening the competitiveness of our economy; and unlocking global trade. However the UK has had a wasted year and the economy is now flat-lining. The Tory medicine is hurting but is not working.

The only clear plan the Coalition has set out is to cut public spending and raise taxes such as VAT as part of its deficit reduction package. It is these policies which have damaged the British economy. The British economy has not grown since last Autumn and therefore to blame the current eurozone crisis will simply not wash. The serious challenges now facing Britain is that without the growth forecasts on which the Chancellor made his original Budget forecasts Britain’s ‘debt crisis’ – which is an economic crisis – will worsen. And don’t forget that our growth forecasts have already been downgraded three times.

Cameron’s recent talk of confronting our debts, strengthening competitiveness and unlocking global trade provides little confidence especially to those young people unable to find jobs. The only tangible commitment here is to continue the damaging and ideological cuts agenda regardless of its impact on our economic or on vulnerable people up and down the country. The rhetoric on strengthening competitiveness could mean anything from lowering taxes for big business to reducing workers’ rights. And big talk on unlocking global trade is little more than an aspiration.

In stark contrast, Labour’s Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls has set out a 5 Point Plan for Growth and Jobs:

One – A £2 billion tax on bank bonuses to fund 100,000 jobs for young people – which they would be required to take up – and build 25,000 more affordable homes.

Two – Bring forward long-term investment projects in schools, roads and transport to get people back to work and to strengthen our economy for the future.

Three – Temporarily reverse the Tory–led Governments damaging VAT rise – an extra £450 for a couple with children would provide a boost for our high streets and help struggling families

Four – A one year cut in VAT to 5 per cent on home improvements, repairs and maintenance to help homeowners and small businesses.

Five – A one year national insurance tax break for every small firm which takes on extra workers would help small businesses to grow and create jobs.

The Shadow Chancellor’s plan is designed to get the economy moving and create jobs for young people across industry, the high street and in small businesses. It would encourage spending to stimulate growth and raise money from bankers bonuses to benefit young people and families and build new homes. Whilst the government wants to take a step back and push the burden of the economic crisis onto ordinary people, Labour is calling for action to protect the most vulnerable and not to let them bear the brunt of this crisis.

The Tories are continuing to press ahead arrogantly with their flawed plan for the economy. Their rhetoric that “this is a debt crisis, and you can’t spend your way out of a crisis” is a weak attempt by the Coalition to wash their hands of the situation. An economic crisis is an economic crisis, regardless of whether its cause is war, debt, famine, corruption, or anything else. It is merely coincidental that one of the contributing causes of this crisis is the very thing that is needed to aid its recovery. For a number of years I worked in an analytical bio-chemistry lab and I think a good analogy is to consider a patient in A&E that has taken a drug overdose. The doctor is not going to refuse the use of drugs on the patient to aid in the healing process. Medicine is medicine and economics is economics. The Chancellor is being reckless by refusing a stimulus to encourage growth and jobs.

It has also come as a surprise to see the Coalition’s leaders try to cover up their failed economic policies of the last 18 months by this week talking about ‘kick-starting’ the economy through new investment. The Deputy Prime Minister yesterday attempted to present a two-thirds cut to regional growth funding as new investment. He even had the audacity to claim the credit for a £36 million investment in Sheffield Forgemasters in his own constituency, when this simply replaced an £80m loan cancelled by the Coalition 16 months ago in its first round of spending cuts. Further claims by the Deputy Prime Minister were that his government were giving the go-ahead for two power stations, when in fact these were already in the pipeline and no government funding is actually being brought forward. This government has promised £1.4 billion through England’s Regional Growth Fund over three years, compared to Labour’s commitment to spend £1.4bn each year.

For Nick Clegg to come out now and pretend he is investing to support the economy is a complete deception, however it may be the first evidence that Ministers realise they are losing the argument to Labour. The people of Britain need a government that is on their side, not abandoning them to unemployment and hardship. The Con-Dem Coalition is neglecting its duty to act; it should give credence to Labour’s Five Point Plan for Jobs and Growth and move to Plan B on the economy.

Labour’s Five Point Plan for Jobs and Growth

Blog / October 31, 2011 / 1662Comment nowhttp://grahamemorris.com/2011/10/labours-five-point-plan-for-jobs-and-growth/Labour%27s+Five+Point+Plan+for+Jobs+and+Growth2011-10-31+11%3A56%3A18grahame

One

A £2 billion tax on bank bonuses to fund 100,000 jobs for young people – which they would be required to takeup – and build 25,000 more affordable homes.

Two

Bring forward long-terminvestment projects in schools, roads and transport to get people back to work and to strengthen our economy for the future.

Three

Temporarily reverse the Tory–led Governments damaging VAT rise – an extra £450 for a couple with children would provide a boost for our high streets and help struggling families

Four

A one year cut in VAT to 5 per cent on home improvements, repairs and maintenance to help homeowners and small businesses.

Five

A one year national insurance tax break for every small firm which takes on extra workers would help small businesses to grow and create jobs.

Labour must Commit to Reclaim The NHS

Blog / October 24, 2011 / 1660Comment nowhttp://grahamemorris.com/2011/10/labour-must-commit-to-reclaim-the-nhs/Labour+must+Commit+to+Reclaim+The+NHS2011-10-24+15%3A41%3A46grahame

The NHS is part of the British psyche. Established by the post-war Labour Government over sixty years ago, its guiding principles and values were enshrined into Law and funding was secured even when Britain was facing a larger deficit [as a percentage of GDP] than exists today. Until now our nationalised health service has survived against all the odds; it came through the privatisation agenda of the 1980s and endured decades of critical underfunding by consecutive Tory governments. It has maintained the public’s support and trust which in turn has inspired politicians to fight for it.  It must count as one of the Labour Party’s major achievements that in 2010 satisfaction with the NHS, as measured in the Patient Satisfaction Survey, had more than doubled to 72% compared to 35% in 1997 when Labour took office and was riding at an all time high. This is the story of the NHS.

The debate surrounding the ‘survival’ of the NHS has become skewed around the many challenges it faces. Its affordability, the increase in long-term chronic illnesses brought about by longer life expectancy and the current debate on the affordability of elderly social care are used by some to argue for the break-up of the NHS or at least for its fundamental reform. The NHS has and always will face new challenges, but its survival depends solely on the political will to maintain a nationalised health service, free at the point of delivery. Even after a decade of increased spending the UK still spends far less as a percentage of GDP than the European average and around 25% less than current levels of French and German spending. So why does the NHS now face such upheaval?

In 1997, the Labour Party won a parliamentary landslide with one of its key election slogans that there was ‘24 hours to save the NHS’. What followed was increased investment, more doctors and nurses, new hospital buildings and significant reform – some good, some not so good – but with survival rates and public satisfaction rising consistently.  In the 2010 General Election no party won a majority in parliament and the National Health Service had all-but ceased to be a political issue. There seemed to be a cross-party consensus that the NHS was here to stay and a contrite, rebranded Tory Party even promised a real terms increase in NHS funding.

However, since coming to power the Tory-led Coalition has proposed the most radical shake-up of the NHS since its inception, applying the threat of ‘reform or die’.  Unfortunately, the Coalition’s reforms are not about protecting the NHS, but unravelling it. To fully understand the impact of these reforms you need only return to Bevan’s founding vision for the NHS.  Bevan envisaged that the State would own the hospitals and employ all of the staff that would deliver NHS treatment. However, as negotiations progressed Bevan was forced to compromise and allow GPs to remain as independent practitioners operating with service contracts to the NHS. It is this loophole that the Tory-led coalition seeks to exploit as it passes the majority of NHS funding from public hands into private GP commissioning groups.

Whilst Bevan won the battle to have state-owned hospitals in the 1940s, it was the last Labour government that opened the door for hospitals to move to Foundation Trusts, with a limit on the amount of private work the hospital could conduct. This cap on private work is now to be lifted to allow a growing reliance on private healthcare and the profits they generate to supplement NHS treatment.

On the whole, the last Labour Government sought to use the private sector in the NHS to increase capacity, for instance in reducing waiting times for cataract and hip operations. However, once the distinction between our public services and the private sector was blurred by the centre-left it was clear that this would be abused once those on the political right took power. Unfortunately, Labour Ministers laid the seeds for this further shift towards the private sector. This is made clear by the former Labour Health Secretary, Alan Milburn, who has even opposed the ‘watering-down’ of Coalition reforms by the NHS Future Forum.   

Whilst the government denies its motives are to privatise NHS services there is growing evidence that NHS providers and social enterprises are continuing to lose out to commercial companies for major NHS contracts. The private healthcare firm Assura Medical recently beat Francis Maude’s ‘favourite’ social enterprise, Central Surrey Health, which reinvests its profits into the local community, for a five-year contract worth £90 million a year in north and west Surrey. The direction of travel that is being chartered by this government, forcing new commissioning groups and hospitals to operate in the private sector, is certain to lead to much more of this gradual privatisation of our NHS services. 

GP fund-holding was abandoned in the 1990s for good reasons and this latest large-scale experiment seems certain to be a disaster for the NHS as well as for the Coalition. The NHS will once again be at the top of the political agenda at the next General Election. The Labour Party must do more than simply oppose these current plans and commit to returning the ownership and stewardship of the NHS to the public and its staff. By 2015 there will be chaos surrounding workforce training, the loss of nationally determined pay, terms and conditions for staff and the provision of basic services as over time private healthcare displaces NHS providers.

