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Mr. Burstow: It has been an interesting debate. I am grateful to the Opposition for their support and for the questions that they put to the Minister. I shall respond briefly to some of the points that she made. In my view, we should return to the matter on Report. I shall not press the amendment to a Division because of the time-honoured provision that amendments voted on in Committee cannot be selected for debate at a later
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stage. It does not always happen but it could, and I do not want to go down that procedural cul-de-sac.
The Minister deployed a number of familiar arguments against Opposition amendments—that they are needlessly burdensome, that they are already covered in some other way, or that they place burdens on organisations.
Miss Johnson: Let me be clear. I was not saying that it would place a burden on the agency; I said that it was inappropriate for that sort of detail to appear in the Bill. I am not saying that the agency ought not to be doing such things; indeed, the agency is doing them, and will continue to do so.
Mr. Burstow: The Minister will have to forgive me, but she said to me earlier that it was not appropriate for me to intervene on her because I had not heard the rest of her speech. I have not made the rest of my speech, and I may yet deal with that point. The purpose of interventions is surely to tease out details. I am not prescient enough to know everything that the Minister is about to say; and the same may be said of her. I want to rehearse my concerns about her rebuttal of the amendment.
Mr. Mike Hall (Weaver Vale) (Lab): I thought that the hon. Gentleman was summing up his views about the amendments. Is he about to introduce new information? He should have given it in his opening speech.
Mr. Burstow: I am about to deal with the Minister's comments on my amendments. It will be for you, Mrs. Adams, to tell me whether I am out of order. I shall respect your rulings, as should all hon. Members.
The Minister said that it would be burdensome on other organisations to have to take part in the process of producing protocols. I was surprised at that response. She said that it would be inappropriate to place so much detail in the Bill. Amendment No. 2 states:
''To facilitate co-operation the Agency shall consult with other bodies and publish protocols for co-operation.''
Hon. Members elaborated on what they hoped might form the detail of such protocols, but the amendment does not spell out those details—nor should it. It is not intended to be prescriptive. It is intended to indicate a mechanism, a natural part of what I would expect the HPA to be undertaking. I am surprised that the Minister should think that to be needlessly prescriptive. She says that the 1997 Act places duties on NHS bodies to co-operate with local authorities. Indeed, the 1999 Act provides for co-operation between NHS organisations.
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All of that is useful. However, to suggest that the amendment should be rejected simply because it would place a burden on the HPA to publish and consult, and that some things should not be published, is to give second-order arguments against the amendment. They might be reasons to amend the amendment, or to propose an alternative, but they are not reasons to reject it, as the Minister suggests.
The Minister also mentioned hospital-acquired infections, and the duty of strategic health
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authorities to manage performance, but she did not address my desire to ensure that the public have meaningful comparable information across the NHS. I do not criticise the Government for introducing a mandatory system to monitor MRSA rates; I hope to see such monitoring for other infections in due course.
I am not convinced by the Minister's arguments. Amendment No. 2 is not intended to be prescriptive about the way in which protocols are drawn up, or about their precise contents. I arrived at the debate with the intention of merely probing—I genuinely wanted clarification from the Minister about the Government's thinking on emergency planning and drawing up procedures to govern relationships between organisations. However, I come away from it surprised that the Government are so resistant to the amendment, puzzled as to why they feel unable to give any comfort in that regard and convinced that I must return to the matter on Report. That would not have been the case had the Minister responded in a slightly more forthcoming way. That said, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 5 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 6 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 8
Transfer of property and staff etc.
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Dr. Murrison: I missed my chance to raise a couple of points in the debate on the previous clause, and hope to return to them later.
I shall be brief on this clause, which is long, complicated and necessary. I have no particular difficulty with it. However, I worry about the transfer of property rights and liabilities to the agency from its predecessor bodies, especially as that will be done on the authority's say so. I am ever so slightly concerned that, because the way in which that can be done is subject to the agreement of a number of agencies, there is potential for conflict. I wonder about the arrangements for arbitration. Who is to decide whether particular pieces of property and liabilities and so on are to be transferred to the new agency from its predecessor bodies, who might object and under what circumstances would such objections be upheld?
I return to the point that I made in connection with a previous clause, when I pointed out the potential for difficulty in deciding which of the devolved assemblies and Parliaments would be liable for financial contributions to the agency, how much those would be and what accounts might be presented to support such contributions. I am trying to delve into the interface between the agency, its predecessor bodies and the authorities that are listed. How will they co-operate? As we have discussed, co-operation is a grey area. Nevertheless, I want to know how the authorities will co-operate to determine what can and cannot be transferred. There is usually room for misunderstanding and confusion in property matters, and it would be nice to know what functions have been
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transferred to the new agency and what arbitration exists to ensure that conflict is avoided and that satisfactory resolutions are arrived at.
Miss Johnson: I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman's questions. As I said in relation to paragraph 19 to schedule 1, the Government are clear that the devolved assemblies need to pick up the bill for whatever they want to be commissioned or whatever services they want the HPA to provide. They therefore need to pay for and receive the service that they pay to receive. Under paragraph 19, they will not get a service that they are not paying to receive.
Dr. Murrison: I am grateful for that clarification, which is quite important. It is what I was trying to establish in relation to a previous clause. Is the Minister saying that this will be a ''pay as you go'' type of set-up under which the authorities will pay for what they demand and receive from the agency? I believe that that is the burden of what she just said.
Miss Johnson: Indeed. That is what I said in relation to schedule 1. It is for the HPA to agree with the devolved assemblies the work that it is doing for them, the cost of that work and the fact that the cost will come across in order to fund the level of service that is required. That is exactly what paragraph 19 to schedule 1 does.
The hon. Gentleman asked a related question on the transfer of property. The requirements to consult the devolved assemblies reflect the fact that they are all joint stakeholders or owners of the NRPB. There is no need for dispute resolution. All Departments agree the contents of the Bill, and the agency will take on the rights of predecessor bodies in that regard. There is always discussion among parts of government about how progress will be made, but that is the usual process of government. It happens every day of the week in a million different ways throughout the United Kingdom, especially now that we have devolution. Nothing is different in this respect. There will be no need for dispute resolution for the reasons that I have just given.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 8 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Schedule 2 agreed to.
Clause 9
Directions
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Dr. Murrison: I am grateful to have caught your eye, Mrs. Adams. I am getting into the swing of catching your eye.
It is a little uncertain what directing powers authorities will have. Earlier in the Bill, we see that the authority may require the agency to take note of its directions. Things become a little grey. Will the Minister tell us the nature of the directions that she envisages, how they will be carried out and what force they will have? Will she also say what veto the
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authority may have over the HPA if it fails to comply with a directive? This is not an arm's length body, but a non-departmental public body, and the whole idea of shifting it from being a special health authority to being an NDPB is to give it some independence. I become a little confused when I see words such as ''direction'' and ''directive'' in a Bill that aims to make a shift in that status.
Miss Johnson: Directions relate to operational matters. The House of Lords Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee has not recommended parliamentary scrutiny of them. Schedule 1 contains powers for the Secretary of State, after consulting the devolved authorities, to direct the agency: paragraph 11 relates to directing it on committees; paragraph 13 relates to directing it on proceedings; and paragraphs 24 to 27 contain powers for each of the appropriate authorities to direct the agency to provide information about the exercise of its functions.
There would be directions under the Immigration Act 1971 on an operational point—the appointment of medical inspectors. Again, the House of Lords Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee has not recommended that that should be subject to parliamentary scrutiny. I take it that the hon. Gentleman seeks clarification on points of that kind. I am not sure whether there are any others on which I can help him.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 9 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
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