argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-02-04
Topic: Health
Michael Ian Grade (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I speak in support of my noble friend Lord Vaizey’s amendments. He said all I could possibly say to support them. This is a shocking piece of bodged legislation, which needs the support of these amendments to make it fairer and more proportionate, practical and sensible At the heart of all this legislation and all the speeches today, I think we are all agreed, is that unhealthy food is the real villain here. It is not the messengers, the advertisers or the media; it is the people who create the formulations that are doing so much harm and increasing obesity at a scary rate, which we can all unite in trying to fight. I am afraid that the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, is in for a terrible disappointment if she thinks that just banning ads in some form on television is the answer to all our problems. Many Governments—
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-02-04
Topic: Health
Michael Ian Grade (Conservative, Centre-right): I will continue. Successive Governments throughout my too many years in the media, faced with intractable social problems, have turned to bashing television, television advertising, violence on television, the Troubles and so on. I remember Prime Minister Thatcher introducing a measure that banned direct speech by duly elected Members of Sinn Féin, thinking that it would in some way contribute to the end of the Troubles. The list is endless, and this is yet another one The Government have missed the target. The target is the manufacturers of unhealthy foods. I ask the Minister whether, at the end, she will kindly give us a sense of what the Government are doing to get to the heart of the problem, which is the reformulation of these unhealthy foods. It is no good blaming the messenger and the media; you have to get to the heart of the problem, and at the heart of the problem are products that have too much sugar and other harmful—maybe even addictive—contents in them I will conclude, in the interests of brevity, by expressing my great sympathy for the Front Bench in having to defend this ghastly piece of legislation.
Telecommunications (Security) Bill — House of Lords, 2021-10-19
Topic: Defense
Gillian Merron (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I thank the Minister for his reply. I am, of course, disappointed that the Minister cannot see that this amendment seeks to strengthen the Bill. It gives the Government an opportunity to showcase all the things of which the Minister has apprised the House. It is important to look at this proposed new clause. It would require the Secretary of State to report on the impact of the diversification strategy, something of which the Government are proud, and it allows for a parliamentary debate, something I would have hoped the Government would welcome, but this is clearly not the case As the noble Lords, Lord Fox and Lord Alton, have indicated, the absence so far of an effective plan to diversify the supply chain is what makes us concerned about security in this country. The Bill is the opportunity to put that right. Therefore, I feel it is only right and proper, in the interests of the security of the country, that we press this matter to a vote and test the opinion of the House.
Telecommunications (Security) Bill — House of Lords, 2021-10-19
Topic: Defense
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I welcome the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, to his position. I am sure we will end up speaking to each other across the Dispatch Box. I wish him all the best and good luck with the important work he will be doing as a Minister of the Crown. We all wish you well in that role Turning to my amendment, we appreciate that, obviously, it is sometimes difficult to strike a balance between the public availability of information, even for debate by Parliament, and national security. This amendment seeks to probe the Government’s thinking. So far, their reassurances have been somewhat lacking I often use, and want to use, evidence—not just what I think and others may wish to say—regarding how the Government should use the Intelligence and Security Committee. It was set up by a unanimous decision of both Houses of this Parliament because they recognised that some information is so sensitive that it cannot be put in the public domain, as that would undermine national security. No Member of this Chamber or the other place would argue with that or say that that is wrong in principle. But so far, in respect of the security aspect of telecommunications, the Government have said that the existing processes and way of doing things works. Many of us would disagree with that and feel that more reassurance needs to be offered and that the Government need to rethink this In moving this amendment, I will use evidence from the chair of the Intelligence and Security Committee himself. I do not need to go on about this, because he summed it up in one sentence. Speaking about the Telecommunications (Security) Bill in the other place, he said: "It is both puzzling and exasperating that the Government are yet again refusing to use the Intelligence and Security Committee for the purpose for which it was created."—[Official Report, Commons, 25/5/21; col 286.] That is quite a stunning sentence. I could quote the whole speech, but for me that encapsulates it. It is for the Minister say why he is wrong. Why is the chair of the Intelligence and Security Committee wrong to say that about the powers in this Bill and the security issues that will arise in respect of telecommunications now and in future? Why is it wrong for the Intelligence and Security Committee to be the body that looks at that information for us?