Nye Bevan argued that abuse in the health service occurred when the incompatible principles of private acquisitiveness and public service were married together. I believe the British people are opposed to private companies profiting from the treatment of the sick. The Labour Party founded the NHS in 1948. It returned to save it in 1997 and yet its toughest task will surely be reclaiming the NHS from the interests of private profit, in the name of the people, after the next General Election in 2015.

Speech on the Health & Social Care Bill at Report Stage 6th September 2011

Blog / September 7, 2011 / 16461 Commenthttp://grahamemorris.com/2011/09/speech-on-the-health-social-care-bill-at-report-stage-6th-september-2011/Speech+on+the+Health+%26+Social+Care+Bill+at+Report+Stage+6th+September+20112011-09-07+13%3A05%3A31grahame

Grahame M. Morris: I am privileged to have the opportunity to speak in this debate on an issue close to my heart. A number of Opposition Members—and perhaps Members across the whole of the House—have taken advantage of the opportunity to spend a day with the NHS to see at first hand some of the issues and problems and to discuss with staff and patients their concerns. Many Members have received e-mails and letters from constituents and from various interest groups, and the issues we are considering this evening are very important.

As my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) said during his contribution, the NHS holds a very special place in people’s affections. In many respects it is viewed not unlike a religion, in so far as it is loved and cherished. Members who have had the opportunity to travel to other countries and see different health systems will no doubt be well aware of the high esteem in which our own health service is held throughout the world. It is a real exemplar—a model of a publicly funded, publicly provided health service. As an aside, I point out as a member of the Select Committee on Health that we have a very frugal Chairman, and the furthest we have travelled is to Hackney. My knowledge is therefore based on reading and on evidence submitted to the Committee.

Let us consider the problem we face with the Bill and the amendments and new clauses. I listened carefully to the Secretary of State’s statement, and the real concern among patients, the public and the Opposition is, what are the motivations behind these reforms? I worked in the health service for a dozen years or more and have taken the trouble to look into the various options in some detail. Ministers have said that there are precedents for Bills of this complexity, but I would be staggered to find that there are. It is incredibly complicated and has been subject to numerous amendments. As members of the Bill Committee who are in the Chamber this evening know, many of the arguments originally made by Government Front Benchers were turned on their heads in Committee, and some of those that were rubbished by the Opposition were taken up and rehashed as part of the Future Forum.

Nicky Morgan (Loughborough) (Con): I am listening very carefully to the hon. Gentleman, as I did in Committee. Indeed, those of us who served on both Committees—the original and the re-committal—deserve a badge of honour. He talks about the Bill being complex. Does he not think that the process has been made more complex by the use of misinformation and emotive language, and by campaigners obscuring the Bill and needlessly causing patients to worry about their ability to access the health service once the Bill has been passed? The point is that free access at the point of need is not changing, and that is what most patients care most about. Does he not agree?

Grahame M. Morris: I am afraid I do not agree with the hon. Lady, as she might expect. The Secretary of State said that it was a question of communication, but I suspect that part of the problem with the Bill is that, far from there being additional clarity, the more that Members of Parliament, the medical profession, health care workers, members of the public and informed commentators have examined the proposals in detail, the greater the number of concerns that have arisen.

If the Secretary of State had been open and honest about the direction of travel and the motivation for these health reforms, perhaps we could have avoided some of the confusions that have arisen. There is no electoral mandate for a huge structural review and reorganisation. I suspect that there is something seriously wrong with the whole privatising agenda and philosophy, which the Secretary of State denies.

Rosie Cooper: Does my hon. Friend believe that misinformation and emotive language almost began and ended when the Prime Minister said that the NHS was safe in his hands? The misinformation began when he fooled the British public into thinking that the NHS was safe. This is the result.

Grahame M. Morris: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that issue, which I will return to later. There were assurances that there would be no top-down reorganisations, but we should note the scale and complexity of this huge, top-down reorganisation. The Government alluded in Committee to the costs of administration, as did other members of the Committee. During Health questions and in Committee, I raised the question of the huge costs of administering Monitor, which have grown exponentially. We have had various estimates from the Government about the true cost, but over the lifetime of a Parliament it could be as much as £500 million, once we know the full extent of the legal challenges that Monitor will be expected to defend. That is a colossal sum of money.

I wanted to intervene when the Secretary of State referred to clause 60 of the original Bill and the intention to extend the duties of Monitor into the social care element of health and social care, but he would not allow me to do so. I wanted to ask whether any estimate has been made of the cost of such an extension of Monitor’s remit, which I suspect will be considerable.

Pat Glass (North West Durham) (Lab): The Secretary of State mentioned 38 Degrees and clearly, it has touched a raw nerve. Quite apart from the people from 38 Degrees who have contacted me, huge numbers of my constituents have also contacted me to express real worries about this issue. Given the concerns of the Opposition, the press and, most importantly, the voting public, how does my hon. Friend think that we all got so out of step with the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State?

Grahame M. Morris: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for expressing that concern, which many people share—even among the Government, although perhaps they conceal it. Such concerns are not restricted just to 38 Degrees and Opposition politicians. Lord Tebbit of Chingford, an outspoken man who could hardly be described as a left-wing agitator, raised real concerns about what he described as these privatising reforms. He said that there is something seriously wrong, and that

“What worries me about the reforms…is the difficulty of organising fair competition between the state-owned hospitals and those in the private sector. In my time I have seen many efforts to create competition between state-owned airlines, car factories and steel makers. They all came unstuck. The unfairnesses were not all one way and they spring from the fact that state-owned and financed businesses and private sector ones are different animals”.

I have rarely found myself in agreement with Lord Tebbit, but on this occasion his analysis is extraordinarily insightful. His comments underline many of the basic contradictions in the Bill and in the subsequent amendments, which number more than 1,000.

Fiona O’Donnell: Apart, perhaps, from his warm comments about Lord Tebbit, my hon. Friend is, as ever, making a well-informed and considered contribution. We face a lack of information, inaccuracy and changing numbers. Does he therefore agree that what we also need, given the concerns raised by many hon. Members about the potential for an increased health inequality gap in this country, is an equality assessment of the Bill?

Grahame M. Morris: I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s contribution, as that is an excellent point. If hon. Members will bear with me, I shall discuss new clause 6 and what

I believe the implications of the Government’s proposal would be for the Bill and for health inequalities. I was intrigued by the Secretary of State’s assurances in his opening statement about the responsibilities being conferred on him in the Bill that did not apply when Labour was in power. I believe he said that those powers were devolved to primary care trusts, but if PCTs are disappearing or clustering and strategic health authorities are disappearing over time or being clustered, surely it is right that the Secretary of State, as an accountable politician, should have these powers clearly defined in the Bill. I did not mean to digress, Mr Deputy Speaker. Those remarks related to clause 1 and I shall confine myself to the provisions before us.

As I have said, many concerns have been raised about the approach being taken, to this cherished institution, not least those set out by my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras about patient perception.

Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP): Is the hon. Gentleman aware of the survey carried out among the 50,000 members of the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy? It indicated that 81% do not agree with the proposals for NHS reform—that touches on the issue that he just raised. It also indicated that 89%—almost nine out of 10 of those who work in the health service—believe that patient care will suffer and that 84% do not believe that the Government have considered these changes. Does he believe that the level of concern among those workers in the health service, and among the general public, means that whenever the vote takes place tonight hon. Members should be very careful and should oppose the Bill?

Grahame M. Morris: I am grateful for that information. I know that other hon. Members have spent a day with the health service and I am sure that Ministers take soundings, but I can honestly say that what the hon. Gentleman describes is the feedback I have received from talking to health professionals, patients and so on. I recognise that the Secretary of State has said on numerous occasions that a substantial body of GPs support this approach. When I tuned in to this morning’s “BBC Breakfast” I saw Professor Chris Ham of the King’s Fund being interviewed. He is an eminent and respected commentator on health service issues who has given evidence to the Public Bill Committee and the Health Committee. He gave his view that it was a small cohort of GPs who were signed up and committed to these reforms. I agree with his assessment.

These provisions deal with the role of Monitor, the relevant implications and changes to the failure regime. A “Panorama” documentary on the BBC featured Sir Gerry Robinson, who has some standing in the business community and for previous journalistic investigations into the NHS. The conclusion of his report was that he thought that these reforms could mean

“the end of the NHS.”

That is his conclusion. Even after meeting the Secretary of State he remained unconvinced of the value of the reforms.

The Secretary of State has failed to persuade the public and he has failed to persuade NHS staff of his approach. That has been illustrated by various surveys, through the British Medical Association, by personal contacts and in other ways. Even elements of the business community recognise the level of public opposition and concern. It seems that the principal backers are overseas US-style private health groups, whose interest is not philanthropic. They see the prospect of substantial profits and unprecedented access to billions of pounds soon to be available from NHS coffers. We hear Ministers and Government Members saying that the NHS was open to private sector providers under the previous Administration, and a very small figure—5% or so—was cited in the Public Bill Committee proceedings.

Frank Dobson: My hon. Friend may like to know that even in the final year of the Labour Government just 2.1% of operations were carried out by the private sector.

Grahame M. Morris: I am grateful that that information has been put on the record.

Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab): My hon. Friend is right to talk about the potential role for overseas health companies. He might have seen the article in The Guardian yesterday stating:

“A German company has been in talks to take over NHS hospitals, the first tangible evidence that foreign multinationals will be able to run state-owned acute services”.

That has become apparent only through freedom of information requests. Does my hon. Friend think that this is the slippery slope that this Bill is going to usher in?

