Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-04-05
Topic: Health
Syed Kamall (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I beg to move Motion J and, with the leave of the House, I will speak to Motions M, N and P. This group of amendments relates to questions of patient safety, patient engagement, public health and building a learning culture in the NHS. Last week in the other place we tabled amendments to ensure the full operability of Lords Amendment 91, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hollins, on mandatory training on learning disabilities and autism. We have discussed and agreed these changes with the noble Baroness, and together these amendments will require all health and social care providers who carry out regulated activities to ensure their staff receive specific training on learning disabilities and autism At Report stage of this Bill the Government committed to accept in principle the amendment by the noble Lord, Lord Sharkey, on reciprocal healthcare and to change the process for regulations that give effect to international healthcare agreements so that they are subject to the affirmative resolution procedure. To ensure this Bill achieves the intended effect, the Government tabled Amendment 95A in lieu, which achieves the same objective but amends the international healthcare agreements clause, rather than the regulations clause. This will ensure that all regulations made under the soon to be named healthcare (international arrangements) Act 2019 are subject to the affirmative procedure, including any regulations made by the devolved Governments. I urge noble Lords to accept all these amendments I now turn to the issue of abortion at home pills. This group contains Lords Amendment 92 and related amendments. Both this House and the other place voted to make provision to permanently allow both pills for early medical abortions to be taken at home. These were, rightly, free votes of both Houses, but the Government brought forward this amendment in lieu to ensure that the legislation operates in the way that this House intended it to. I therefore ask noble Lords who agree with the intention of my noble friend Lady Sugg to instead support the Commons amendment in lieu I am also grateful to my noble friend Lady Eaton for bringing the important topic of safeguarding before the House. I reassure her that the well-being and safety of women and girls accessing abortion services has been, and will continue to be, our first and foremost priority. Safeguarding is an essential aspect of abortion care, and it has been long-established that a doctor or health professional is legally able to provide contraception, sexual and reproductive health advice, and treatment, including abortion, without parental knowledge or consent to a person aged under 16 years, provided that the doctor or healthcare professional is satisfied that certain conditions, including ability to consent, are met As a matter of best practice, every effort should be made to encourage those under age 16 to involve their parents, and if they cannot be persuaded to do so, they should be assisted to find another adult, such as another family member or specialist youth worker, to provide support. All abortion providers are already required to have effective arrangements in place to safeguard vulnerable children and to assure themselves, regulators and their commissioners that those are working. Having effective safeguarding arrangements in place will be essential for clinicians to make a robust assessment of whether a home abortion is suitable for anyone under age 16 and those under age 18 I noted the statement from the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, which stated that all young women aged under 18 and care leavers aged under 25 should be actively encouraged to attend an abortion service in person. With that in mind, we will work with the royal colleges, including the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, and NHS safeguarding leads, to ensure that children and young people are actively encouraged to take up a face-to-face appointment and that anyone at risk of harm is identified and supported appropriately, including through referrals to other agencies The Government will continue to work closely with relevant professional bodies to ensure that the principles and duties of safeguarding children, young people and adults at risk are consistently and rigorously applied and that we continue to monitor all impacts of home use of both abortion pills. I hope that my noble friend will be reassured to hear that we will work with NHS England, the Care Quality Commission and abortion providers to ensure that they can safely offer telemedicine abortion services on a permanent basis and that all women are genuinely offered the choice of a face-to-face appointment On other issues, the Government cannot accept Amendment 88B, which has been put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, as an amendment in lieu of Lords Amendments 85 to 88, which were rejected by the other place. It would bind the Government in statute to consult, to a particular timeframe, on all recommendations within the Khan independent review which in the opinion of the Secretary of State require a consultation to implement. The review itself is not yet complete and is not scheduled for publication until May, when we will of course consider our next steps As the review is currently in the process of being drafted, the Government should not pre-empt what it will include. Importantly, the Government should not be put under a duty to consult on a range of proposals that they have not yet seen and may not support. Some proposals may require further development and agreement across government and across the UK before a consultation. We risk wasting government resource and time to consult, and stakeholders’ time to respond, by consulting on proposals that we may not intend to pursue The Government are firmly committed to Smokefree 2030 and we look forward to the outcome of the independent review. The review will inform both the health disparities White Paper and the Government’s new tobacco control plan, which will be published later this year. If any changes to tobacco legislation are proposed by the Government in that plan, I can commit that they will be consulted on. The need for additional spending to deliver our Smokefree 2030 ambition—and possible funding mechanisms—will be considered as part of the tobacco control plan and agreed with Her Majesty’s Treasury in the usual way I beg to move the Motion standing in my name and commend many of these amendments to the House Motion J1 (as an amendment to Motion J)