Telecommunications (Security) Bill — House of Lords, 2021-10-19
Topic: Defense
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Centre-left): I thank the Minister for a generally helpful reply and for his engagement with the amendment itself, my remarks and those of the noble Lord, Lord Fox. It is helpful when a Minister engages with a debate, rather than just reading the words in front of him. The Minister did that, and that is to be welcomed The Minister offered reassurance on many of the issues that I raised—and they are issues. The debate has in some ways gone beyond the Bill itself and will help the debate within government about how to resolve the issue of national security and parliamentary scrutiny. Of particular importance was the Minister saying that the memorandum of understanding between the Government and the ISC is being reviewed. That MoU is crucial, and the debate we have had on this Bill and, indeed, this amendment, should inform the Government of the view of many in this House and beyond that the memorandum of understanding needs to be clarified and perhaps reviewed and changed. I ask the Minister to ensure that that review happens in the discussions that take place within government With those remarks, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-02-04
Topic: Health
Frederick Richard Penn Curzon (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I begin by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, and many other noble Lords for bringing these amendments relating to these important and sensitive issues to the Committee today Amendment 265 seeks to prohibit the use of imported bodies or parts of bodies for the purpose of public display without the specific consent of the donor. The Government share the concern motivating Amendment 265 that bodies may in the past have been displayed in public exhibitions without the donors’ consent. We therefore committed in this House, during the passage of the Medicines and Medical Devices Act, to address this concern, and have since worked closely with the Human Tissue Authority to strengthen its code of practice on public display, which was laid before Parliament last July. The code now guarantees that robust assurances on consent for all donor bodies, including imported bodies, are fully received, assessed and recorded, before the authority issues any licence for public display. The Government therefore do not believe that this amendment is necessary.
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-02-04
Topic: Health
Frederick Richard Penn Curzon (Conservative, Centre-right): The noble Lord makes a very good point and, if I may, I will investigate the feasibility of doing that and what systems are in place to capture that kind of data I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, for her Amendment 297H, which covers the retention and use of tissues after coroner post-mortem examinations. I of course share the commitment to promoting education and research. However, I am afraid I do not believe that this amendment represents the right approach to supporting this aim. I appreciate that the noble Baroness emphasised that she was referring to blocks, slides and urine samples; the amendment refers to tissue samples. The advice I have received is that it is important that we remain committed to the principle that consent is fundamental to how we treat the remains of the deceased. I remember the passage of the Human Tissue Act; the noble Lord, Lord Alton, was absolutely right in what he said earlier about that. All of us should have a choice about what happens to our bodies after we die, and if we cannot exercise that choice, those close to us should be able to Post-mortems can already be distressing to the families of the deceased. Denying them a say as to what happens to the remains of their loved ones will compound that distress—often unnecessarily, as many of the retained tissues will never be put to use There are three other defects, as I see them, in the amendment; I am concerned that it would allow tissues to be stored indefinitely; it would allow for an overly broad interpretation of what constitutes a tissue sample —that is, in fact, my main concern; and it does not address the considerable challenge of how to effectively catalogue, audit or access the large amount of new material that would have to be retained Having said that, I believe that under the current consent-based model we can and should do more to encourage the active identification of tissues that could serve an important purpose, and to communicate the significance of retaining this tissue to the deceased’s family when seeking their consent. I understand the force of what the noble Baroness is trying to achieve and there may be different ways of doing that While I am grateful to noble Lords for their amendments in this area, I respectfully ask them to withdraw or not press them at this stage.
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-02-04
Topic: Health
Frederick Richard Penn Curzon (Conservative, Centre-right): I noted that the amendment tabled by the noble Baroness is closely modelled on the current law in Scotland. Because of that, it fails to account for the significant differences between how Scotland, and England, Wales and Northern Ireland, regulate the storage and use of human tissue. In England, Wales and Northern Ireland, that storage and use is regulated by the Human Tissue Authority. In Scotland, there is no equivalent body and the amendment is silent as to what impact it would have on the authority, especially given the challenges involved in managing the great quantity of tissue that would be retained I am aware that many Scots share my concerns about consent for retaining tissue. A recent petition to the Scottish Government highlighted the anguish faced by a grieving mother on learning that she did not have the choice to have some of her child’s remains returned to her. She was upset at how long it took for those remains even to be located, so although this amendment would apply only to adults the same kind of issues would apply.