Grahame M. Morris: That point was raised during the Secretary of State’s earlier remarks. [Interruption.] Well, it came in response to a freedom of information request. I thought that his response was illuminating, as he assured us that that would not involve the transfer of NHS real estate, although he did not rule out the possibility that private sector providers would take over the running of these things. The report that I saw said that they would take responsibility for the management and staff, and he gave no rebuttal of that report.

Mr Simon Burns rose—

Grahame M. Morris: I will give the Minister an opportunity to do that, if he so wishes.

Mr Burns: There is an air of déjà vu to this debate now, although I am delighted to be taking part in a debate with the hon. Gentleman yet again. May I point out that the only example of what he is saying relates to Hinchingbrooke hospital? What happened there was started by the previous Labour Government—his Government.

Grahame M. Morris: I do not wish to labour the point, but the report in The Guardian said that freedom of information requests to the Department of Health indicated that discussions were taking place between officials in respect of the transfer of between 10 and 20 NHS units—[Interruption.] I am simply reporting what I have read in the paper.

Mr Burns: May I say to the hon. Gentleman that that report is unadulterated claptrap? The trouble is that it was a misunderstanding of the contents of the e-mails. [Laughter.] The right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) may think that that is funny, but the e-mails were not there to discuss these bodies taking over NHS hospitals; the e-mails were about discussing what their views are on hospitals that are struggling. The e-mails were part of an information-gathering mechanism to find out how policy in the NHS could be improved to deal, within the NHS, with hospitals that might be struggling as part of the foundation trust pipeline.

Grahame M. Morris: I do not find this at all funny. I would find it really worrying if this report is an indication of what is in store. It is rather ironic that the Secretary of State quoted from the Labour party manifesto. Perhaps it might be instructive if I were to quote from the Conservative party manifesto. It said that the Conservatives would

“defend the NHS from Labour’s cuts and reorganisations”.

If this Bill is not the biggest reorganisation that we have ever seen—[Interruption.] Well, it is, even though the Conservatives said that they would not proceed with any such huge reorganisation.

Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab): Would not the Secretary of State be able to clear that up tonight by giving a categorical assurance that no hospital will be transferred to or run by a foreign entity?

Grahame M. Morris: I am happy to give way to the Minister, if he wishes to give that assurance from the Dispatch Box. It would reassure staff and members of the public. Ah well. Perhaps we can read something into the Minister’s reluctance to give such an assurance.

The Government, despite the spin, are delivering one of the most radical reorganisations ever and in the view of many Opposition Members it will undermine the basic principles of the NHS. When the Health Secretary was shadow spokesman for the then Opposition, at no point did he explain his plan to apply 1980s-style privatisation mechanisms to the NHS. I am an avid follower of health policy and the idea of creating an economic regulator—as we have discovered through a series of parliamentary questions, the costs of Monitor could be £500 million in a single Parliament—is again ironic when we hear the Government talk about waste and bureaucracy.

As for exposing the NHS to competition law, I accept the point made by the hon. Member for Southport (John Pugh), which was also made by my own Front Benchers, that it is not the provisions on the face of the Bill but the changes to the architecture of the NHS that will expose the NHS to European competition law—the same law, as we have heard, as applies to the utility companies. Health would be considered a commodity and £60 billion of the NHS budget would be handed over to private bodies, by which I mean those bodies that were the GP commissioning consortia, now renamed clinical commissioning groups. Despite the assurances about openness, transparency and accountability, those would be private-sector companies and my understanding is that they would not be open to FOI requests. That must be of huge concern to people who champion civil liberties, freedom and transparency. Over the past six years or so, we had no indication from the Secretary of State that he was planning such a radical change.

On the subject of the new failure regime, as set out in the amendments, having sat through the Public Bill Committee on the initial Bill as well as that on the re-committed Bill and having listened intently to the arguments, I cannot decide even now whether this is a U-turn or a side-step. I have read this huge document—the weighty tome that makes up the Bill, with all its various chapters and parts—as well as the impact study and the whole justification behind the Ministers’ arguments was that the NHS needed a market and a failure regime to boost productivity. Has that whole idea been left by the wayside?

 

Dr Poulter: Does the hon. Gentleman accept, however, that the previous Government failed to put in place any adequate failure regime to deal with situations such as that which occurred at Stafford hospital and that the Bill is a step towards providing a proper overview of what to do when trusts fail and let down patients?

Grahame M. Morris: I am not suggesting in any way, shape or form that every NHS organisation—be it an NHS hospital trust or a community-based organisation—is incapable of improvement. My philosophy, as someone with a bit of a scientific background, has always been that we should assemble an evidence base, pilot a proposal in one area, establish best practice, see where the faults lie, tweak it if necessary and then, if it works, roll it out. This leap-in-the dark approach is flawed and will end in tears. The service is hugely important and touches everybody’s life in this country at one time or another. The whole concept of the Bill is flawed and the way it has been prosecuted is compounding the problem.

As for a number of the new clauses and the changes to the failure regime that we are dealing with, in the recommitted Public Bill Committee we tried on numerous occasions to tease out from those on the Government Front Bench precisely what they had in mind. I was shocked when I saw that there were 1,000 amendments. Admittedly, the Minister said that 715 are so-called technical amendments—

Mr Simon Burns: Changing the name.

Grahame M. Morris: Absolutely. At this late stage in the process, however, these are huge and significant changes.

Nicky Morgan: Just to help the hon. Gentleman, a number of the amendments relate to the continuity of services, which his party and those on his Front Bench asked to have considered by this House on Report rather than being left to the Lords. I am sure that the Ministers can help, but if that subject was not included, I suspect that the number of amendments would be significantly smaller. It is right that they should be considered in this House at this time—does he not agree?

Grahame M. Morris: That is a fair and reasonable point and I concede that.

Diana Johnson: Does my hon. Friend agree that if this Bill had been properly drafted in the first place and there had been proper pre-legislative scrutiny, we would not have to have this cartload of amendments brought in at the last moment?

Grahame M. Morris: Again, that is a really good point. An incredible number of complex and detailed changes have taken place during the passage of the Bill, including the listening exercise and the consideration of a series of complex amendments, and even they did not address every issue that had been raised. Essentially, I am trying to say in a clumsy kind of way that the Bill is poorly thought out. I think it is a bad Bill, and if it is implemented it will cause real problems for the service and the people who use it.

Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab): I do not think my hon. Friend is making a clumsy speech at all; he is making a lot of very good points. His point about the Bill being badly drafted and set out is why I have been inundated over the past few days with messages from a range of professionals and service users who are very concerned about where things are going. I applaud my hon. Friend’s approach.

Grahame M. Morris: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his point and for his kind words. My contention is that the problem with all these reforms is that they tend to unravel once there is an opportunity for not just Members of Parliament but health care professionals and the broader public properly to scrutinise them. Once people have the chance to consider the proposals in detail, there is an outcry such as that described by my hon. Friend.

I have tried to understand the thinking behind the Government’s changes and amendments. As I mentioned earlier, many of the changes fly in the face of the logic of the arguments originally made in Committee and when the Bill was first published. The obvious logical conundrum, if that is the term, can be seen in the fact that the original impact assessments, which were very comprehensive, said that it was essential to create a functioning market to gain the benefit of the reforms. A whole section of the impact study explained why “market exit” was fundamental to reforming the NHS. I heard what the Minister said earlier and I have read the Government’s amendments, but I am not quite convinced—perhaps I am a bit of a cynic—that this is a real concession. If we follow the Government’s logic, that makes the Bill as a package at best inconsistent and at worst it removes the possible benefits that Government Members may wish to promote in terms of the costs of any market system. Instead, we are subject to a strange system. The Secretary of State initially mentioned creating a level playing field to allow access for private health care firms as well as existing NHS and public providers. There are therefore some basic contradictions in the rationale behind some of the reforms, if there was any merit in the arguments initially.

Tom Blenkinsop: Is my hon. Friend concerned, as I am, that 2% of PCT budgets—approximately £2 billion—is being used for this reorganisation? There is a direct effect on my community and the Redcar and Cleveland PCT, where almost £4 million has been taken from health inequality budgets, which could have been used on the front line.

Grahame M. Morris: I am making rather slow progress, but I did want to get on to health inequalities. My hon. Friend makes an excellent and important point. We touched on it briefly in the Bill Committee and it relates to new clause 6. I was concerned about the reports that in the allocations to PCTs and SHAs, the element set aside for addressing health inequalities had been reduced. That should concern us all, especially those who represent areas that suffer high levels of health inequality and deprivation.

It is a bit of an achievement that the Government could take the NHS at its most successful point and turn it around. Government Members have highlighted particular failings, but the NHS had a record number of doctors and nurses and a hospital building programme. There had been a transformation from waiting times of 18 months for routine operations such as knee and hip replacements or removal of cataracts to only a few weeks. The previous Government should be given some credit for that. The improvement was confirmed in patient satisfaction surveys and it is a great shame that the Government have decided not to commission the Department of Health to conduct such studies in the future. I suspect their motives in that regard.

Dr Poulter: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Grahame M. Morris: I give way to my hon. Friend from the Committee.

Dr Poulter: That is a good point. Under the previous Government cataract and hip operations were done more quickly, but that was because the Labour Government commissioned private providers to do those operations. The unfortunate thing was that those providers cherry-picked services and did not provide the integrated health care that this Bill will provide.

Grahame M. Morris: We had this exchange many times in the Committee on a variety of clauses. We need to give some credit to the previous Government. I am old enough to remember when people routinely waited a year, 18 months or longer for life-changing operations such as knee and hip replacements. It is a real quality-of-life issue if someone has cataracts and has to wait a long time for an operation. I accept that Labour used the private sector. I am a socialist and make no apology for that, and I want the provision to be public sector. I was not a Member of Parliament and did not vote for the commissioning of private providers, but I acknowledge that the private sector played a role in bringing extra capacity and some innovation to the service.

Barbara Keeley: My hon. Friend is making a wonderful speech. I wanted to make this point when my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) was speaking about the number of operations and the improvements during Labour’s term of office.

In the 1997 general election when I was campaigning in Wythenshawe and Sale, East constituency, I met someone who had been told that he had to wait two years for vital surgery and was desperately worried that he would die while he was waiting. I met someone in my constituency in last year’s general election campaign who received a diagnostic test on Monday, found he had cancer on Tuesday, went into hospital on Wednesday and was operated on on Thursday and his life was saved. From two years to four days—I thought that was the best testament to the improvement that Labour had brought about in the NHS.

Grahame M. Morris: I am grateful for that example. It illustrates the importance of that improvement, the value that people place on it and how critical it is to people’s health and well-being.

I know that we shall come later to the clauses that lift the cap on private patient work, which the Minister mentioned in his opening remarks. If the cap on private patient work in NHS foundation trusts is lifted and those trusts are under financial pressure—those of us who are in touch with our hospital trusts know that they are under financial pressure, with the reductions in the tariff and other issues—the level of private sector involvement in NHS trusts will increase.

Rosie Cooper: The hon. Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich (Dr Poulter), who is also a member of the Select Committee, pointed out that Labour reduced waiting lists and private providers were involved. Does my hon. Friend agree that the general public now face longer waiting lists and more private providers?

Grahame M. Morris: This is the danger. Labour Members have attempted to highlight it, and people are increasingly aware of it.

Frank Dobson: Does my hon. Friend accept that if we want to look at how best to increase the number of people who are treated, the best thing to do is go to the people who do the treatment? When I was Health Secretary, the NHS was doing 160,000 cataract operations a year. Following discussions with the experts, some changes were made—no structural changes—and in the last year for which figures are available the NHS did 346,000 cataract operations a year. The private sector’s contribution averaged 6,000 a year.

Grahame M. Morris: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for putting those important statistics on the record. Government Members often raised these issues in the Bill Committee so it is helpful to have that clarified with such precision.

I want to deal in more detail with health inequalities, if that is in order, Mr Deputy Speaker. While serving on the Bill Committee and as a member of the Health Select Committee, I have always tried to champion the cause of reducing health inequalities. In the Bill Committee, Opposition Members pushed for greater duties to reduce health inequalities to be placed on the new bodies being created by the Bill.

I am conscious that there has been some movement in this direction. New clause 6 is relevant to the special administration of services and makes references to health inequalities. I would be grateful if the Minister gave some clarification in respect of the point that I wish to make. I am delighted that the Government have recognised that a market system in health care will only worsen health inequalities. My rationale in making that statement is that at least new clause 6 says that services must be kept open where closure would adversely impact on or increase health inequalities. Opposition Members are not convinced that the safeguards are strong enough, that the safeguards could not be overturned or that inherent health inequalities that areas such as mine suffer from so terribly, largely reflecting socio-economic patterns in society, would not be exacerbated.

Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con): I have been listening carefully to the hon. Gentleman. Will he accept and welcome the fact that clause 3 imposes on the Secretary of State a duty to reduce inequalities? Is that duty not a welcome innovation in legislation that he expects the Secretary of State to apply with rigour?

Grahame M. Morris: That is a good point. Like the curate’s egg, the Bill is good in parts—and bad in parts. I am prepared to acknowledge the commitment on health inequalities but, as I have mentioned, there are contradictions in the Bill, and that is what I seek to highlight. My concern is that the new structures proposed in the Bill move us away from a co-ordinated health service and towards a competition-based health service. Failure has been touted by Ministers as a driver of improvement, but following the latest U-turn, that commitment seems to have been dropped. I would welcome Ministers’ views on that.

Our concern is that the health service will be left to the worst elements of privatisation, without the supposed benefits of market competition. Members have referred to the British Medical Association and its calls for a co-operative and co-ordinated environment, which an open market would make impossible. When Dr Clare Gerada, the chair of the Royal College of General Practitioners, gave evidence to the Bill Committee, she raised a number of concerns about the clauses that we are discussing—concerns

“about the duplication of care and fragmentation…the under-provision of care once competition starts kicking in, the pace and extent of change, and the capability capacity and competence of GPs”

to deal with the extent of health needs. Most importantly, she said that

“the Bill risks widening health inequalities and could lead to worse patient care”.––[Official Report, Health and Social Care Public Bill Committee, 8 February 2011; c. 43, Q94.]

Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con): The hon. Gentleman talks about health inequalities, but does he accept that under the current system, primary care trusts have brought about a number of health inequalities? Certainly in my area of north Yorkshire, the PCT has brought about a number of health inequalities, and I think that that is the case in other areas, too. The system is already delivering that; that is why we need the change.

Grahame M. Morris: The picture is incredibly variable. We should consider many of the policies that the Government are pursuing, not least that on public health observatories, which collect the evidence on which many public health interventions are based. The sustained cuts to their budgets—there is a cut of 30% this year, and 30% next year—are exacerbating the situation. Some PCTs are performing well in this regard, and some are not performing as well. If there are measures that can strengthen our performance, they ought to be welcomed.

We have in the past mentioned some of the public health issues. As far back as 1977, the Department of Health and Social Security’s chief scientific adviser, Sir Douglas Black, commissioned a report on the extent of health inequalities in the UK. The Black report, published in 1980, brought about a sea change in how Governments would respond to health inequalities and reduce their worst effects, particularly for the lower social classes. It is generally acknowledged in more recent reports by Professor Sir Michael Marmot that the NHS can only do so much to address the situation. There are general issues that must be addressed through a whole plethora of Government policies—child benefit, improvements in maternity allowances, more pre-school education, an expansion of child care, and better housing. I mention that in relation to the amendments that we are discussing to highlight the stark danger of a reversal in relation to health inequalities, which are not only influenced by decisions of the Health Secretary, but greatly influenced by decisions taken across Government.

I shall draw my remarks to a conclusion. I am sure that Government Members will be relieved to hear that. [Interruption.] Well, I could go on for longer if they want; I have another six pages. I draw the House’s attention to the real concerns that the general public, the medical profession, staff who work in the service and patients have about particular details—about the new and expanded role of Monitor, and about the implications for the new NHS. It will not necessarily be Monitor that decides the future of failing services; in the end, that will be decided in the courts. Finally, in parts 3 and 4, we are dealing with some of the most contentious issues in the Bill, and I urge Members to consider the issues very carefully and to think about what is at stake, before deciding how to vote on the amendments.

Comment: A new vista in film for a government willing to seize the opportunity

Blog / August 15, 2011 / 1638Comment nowhttp://grahamemorris.com/2011/08/comment-a-new-vista-in-film-for-a-government-willing-to-seize-the-opportunity/Comment%3A+A+new+vista+in+film+for+a+government+willing+to+seize+the+opportunity2011-08-15+15%3A29%3A07grahame

The film industry isn’t just about entertainment – it can also help drive real recovery in our economy.

Article by Grahame Morris MP for Politics.co.uk

Providing the support, infrastructure and incentives to attract new businesses and growth industries to the regions of the UK is essential in our globalised economy. Disappointing growth figures for the last three months (totalling 0.2%) illustrate the importance of supporting our economy and the businesses that will help to grow it and reduce the deficit. However, it is unfortunate for all of us that the government has embarked on a blunt strategy relying simply on tax increases and spending cuts to put the economy back on track. It is clear that poorly thought through cuts in spending could make the deficit worse, not better, and could have a damaging effect on our ability to support businesses, create jobs and ensure economic growth.

In an economy where businesses cross borders and are able to operate almost anywhere in the world with relative ease, government support for the full breadth of new and growing industries is essential if we are to win market share and generate tax income for the exchequer. I have a particular interest in what can be done to nurture the growing film industry in this country. In my constituency of Easington, a former coal mining area with some of the highest deprivation in the UK, there is a rare opportunity to secure significant private sector investment with a proposed new film studio and Centre of Creative Excellence to be built on the East Durham Heritage Coast at Seaham. Private sector investment, jobs, training opportunities and an export market is available if the government are willing to seize the opportunity. I have met with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills minister Mark Prisk, who appeared sympathetic to the arguments for sector-specific support for the industry. The responsibility now lies with ministers to strike while the iron is hot and secure the investment without delay.

During Labour’s 13 years in government there was significant new public investment across East Durham building the infrastructure to attract and support high-tech industries and other emerging markets. In an area which was dominated by coal mining and which fell into economic decline following the closure of the mines, investment in infrastructure was a necessity to bring a new age of economic activity such as the regeneration of Seaham Town Centre and the new East-West A19 link road.

The north-east regional development agency, One North East, and its film and digital technology arm, Northern and Film Media, has now been abolished and replaced by much weaker and unfunded local enterprise partnerships. Our excellent regional minister who acted as a catalyst and provided a link between business leaders, local and regional bodies and central government has also gone. Added to this overall funding for regional development has been cut by two-thirds. Upheaval and uncertainty during the prolonged transition period as the coalition developed alternative policies, has at times come to characterise the relationship between business and government in the regions.