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-02-04
Topic: Health
Julia Frances Cumberlege (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I have Amendment 288 in this group. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, for the way that he has introduced this group of amendments; he is quite right that there is a lot of synergy between them Before I get to my subject, as it were, I will address litigation. We have been working very hard with NHS England and others to introduce the rapid resolution and redress system—RRR—for maternity services. The damage done to babies costs a huge amount of money. It is very rare, but some of the settlements are now over £10 million per baby, so this issue really needs to be addressed. The noble Lord is right that, when litigation comes in with force, it causes enormous trouble and heartache for those involved in it. We know that, when it is based on clinical negligence, the trouble is that the learning disappears or is suffocated. If we had a system that gave rapid redress and resolution, we would learn so much more from the cases that come to court Amendment 288 requires the Secretary of State to bring forward proposals for a redress scheme to help those who have suffered avoidable harm linked to the three medical interventions that were examined in my Independent Medicines and Medical Devices Safety Review: hormone pregnancy tests—the most common of which is Primodos—the epilepsy drug sodium valproate and pelvic mesh, which is used to treat stress urinary incontinence and pelvic organ prolapse.
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-02-04
Topic: Health
Fiona Hodgson (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I support Amendment 268, to which I have added my name, and thank the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, for moving it so eloquently. I also support the two other amendments in this group I declare my interest as chair of ISCAS—the Independent Sector Complaints Adjudication Service—and because I have been involved personally in two clinical negligence situations. The first involved a death. We did not take legal action but tried to get answers. Answers were very difficult to obtain because all the papers that the hospital had disappeared. On the second, we had to take legal action Amendment 288 will, as discussed, do exactly what it says on the tin. It will ensure an independent review of the process for handling clinical negligence. The present situation where the only solution is to resort to law to get damages is far from satisfactory. Where a patient sustains damage, as my noble friend Lady Cumberlege so eloquently explained, the impact on them and their family is utterly devastating. In some cases, there is a need to get damages, because the situation means that there are ongoing costs for ongoing care, as we have just heard. They need financial help in these situations. Legal cases can often take years to settle. The one that I helped with took five or six years going over and over what happened, going to endless meetings, going to meetings with the lawyers and chasing the lawyers, who seemed to have dropped it. It was unbelievably stressful. I cannot think that anybody would want to go down that route unless they really had to. For the patient, if they are still alive, or the relatives, it means reliving and reliving the incident on top of coming to terms with the damage that has been inflicted Moreover, I understand that the costs of medical negligence have quadrupled in the last 15 years to £2.2 billion in 2020-21, equivalent to 1.5% of the NHS budget. I understand that about 25% of this goes on legal fees. I believe we urgently need to find a better way to deal with these cases, rather than resorting to the law. Not only do long, drawn-out legal wrangles put patients through years of unnecessary stress, but huge legal fees eat into the resources that should be available for front-line care An independent review would hopefully be able to examine and deliver a more satisfactory solution for patients and the NHS alike, and I hope the Minister can support this amendment.
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-02-04
Topic: Health
Julia Frances Cumberlege (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I very much welcome my noble friend’s response. Of course he is right: we must always look to the future safety of our services. I am really grateful to Ministers and the department for what they have done in response to our report. It is not 100% yet, but we are nearly there, and I thank them for that But I am not talking about the future. I am talking about the people who are suffering now as a consequence of the treatment they received, not knowing that it would do them harm. So I ask my noble friend to take this away and think further on it. As I tried to explain, we have devised in the amendment a system that is not, as we said, an open cheque. It is not huge amounts of money; it is not huge numbers of people. It is to help those who are struggling with their lives as a consequence of the harm that has been caused to them. I just ask my noble friend to take this away and think further.
NHS: Staff Pay — House of Lords, 2018-03-21
Topic: Health
Mary Watkins (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I welcome this Statement as a sign that the Government have at last recognised the effect that the pay cap has had on recruitment and retention, in particular in nursing. I hope that this pay increase will lift many nurses out of hardship and improve morale. It is a sign that the Government value NHS staff and I especially welcome the significant increase for newly qualified nurses for 2020-21. These new recruits, who commenced their training in 2017 without bursaries, will be in a far better position—comparable with other graduates in terms of starting pay—as they proceed to repay some element their salary after achieving an income of more than £25,000 a year. My only concern is that the charitable and social care sectors, which employ nurses, will need to match these salaries. How can we ensure that they will be able to do so?