Sector-specific support involves working closely with businesses to understand what they are looking for when they are considering where to invest. Eastern Europe has become a popular destination for the film industry to operate in as it offers a natural environment sought after for many film backdrops. This is also the case on the North East coast where the growing creative industries benefit from the beautiful natural environment which has already attracted a number of film productions to the area including Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Elizabeth, Atonement and the Harry Potter series. The UK, and the north-east in particular, can also offer a comprehensive range of technical expertise required by the film industry. Our great northern universities are amongst the best in the world in applying CGI and digital technology to film. The North East’s creative industries form a significant part of the region’s economy. In 2007 the region’s creative industries were worth around £430 million and employed 13,000 people, but there is so much more that can be achieved with some ambition and practical support.

If the government can offer the coordination, modest incentives and sector specific support that is being sought by companies looking to set up stall in our regions, the benefits would be overwhelming. In the case of the proposed Seaham Film Studio and Centre for Creative Excellence, it would bring hundreds of jobs, education and training and, with any luck, a repertoire of worldwide blockbusters.

The abolition of the world renowned UK Film Council last year caused consternation and rocked the confidence of the film industry in Britain, but it was carried out under the guise that support would be allocated more directly. It is time for the government to make good on this promise.

Press Release from uSwitch on Fuel Poverty

Blog / August 1, 2011 / 16271 Commenthttp://grahamemorris.com/2011/08/press-release-from-uswitch-on-fuel-poverty/Press+Release+from+uSwitch+on+Fuel+Poverty2011-08-01+08%3A48%3A53grahame

6.3 MILLION OR ALMOST A QUARTER OF HOUSEHOLDS ARE IN FUEL POVERTY

Shocking new research^[1] reveals that fuel poverty levels in the UK are spiralling dangerously with 6.3 million or almost a quarter of all households (24%)^[2] now classed as fuel poor. Previously thought to affect mainly lower income households and pensioners, the fuel poverty net is now spreading rapidly into the more affluent middle classes too. But, if fuel poverty is re-defined to be calculated after housing costs, as currently being suggested^[3], fuel poverty levels rocket to almost 9 million or a third (33%) of all households^[4]:

• Single working parents are the most likely group to be in fuel poverty – 39% of these households are fuel poor^[1]
• 36% of working class households are in fuel poverty, but 15% of middle class households are fuel poor too^[1]
• No escape: while 44% of working class pensioners are struggling with fuel poverty, so are 24% of middle class pensioners^[1]   
• A third of households (33%) with an income of up to £30,000 a year are in fuel poverty while one in fifty households (2%) with an income of over £30,000 a year are in fuel poverty^[1]
• Current definition of fuel poverty doesn’t take into account housing costs – if rent or mortgage payments are factored in^[3] then 22% of middle class and 47% of working class households would be considered fuel poor^[4]
• Household energy bills have rocketed by £472 or 71% in just over 5 years^[5] making affordability and fuel poverty a middle class issue too.

The high cost of energy is forcing growing numbers of UK households, including middle class families, into fuel poverty, according to new research^[1] out today by uSwitch.com, the independent price comparison and switching service. The findings show that 6.3 million^[2] or almost a quarter of all households (24%) are now living in fuel poverty, with single working parents the most likely to be fuel poor.

Fuel poverty is where 10% or more of net household income is spent on energy bills. Previously it was seen as an issue affecting mainly pensioners and lower income groups. However, as energy bills have gone through the roof the total number of households in fuel poverty has soared, with the more affluent middle classes now also falling prey.

In just over five years, household energy bills have rocketed by £471 or 71% from £660 a year in 2006 to £1,131 a year today^[5]. As a result, a third of households (33%) with an income of up to £30,000 a year are in fuel poverty while one in fifty households (2%) with an income of over £30,000 a year are in fuel poverty^[1]. However, these numbers do not take into account ScottishPower’s forthcoming price rise and if other suppliers follow suit fuel poverty will only get worse.     

Fuel poverty in 2011^[6]:

Type of household	% working class  in fuel poverty	% middle class in fuel poverty	Total % in fuel poverty	Total % in fuel poverty (net of  housing costs)
Pensioner	44%	24%	33%	36%
Single parent (working)	45%	33%	39%	52%
Single person (working)	16%	11%	13%	32%
Couple (one income, no children)	47%	14%	31%	39%
Couple (two incomes, no children)	5%	6%	5%	11%
Family with children and a stay-at-home parent	38%	13%	25%	44%
Family with children and two incomes	12%	5%	8%	16%
All households	36%	15%	24%	33%

Source: uSwitch.com/YouGov

More worryingly, the current definition of fuel poverty doesn’t take into account housing costs – mortgage or rent payments. There have been calls for the definition to be updated so that fuel poverty would be calculated as 10% of net household income after household spend on mortgage or rent^[3]. If this was the case then fuel poverty numbers would rocket to almost 9 million or a third (33%) of all households^[4].

Incredibly, 22% of middle class households would be classed as being amongst the fuel poor, along with 47% of working class households^[4]. But the greatest impact would be seen on households made up of a single person who works and families with children and a stay-at-home parent. Both of these groups would see an extra 19% classed as fuel poor if the definition was revised to take into account the cost of keeping a roof over their heads^[4].

However, the highest incidence of fuel poverty would still be seen amongst single working parents where over half of such households (52%) would be in fuel poverty under the proposed new definition. This shows the powerful impact that a combination of high energy costs along with mortgage or rental payments can have on family finances.  

Ann Robinson, Director of Consumer Policy at uSwitch.com, says: “Rocketing energy prices mean that the middle classes are no longer immune to social ills such as fuel poverty. The fact is that we can now find the fuel poor amongst all walks of life and in all types of households. Start to factor in housing costs such as mortgage and rental payments and we are left with the shocking image of a third of all British households living in fuel poverty. The sad truth is that consumers are paying a heavy price for this country’s disjointed, incoherent and unaffordable energy policy.

“There is now a real urgency for the Government to get on with its review of fuel poverty so it can relieve the misery facing those who cannot afford to keep warm this winter. But, in the meantime, households have to start protecting themselves and there are two key steps to this: pay the lowest possible price for your energy and learn to use less of it.

“With household energy prices likely to rise again, many households, especially those on tight budgets, may like the security of a fixed price energy plan. But all households should also look to invest in longer-term energy efficiency measures, such as insulating lofts and cavity walls. Those who would struggle to afford this investment should contact their energy supplier to see whether they would qualify for any energy efficiency grants or financial support. Suppliers have a pot of money available to help customers in this way and those who qualify could see their energy bills substantially reduced as a result.”

For more information visit www.uSwitch.com or call 0800 093 06 07

-Ends-

For more information please contact:

Jo Ganly, uSwitch.com on 0207 802 2915 or joganly@uswitch.com

Beth Murray, Lansons Communications on 0207 566 9728 or bethm@lansons.com 

Notes to editors:

1. Research conducted by YouGov on behalf of uSwitch.com. Total sample size was 2,323 adults with bill paying responsibility for their household. Fieldwork was undertaken 12^th-15^th April 2011. The survey was carried out online. The figures were weighted and representative of all GB adults (aged 18+). The groups identified as in fuel poverty were calculated by cross referencing type of household and social grade (ABC1 classified as middle class, C2DE classified as working class) with net monthly household income and average monthly energy spend. Respondents who answered “Don’t Know” or “Prefer not to say” have been excluded from fuel poverty calculations. ABC1/C2DE are classified as follows:

social grade	social status	occupation
A	upper middle class	higher managerial, administrative or professional
B	middle class	intermediate managerial, administrative or professional
C1	lower middle class	supervisory or clerical, junior managerial, administrative or professional
C2	skilled working class	skilled manual workers
D	working class	semi and unskilled manual workers
E	those at lowest level of subsistence	state pensioners or widows (no other earner), casual or lowest grade workers

Fuel poverty calculation = Monthly energy bill divided by net monthly income. Those who were spending 10% or more of their net monthly income on energy bills are classified as being in fuel poverty.

1. Research as per point 1 above – number based on 26 million households in the UK and 24.4% of respondents classified as being in fuel poverty.
2. Consumer Focus, NEA, FOE, ACE and Age UK joint submission to inquiry on social justice in the low carbon economy, where they say: “remove housing costs from income to give an After Housing Costs measure. The government’s Before Housing Costs measure does not allow like-for-like comparison of fuel poverty across tenures and different geographic areas” as a way of strengthening the definition of fuel poverty:

http://www.consumerfocus.org.uk/files/2011/06/Joint-submission.pdf

1. Research as per point 1 above, but numbers in fuel poverty were re-calculated taking into account the household’s monthly spend on rent or mortgage. Fuel poverty calculation (net of housing costs) = Monthly energy bill divided by (net monthly income minus monthly rent/mortgage). 9 million is based on 26 million households in the UK with 33.4% in fuel poverty under the revised definition.  
2. Based on a medium user customer consuming 3,300 kWh of electricity and 16,500 kWh of gas, on a standard plan paying by cash or cheque with bill sizes averaged across all regions and all the big six suppliers.
3. Based on following base sample sizes for working class households: pensioner (190), single parent working (33), single person working (87), couple with one income and no children (64), couple with two incomes and no children (88), family with children and stay at home parent (89), family with children and two incomes (106). Based on following base sample sizes for middle class households: pensioner (218), single parent working (30), single person working (123), couple with one income and no children (57), couple with two incomes and no children (217), family with children and stay at home parent (99), family with children and two incomes (176).

About us

uSwitch.com is a free, impartial, online and telephone-based comparison and switching service, helping consumers compare prices on gas, electricity, water, heating cover, home telephone, broadband, digital television, mobile phones and personal finance products including mortgages, credit cards, current accounts and insurance. In 2010 uSwitch.com celebrated ten years of saving customers money.

uSwitch.com is the first comparison website to achieve the Plain English Campaign’s Internet Crystal Mark, which is recognised as a standard that a website has clear language, is accessible and easy to use, and has been tested on a sample of its users. 

uSwitch.com is dedicated to helping consumers save money whether they have internet access or not. It offers a dedicated call centre, manned by uSwitch customer service representatives, as well as a freepost ‘Send us your bill’ service, whereby customers can post their latest energy bills with their telephone number to FREEPOST USWITCH, to get a free call back from a dedicated customer services representative. The service is also available via fax, email and post. Consumers should fax 0203 214 8417, email CustomerServices@uswitch.com or write to Customer Services, uSwitch.com, Centro 3, 19 Mandela Street, London, NW1 0DU with their postcode and usage details.

uSwitch.com is owned by Forward Internet Group Limited, a privately funded collection of internet-based businesses focused on consumer engagement and innovation.

Update: Continued disruption to phonelines at Constituency Office

Blog / July 27, 2011 / 1622Comment nowhttp://grahamemorris.com/2011/07/phonelines-off-at-constituency-office/Update%3A+Continued+disruption+to+phonelines+at+Constituency+Office2011-07-27+13%3A11%3A14grahame

The phonelines at Grahame Morris’s Constituency Office are still not working and it remains the case that they may be out of use for 3 to 5 days.

It is thought that the damage has been caused by vandals and is affecting a significant area of Murton.

Please continue to contact Grahame by email Grahame.Morris.MP@Parliament.UK  and we will endeavor to deal with your request as quickly as possible.

Thank you for your patience while this problem is being resolved.

The ‘Big Six’ energy companies and energy price rises

Blog / July 22, 2011 / 16183 Commentshttp://grahamemorris.com/2011/07/the-big-six-energy-companies-and-energy-price-rises/The+%27Big+Six%27+energy+companies+and+energy+price+rises+2011-07-22+09%3A01%3A55grahame

British Gas, owned by Centrica, is increasing its domestic gas and electricity prices from 18^th August.

This follows an announcement by Scottish Power who said they would raise the cost of gas by 19% and the cost of electricity by 10%.

It is anticipated that the other Big Six energy companies (nPower, EDF Energy, E.ON and Scottish and Southern Energy) will follow suit and increase their prices as they have done in the past.

These latest increases come after last winter’s price rises with British Gas who led the way with a 7% rise for gas and electric. Only one of the Big Six held their prices until after one of the coldest winters for over 100 years. 

The energy companies put the sharp increase down to the rising wholesale costs they face on the global energy market.

However, Mike O’Connor, Chief Executive of Consumer Focus, rejects the spurious claims made by the Big Six energy companies.

“Wholesale costs have gone up but they are still around a third lower than their 2008 peak” he said.

“Yet in this time British Gas prices have risen by around 44% on gas and 21% on electricity and suppliers have made healthy profits”.

British Gas’ residential business registered profits of £740m last year. As a whole, energy companies are squeezing more profits out of their customers.

Profits are rising; in September 2010 the Big Six energy companies were making £65 a year per customer. Just four months later on a typical annual bill of £1,200 profit increased to £97 a year per customer.

The consumer is powerless to combat rising energy prices due to the stranglehold of the ‘Big Six’ who operate 99% of the UK energy market.

In perfect synchronicity energy companies raise prices in line with their competitors. While not price fixing, the consumer feels no benefits of the “market forces” in operation in the energy market.

The energy market is failing the public. It is time for Ofgem and David Cameron to act and demand that the Competition Commission launch a full investigation into the stranglehold of the ‘Big Six’ energy suppliers.

Without a full investigation to break the ‘Big Six’ oligopoly the public will continue to be powerless to ever increasing price rises.   

The Government should support the tax payer who are at breaking point as their budgets continue to be squeezed by VAT rises, pay freezes and the Government’s inability to tackle inflation.

The Government must act; it is a matter of life and death as millions of families fall into fuel poverty.

Fuel poverty is when a household spends over 10% of its income on gas and electricity bill.

Due to the rising energy price rises the Government official figures estimate an additional one million UK households, 5.5 million, will be in fuel poverty.

However, these figures are already out of date by two years with the Department of Energy and Climate Change dating back to 2009.

By comparison, uSwitch research put the true figure at 6.3 million households, or 24% of the population.

Government research found that single person households under 60 are most likely to be in fuel poverty, followed by single people over 60. However, no one in society is immune to the impact of rising energy prices.

According to Consumer Focus the North East is the worst affected region in England. In 2007, 21.3% of households were in fuel poverty; by 2010 this had increased to 27.6%. The Government’s figures also support this finding.

Those on fixed incomes are worst affected as their budgets are squeezed ever tighter. With nearly half of all people living in fuel poverty over 60, many on fixed incomes, a cold winter in 2011 could prove to be a national crisis.

Winter will already be a little colder for the millions of UK pensioners. A detail the Chancellor George Osborne chose to overlook during this year’s budget was his choice to cut the Winter Fuel Allowance for the most vulnerable in society.

Last year’s Winter Fuel Allowance was worth £250 for over 60s and £400 for over 80s. However, this year the Chancellor allowed the payments to slip back to the same levels as 2008 with pensioners over 60s receiving £200 and over 80s £300.

It is the most vulnerable in society who suffer the biggest losses with over 80’s receiving £100 less for heating despite rocking energy prices.

David Cameron famously said during the 2010 General Election “you can read my lips” as he promised the Winter Fuel Allowance was safe.

It is now obvious you can’t trust the Tories to protect the Winter Fuel Allowance and it makes a mockery of the Tories’ claim to protect the most vulnerable in society.

It is a national scandal that on average there are 25,000 additional deaths every year among people over the age of 65 in England and Wales caused by the cold weather.

The cost to society is enormous. For Every additional winter death, there are also around 8 admissions to hospital, 32 visits to outpatient care and 30 social services calls.

Many of these deaths and much of the ill health is avoidable. The annual cost to the NHS of treating winter related illness because of cold private housing is £859 millionv.

With gas and electricity prices out of control many pensioners will be left with a terrible question this Christmas – heat or eat?

Grahame Morris MP has written to Ofgem calling for the Big Six energy companies to be referred to the Competition Commission.

British Government aligns itself with some dubious company on ILO convention

Blog / July 13, 2011 / 1616Comment nowhttp://grahamemorris.com/2011/07/british-government-aligns-itself-with-some-dubious-company-on-ilo-convention/British+Government+aligns+itself+with+some+dubious+company+on+ILO+convention2011-07-13+12%3A15%3A18grahame

Read my speech on the Convention on Domestic Workers in Westminster Hall

From the Slave Trade Act 1807 to signing into law the Human Rights Act. Britain is rightly proud of its history and role in the abolition of slavery. It would be naive to believe modern-day slavery does not exist – it still exists in Britain.

The exploitation of the vulnerable, in particular women and girls, has been raised recently in two international conventions, the EU Directive on Human Trafficking and the International Labour Organisation’s Convention on Domestic Workers.

However, the Government has shown themselves to be increasingly reluctant to sign up to any international convention no matter how worthy the cause.

It took a lot of political pressure and intensive campaigning before the Prime Minister reversed his decision to opt-out of the EU Directive on Human Trafficking.

The facts and statistics from the United Nations speak for themselves:

• Sexual exploitation, usually forcing a person into prostitution, is the most widespread form of human trafficking, making up 79 percent of all recorded human trafficking cases, followed by forced labour accounting for 18 percent of recorded human trafficking cases.
• One out of every seven sex workers in Europe is thought to be enslaved into prostitution through trafficking and at any given time more than 140,000 victims are trapped in human trafficking in Europe, with no sign of that figure decreasing.
• One in five victims are children; two thirds of victims are women.
• The International Labour Organisation estimates there are 2.4 million people throughout the world who are lured into forced labour.

Conviction rates for these crimes remain horrendously low. In Europe on average there is less than one person convicted of human trafficking per 100,000 inhabitants. In Hungary, the rate is 0.24 per 100,000 inhabitants.

The original decision to opt out of the Directive on Human Trafficking was met with shock. Dr John Sentamu, Archbishop of York hit out at the Government stating:

“Sex trafficking is nothing more than modern-day slavery. This is women being exploited, degraded and subjected to horrific risks solely for the gratification and economic greed of others. I am therefore stunned to learn that the Government are ‘opting out’ of an EU directive designed to tackle sex trafficking.”

The UK has recently stunned campaigners again by refusing to support a new international convention to protect domestic workers from exploitation. The convention received overwhelming support with 165 out of 173 Governments in favour including the United States and China.

The UK is only one of eight countries who failed to support the convention and now resides in some dubious company alongside El Salvador, Panama, Czech Republic, Sudan, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Swaziland.

What outrageous rights would the new convention afford domestic workers?

They state that domestic workers around the world who care for families and households, must have the same basic labour rights as those available to other workers.

• reasonable hours of work,
• weekly rest of at least 24 consecutive hours,
• a limit on in-kind payment,
• clear information on terms and conditions of employment,
• respect for fundamental principles and rights at work including freedom of association and the right to collective bargaining.

In its introductory text, the new Convention says that “domestic work continues to be undervalued and invisible and is mainly carried out by women and girls, many of whom are migrants or members of disadvantaged communities and who are particularly vulnerable to discrimination in respect of conditions of employment and work, and to other abuses of human rights.”