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-11
Topic: Health
Syed Kamall (Conservative, Centre-right): I start by thanking the noble Baroness, and indeed all noble Lords who have spoken thus far. I will make a general point in response to my noble friend Lord Cormack. I recognise that I am relatively new to this House and that I have much to learn. I hope to learn much, not only from noble Lords who have more experience of the procedures of this House and of holding the Government to account but from many noble Lords from across the House with medical expertise and management expertise in the health and social care sector I also thank the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, for bringing this debate before the Committee. Amendment 1 would mean that we could not commence the change of legal name from the National Commissioning Board to NHS England until after an impact assessment for each of the clauses in Part 1 of the Bill is published, while Amendment 315 would mean that we could not commence Part 1 until after the publication of an impact assessment for each clause’s impact on the risks, costs and benefits to patients I hope I can reassure the noble Baroness that my department has published the impact assessments. She acknowledged this and I accept that they were not published in the most timely way. I will endeavour to do my best to make sure that we publish these assessments with as much notice as possible. They are available for noble Lords to review on GOV.UK. I am very happy for the noble Baroness to take credit for the first impact assessment. We will endeavour to do better. We will also commit to publishing further impact assessments for secondary legislation made under the powers contained in the Bill, where those regulations will have significant impact on the health and care system or private businesses, to provide transparency and clarity to the system The amendment would also delay the commencement of Part 1 until at least six months after commencement regulations were laid before your Lordships’ House. This would delay the implementation of the key provisions contained in Part 1 The NHS put forward its recommendations for legislation in 2019. It is preparing, subject to parliamentary passage, to implement the ICB provisions of the Bill from July 2022. We know that ICBs in effect exist in many areas, in whatever form of development, and it is essential that we put these on a statutory footing as soon as possible. The development of ICBs builds on years of development work in local systems to improve partnership working. Delaying the implementation risks a loss of momentum in establishing statutory integrated care boards and the benefits that they are intended to deliver. For these reasons, I ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-11
Topic: Health
Diana Harding (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I begin by declaring my interest, having very recently stepped down as the chair of NHS Improvement, which included both the NHS Trust Development Authority and Monitor. I am very supportive of the spirit of these amendments, and I could not agree more with the way in which the noble Baroness, Lady Merron, set out the importance of propriety in the appointment process and the skills, attitude and culture that the directors on the board of the new NHS England need to have. It is essential, as she said, to have a spirit of collaboration, integration and patient focus.
Salisbury Incident Update — House of Lords, 2018-03-12
Topic: Health
Norman Warner (Crossbench, Unknown): As the Health Minister who was responsible in COBRA for the first set of responses to Litvinenko’s assassination, may I ask the Minister what action the Government have taken to learn lessons from that episode, particularly in terms of informing the public within 24 hours, and then on a daily basis, what elements should be of concern to them and how they might deal with them? Those public reassurances were an integral part of that Government’s response to the attack on Litvinenko.
Covid-19 — House of Lords, 2021-05-26
Topic: Health
Dorothea Glenys Thornton (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, we can probably all agree that the Minister has drawn the short straw today—and not for the first time, I think The issue I want to raise on this Question is that the Government took powers in the road map legislation to impose local lockdowns, so I ask the Minister: are any discussions taking place about whether those powers will be activated in those areas? Secondly, we know that a single dose of the vaccine is less effective against this particular variant, so I repeat the question asked earlier: what plans are there to increase vaccination in the areas most affected by the spread of the Covid variant B16172? Will the Government produce a plan with the local directors of public health to roll out the vaccines to everybody in those areas, and consider including bringing forward a second dose for a larger cohort of people?
Covid-19 — House of Lords, 2021-05-26
Topic: Health
Rita Donaghy (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I understand the Minister saying that he is focusing on the vaccines and surge testing. I even understand his reply to the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, that one cannot have surge testing in 120 areas. However, I want to go back to the Bedford issue. Despite the director of health, the mayor and the local MP spending nearly a fortnight saying that the Indian variant was just as bad in Bedford as it was in Bolton, the surge testing took place days later. What weight is given to the advice from the local directors of health? There seems to be an imbalance here because it is the Government’s decision rather than that of the local directors. Can the Minister assure us that there is not a change in policy on this? He stated: "We are … looking to see how we can communicate more effectively with local authorities" Actually, the local authorities are communicating effectively with the Minister. Has there been a change of emphasis on this?