You may assume that those working legally in the UK would already enjoy these protections. However, just one story of many shows this is not the case. Frances, a migrant domestic worker from Africa, was thrown out onto the street, her employer retaining her passport, bank card and national insurance number. Frances crime was to ask for one day off from working in excess of 12 hours a day, seven days a week, for a wage of £250 a month.

The Convention would provide clear rights to the 53 million domestic workers globally. However, experts say that due to the fact that this kind of work is often hidden and unregistered, the total number of domestic workers could well over 100 million. Research by the International Labour Organisation found that for over 56 per cent of domestic workers the law does not establish a limit on how long a working week can be. About 45 per cent of all domestic workers are not entitled to at least one day off per week. About 36 per cent of female domestic workers have no legal entitlement to maternity leave. With over 90 per cent of domestic workers being women and girls the implementation of this convention will have a tremendous impact on gender equality ensuring women enjoy the same rights as those in other work places.

These are not extreme demands, just a request for basic human rights. Juan Somavia, Director-General of the International Labour Organisation stated the simple aim of the convention:

“[To] bringing the domestic workers into the fold of our values is a strong move, for them and for all workers who aspire to decent work”

A modest move too far for a Coalition Government that opposes any co-operation with international organisations to promote basic human rights.

The Coalition Government’s position leaves a stain on Britain’s reputation as an advocate of basic human rights casting a cloud over our democratic values. The Prime Minister has betrayed Britain’s 200-year history of anti-slavery and has isolated itself to the margins of the world stage.

Britain has aligned itself alongside countries where worker’s rights are routinely infringed and as stated by the Department for Business, Innovations and Skills, does not intend to ratify the convention “for the foreseeable future”

It has been a long struggle for migrant domestic workers in fighting for their human rights. A Labour Government in 1998 introduced a visa for domestic workers.The specific purpose was to protect migrant domestic workers from abuse and exploitation. It recognised their vulnerable position in the under-regulated work environment, their isolation from co-workers, and their absolute dependency on their employer for finance, accommodation, immigration status, and information about their general rights.

Signing the convention would be a first step in putting the employment relationship, visa demands and working choices in the hands of migrants to some degree. Migrant domestic workers could, for the first time, enforce their rights.

I believe the British public would deplore the Government’s position, standing alongside despicable regimes that wish to deny basic human rights to women.

The Prime Minister’s position has isolated Britain, aligned us with some of the most deplorable regimes, damaging our reputation and standing on the world stage. I believe Britain should be promoting human rights, not denying them.

The verdict of the Anti-Slavery Campaign:

 “The UK can no longer claim to be a global leader in tackling the menace of modern slavery”.

Speech to the Health & Social Care Bill Committee

Blog / July 7, 2011 / 1614Comment nowhttp://grahamemorris.com/2011/07/speech-to-the-health-social-care-bill-committee/Speech+to+the+Health+%26+Social+Care+Bill+Committee2011-07-07+14%3A49%3A04grahame

Grahame M. Morris: I am grateful, Mr Gale. The Minister is looking perplexed, but I did indicate earlier that I wished to speak.

The Minister of State, Department of Health (Mr Simon Burns): I look forward to hearing you.

Grahame M. Morris: Other hon. Members have highlighted in this debate and on previous occasions, not least in the initial exchanges between my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth and the Secretary of State in the initial consideration of the Bill, the dubious relationship between what the Government say and what the Bill actually does. During his first attendance at an evidence session, the right hon. Gentleman was asked by my hon. Friend if he could explain why he decided to repeal the duty placed on the Secretary of State to provide a comprehensive health service. His reply was,

“I have not… Clause 1 effectively reproduces the 1948 duty on the Secretary of State and it applies it to the other organisations through the rest of the Bill.”

He went on to say,

“It is in the original language. It is reproduced the same way.”––[Official Report, Health and Social Care Public Bill Committee, 10 February 2011; c. 166, Q402-04.]

The duty of the Secretary of State under the National Health Service Act 2006, repeating the language of section 1 of the National Health Service 1946, is, for the purpose of promotion of a comprehensive health service, to

“provide or secure the provision of services in accordance with this Act”.

Clause 1 of the original Bill replaced that duty—the point made by my hon. Friend that the Secretary of State sought to push to one side. It provided instead that the Secretary of State

“in exercising functions in relation to a body mentioned in subsection (2A), must act with a view to securing the provision of services for the purposes of the health service in accordance with this Act.”

For the information of the Committee, new subsection (2A) lists the NHS commissioning board, the commissioning consortia, which we are now calling commissioning groups, and local health authorities in respect of their public health functions.

Our concerns about the clause, voiced in the original Committee, were that the Secretary of State sought to reduce the accountability of his role in the delivery of health services. That was vigorously denied. The recommendations of the NHS Future Forum are clear:

“The NHS should be freed from day-to-day political interference but the Secretary of State must remain ultimately accountable for the National Health Service. The Bill should be amended to make this clear.”

The clause establishes an NHS commissioning board, the commissioning groups as well as passes responsibilities to local authorities for public health. The importance of the clause is the way in which the Secretary of State’s responsibilities would change. He would lose his current duty to provide or secure the provision of services for the purpose of the health service. Instead, the new duty on the Secretary of State is the simple promotion of the comprehensive health service, which is an important and fundamental difference of approach. [ Interruption. ] The hon. Member for Southport says it is the same thing, but in fact it is quite a fundamental difference, placing a direct responsibility or duty on the Secretary of State, which is what the Future Forum indicated the Government should do.

Fiona O’Donnell (East Lothian) (Lab): My hon. Friend and I share the experience of being new Members, which is perhaps why we are so perplexed. Does he share my concern that the Government are seeking to amend a piece of legislation while saying that that will make no difference to it?

Grahame M. Morris: That is spot on the heart of the matter. Time and again, our interpretation has been different and Ministers have said that we misunderstood the intent, but the NHS Future Forum, other organisations and, indeed, the Liberal Democrats have indicated that this is a major concern. It is, therefore, reasonable to highlight it.

John Pugh (Southport) (LD): I might be wrong, but when the hon. Gentleman referred to the Bill as previously drafted, I think he said that the Government’s intention was to put in the clause only a reference to “promoting”, yet new clause 1 uses the verb “secure” twice. The hon. Gentleman should speak to the new clause, rather than to a clause that will be altered however we vote.

Grahame M. Morris: If the hon. Gentleman will bear with me, I am seeking to expose or identify the original arguments made by the Ministers. They are now moving away from that position and accepting the arguments made by Opposition members of the Committee, who, to be fair, were the first to discover that the emperor had no clothes. It seems to have been generally accepted that that is the case. A significant bone of contention is that Opposition members of the Committee believe that an elected official—a Minister—should be accountable for the performance of the NHS.

Nick de Bois (Enfield North) (Con): On a point of order, Mr Gale. Perhaps you can give me some guidance. We have tight time limits and want to give due scrutiny to the Bill, so is it right for prepared texts to be used when speaking?

The Chair: That is not strictly a point of order, but I will seek to answer it. The Speaker has indicated, and the traditions of the House suggest, that wherever possible Members should speak from notes rather than from prepared speeches and that they should most certainly not read speeches prepared by any outside organisation. However, I have no indication at present that that is what is taking place.

Grahame M. Morris: I am grateful to you, Mr Gale. Many of the issues are highly technical. I am not absolutely familiar with the detail of the NHS Future Forum report, so I am afraid that I need to refer to a written text. It is important that the issues are placed accurately on the record.

Karl Turner (Kingston upon Hull East) (Lab): On a point of order, Mr Gale. I find it outrageous that Government Back Benchers should make such points. I have spent many days and weeks on this Committee, and have heard the Minister read prepared speeches into the record, with no criticism from either side of the Committee. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Easington is not reading a prepared speech, but even if he was, it would be his own work, not that of an outside body.

The Chair: I listened very carefully to the question that was put to me and I answered it. I do not recall any suggestion being made, and I indicated that I had not seen any evidence to suggest, that the hon. Member for Easington was reading a prepared speech. I answered the question that I was asked. I have ruled on the matter. I think that we had better leave it there.

Grahame M. Morris: I am grateful to you, Mr Gale. We have identified a contentious point. An elected official—a Minister in this case—should be held accountable for the performance of the NHS, and the Secretary of

State should exercise responsibility for the provision of high-quality health care in a comprehensive national health service.

Until now, the Secretary of State has been directly responsible for securing the provision of all health services, as set out in the National Health Service Act 2006. If my memory serves me correctly, the disagreement with Opposition members of the Committee was based on the difference, which the hon. Member for Southport has just indicated, between whether the Government were delegating or conferring on other bodies the specific duties that were previously placed on the Secretary of State—essentially, delegating his responsibilities.

Dr Daniel Poulter (Central Suffolk and North Ipswich) (Con): I am following the hon. Gentleman’s argument and the case that he is making. The hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury made the point that it is important for the Secretary of State to have a duty to reduce health care inequalities. Is the hon. Gentleman disappointed that such a duty was not put into legislation by the previous Government during their 13 years in power?

Grahame M. Morris: Mr Gale, I will confine my remarks to the issue in hand. I have some specific points in relation to health inequalities, but to move things along a little more speedily, I will not refer to them.

The Secretary of State should have a responsibility for a truly comprehensive national health service, as was previously the case.

Mr Burns: It still is.

Grahame M. Morris: The Minister says that, but our concern is that under the original Bill, those functions were delegated to other bodies—the NHS commissioning board, local commissioning groups and other organisations. The NHS Future Forum recommended that that was not an appropriate course of action, which is a view that was first highlighted by the Labour party.

Mr Burns: I am not sure whether the hon. Gentleman fully appreciated what the Future Forum said about this. Let me help him by reading what it said in its “Patient Involvement and Public Accountability” report. It says:

“We have heard concern from various quarters that the Secretary of State for Health will no longer have a responsibility or duty in respect of promoting a comprehensive health care service… We understand that this is not in fact the case as far as the proposed Bill is concerned.”

It continues:

“The Secretary of State will remain ultimately responsible for improving the health of the nation”.

Grahame M. Morris: I am aware of what the Future Forum said. Indeed, we took evidence from representatives of the forum and questioned them at greater length in the Select Committee on Health, but I question some of the responses of Professor Steve Field on the basis on which he arrives at some of his contentions, not least in

relation to taking independent legal advice. Under questioning, Professor Field was asked whether European competition law applied and whether the Future Forum had taken independent legal advice. His response was that the only legal advice that it had taken was from the solicitors from the Department for Health. I can cite other examples of inconsistencies in Professor Field’s evidence to this Committee and the Health Committee.

Emily Thornberry: I do not know whether my hon. Friend is aware that an application was made by Opposition Members to have an expert in international competition law called to give evidence, but that was voted down by the Government.

Grahame M. Morris: Yes, I was aware of that. It is disgraceful that the Government were not prepared to clarify this issue and have some independent legal advice.

John Pugh rose—

Dan Byles (North Warwickshire) (Con) rose—

Grahame M. Morris: I am happy to give way, but I am being berated for not making enough progress.

Dan Byles: I am a little concerned about the hon. Gentleman’s comments about the apparent inconsistencies in Professor Field’s evidence. Are you accusing him of incompetence or of misleading us? What exactly are you saying about Professor Field?

The Chair: Order. The hon. Gentleman must address his remarks through the Chair. I am not commenting upon it at all.

Dan Byles: I apologise, Mr Gale.

Grahame M. Morris: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising that because my observations are based upon fact. It calls into question the reliability of Professor Field’s evidence.

Fiona O’Donnell: Will my hon. Friend give way?

Grahame M. Morris: I will in a moment. When Professor Field came before the Health Committee in his capacity as one of the leaders of the Future Forum, he was asked about its role and independence. He was asked whether the Future Forum had taken representations from the trade unions and the staff involved in the health service as legitimate stakeholders in the exercise and whether they had raised with him their concerns about the fragmentation of the service caused by implementation of the proposals and the threats to national bargaining on pay and conditions. He replied that no such representations had been received, yet the written evidence that this Committee received on Tuesday from the trade union representatives Professor Field consulted states that they had made that very point. To my mind and that of many other people, hat calls into question the reliability of Professor Field’s evidence. I do not know if he is a reliable witness on that basis. He said one thing to the Select Committee and something

completely different to the Bill Committee, which was directly contradicted by a stakeholder group with whom he had had dealings. That is a simple point.

Fiona O’Donnell: I am sure my hon. Friend will remember that on Tuesday Professor Field also acknowledged that he had omitted caps on private patients in foundation trust hospitals from the report.

Grahame M. Morris: That is a relevant point when the whole basis of this Committee’s deliberations is the recommendations of the Future Forum report. Many of the issues that have been raised have not been taken up either as clauses referred back or as Government amendments. There is an issue of consistency and fairness in this.

Returning to the clause stand part debate, we were dealing with delegating or conferring duties from the Secretary of State and on to other bodies. It was the Minister or the Secretary of State, I think, who in their evidence coined the expression that when the bedpan is dropped the noise should be heard in Whitehall.

Mr Burns: I rise to help the hon. Gentleman. That is actually a quote from his hero, Nye Bevan.

Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab): He is my great hero and the bedpan in question was in Tredegar.

Grahame M. Morris: Anyway, it was referred to in this Committee as a way of saying that the Secretary of State should be in tune with problems and issues in the health service.

I accept that, under current arrangements, it is only possible for the Secretary of State to do that. My hon. Friend the Member for Islington South and Finsbury made an excellent point this morning about the Secretary of State for Defence not being responsible for equipping individual soldiers with items of kit—army boots were given as an example—but is ultimately responsible for ensuring that the Army is properly equipped and able to deal with the tasks that it faces. Similarly, I am not suggesting that the Secretary of State should be hands-on and micro-manage, as Government Members often say, every single issue. I accept that he cannot do that because, at the moment, those functions are exercised through structures such as the strategic health authorities and primary care trusts, which will not exist under the new arrangements. It is therefore all the more important that the duty is conferred upon an accountable individual. Despite the delegation under the current arrangements, it is quite clear that the SHAs and the PCTs remain under the duty of care of the Secretary of State, who—this is the key point—remains accountable to Parliament for the provision of services.

Despite the Secretary of State’s denials to the Committee, the Opposition have been clear from the very start that the duties outlined in the Bill would no longer be delegated and that direct responsibility would be taken away from the Secretary of State through the modified clause 1. It is also clear that direct responsibility for securing the provision of health services would be conferred on the bodies that I referred to earlier—the NHS commissioning board and the local commissioning

groups—and that provision is set out explicitly in clauses 5 and 6. We will deal with those later, so I will not say any more about that.

Government new clause 1 changes the role of the Secretary of State, but it is disingenuous to pretend that the original duty on the Secretary of State has been fully applied. As I have said, these concerns have been raised by several organisations and, indeed, by the Liberal Democrats as one of the three key issues. The hon. Member for Southport mentioned the number of e-mails that he has received, and I have received a similar number, including some that also highlighted the duties that are to be placed on the Secretary of State. New clause 1 reiterates the

“duty to promote comprehensive health services”

and, although it uses the original language, it adds a key point:

“For that purpose, the Secretary of State must exercise the functions conferred by this Act so as to secure that services are provided in accordance with this Act.”

We have an ever more complicated set of intertwining and cross-cutting stipulations about who is responsible for what.

I found the grouping of amendments slightly confusing this morning, Mr Gale, but I now appreciate that we are dealing with similar themes. I shall refer briefly to clause 5 because it covers some of the same elements. That clause creates a new section 1D of the 2006 Act, whose wording is similar to clause 1, giving the NHS commissioning board its general duty. This group of amendments also affects clause 5, but new section 1D(2) remains, meaning that the board will be concurrently bound with the Secretary of State to the duty in section 1(1) of the 2006 Act, which is to promote comprehensive health services—except for public health, which is going to local government. However, where the duty on the Secretary of State is to act

“with a view to securing the provision of services”,

that has now been changed, and it remains applicable to the board.

Government amendment 55 outlines the board’s duty to

“exercise the functions conferred upon it by this Act in relation to the commissioning consortia so as to secure that services are provided for those purposes in accordance with this Act.”

However, the changes to section 3 of the 2006 Act, which is the successor to section 3 of the 1946 Act, remain intact, and it currently states that the Secretary of State

“must provide throughout England, to such extent as he considers necessary to meet all reasonable requirements”.

For the Committee’s information, those requirements are:

“ (a) hospital accommodation,

(b) other accommodation for the purpose of any service provided under this Act,

(c) medical, dental, ophthalmic, nursing and ambulance services,

(d) such other services or facilities for the care of pregnant women, women who are breastfeeding and young children as he considers are appropriate as part of the health service,

(e) such other services or facilities for the prevention of illness, the care of persons suffering from illness and the after-care of persons who have suffered from illness as he considers are appropriate as part of the health service,

(f) such other services or facilities as are required for the diagnosis and treatment of illness.”

As for the issue of consistency between clause 1 and some of the other clauses where similar changes would make sense, clause 9, which we will come to later, replaces the duty on the Secretary of State that we have just been talking about with a duty on the commissioning consortium. As the Minister kindly pointed out this morning, we have changed the nomenclature, so that the commissioning consortium

“must arrange for the provision of the following to such extent as it considers necessary to meet the reasonable requirements of the persons for whom it has responsibility”.

Again, on ensuring consistency and a similar approach throughout all the clauses, clause 10 will add to the 2006 Act new section 3A, which provides that consortia

“may arrange for the provision of such services”—

The Chair: Order. When the hon. Gentleman got to clause 5, he was referring to Government amendments, which was fine and in order. Clauses 9 and 10 will be considered through other amendments, so I trust that he will not seek to speak on the same subject when we reach those clauses.

Grahame M. Morris: I accept that, Mr Gale. Overall, the Government amendments go some way towards restoring the duty on the Secretary of State. I acknowledge that, but I regret that the Government were not prepared to admit that initially when Opposition Members made exactly the same arguments in the original Bill Committee. As I say, the Government’s amendments go some way towards restoring the duty on the Secretary of State, and apply it to the commissioning board with regard to securing the provision of services, but only in so far as it is exercising functions conferred by the Bill. Indeed, the Bill as amended by clause 1 gives the commissioning board a duty to ensure that services are provided through its functions in relation to the local consortia, but specific services are left to local determination.

Despite the Government’s amendments, the Bill as a whole still considerably weakens the Secretary of State’s duties and places the most significant weight of duty at the national level, with the NHS commissioning board. If there is not an accountable individual—a politician in the form of the Secretary of State—and those duties are exercised by the national NHS commissioning board, Opposition Members will have concerns about accountability issues. We have already been told that we should refer to clinical commissioning groups, rather than commissioning consortia. The legal framework places the bulk of power with clinical commissioning groups, which will be able to determine what services are provided on the NHS to a far greater extent than local commissioners ever could under existing arrangements.