Earlier today Nick Clegg gave a major speech on the NHS, signalling big changes to the NHS Bill, something Paul Burstow had talked of on Friday.
The Daily Mail has a straight, factual report of the speech, which given its normal reporting of Nick Clegg almost counts as praise:
A huge shake-up of the NHS could be delayed by weeks if not months, the Deputy Prime Minister said today.
Nick Clegg said he believed the Health and Social Care Bill would need to go back to a committee of MPs for further scrutiny. This is where proposed legislation is examined line by line and substantial amendments can be made…
Mr Clegg told his MPs last week that making Monitor an economic regulator was a ‘misjudgment’ and that it should be tasked with securing NHS collaboration not competition.
Mr Clegg said he backed the use of private companies in the health service and that they had improved patient choice.
But he said: ‘It’s not the same as turning this treasured public service into a competition-driven, dog-eat-dog market where the NHS is flogged off to the highest bidder.’
Positive coverage of the speech has also appeared in the Evening Standard:
Nick Clegg went into battle today over Tory-led health reforms, vowing that the NHS would not be turned into a “dog-eat-dog market”.
In a landmark speech, the Deputy Prime Minister promised to protect the NHS as a “treasured public service” and stop it being “flogged off to the highest bidder”.
One point to watch out for is that the Department of Health itself is not (yet) fully behind sending the Bill back to committee in Parliament. There’s a bit of coalition debate being carried out in public here (which, as I’ve argued before, is good) – and we all need to keep up the pressure to make sure the debate comes to the right conclusion.
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9 Comments
Re: ‘One point to watch out for is that the Department of Health itself is not (yet) fully behind sending the Bill back to committee in Parliament. . ‘
More masterly understatement from MArk. The C4 News report impies that it’s a lot more than that.
More like: !!??** WTF— !!!! That —- Clegg! etc. etc. by implication from Lansley or his SPADs.
The report is not yet on the website so I can’t post a link. The key point is that what Clegg proposes has not been agreed by Cabinet so it may not happen. In which case, the battle shifts to the Lords, who are ready for a marathon session on the Bill, which was exhaustively scrutinised by the Commons.
Personally, I think Clegg HAS to force what he has proposed through now! Especially, the commitment to have the bill go back through committee stage. This to me seems like a crucial point because:
A) its something thats just not normally done in British politics, its a bit of a shock to see a minister force a bill they don’t like through reading again.
B) Clegg has CLEARLY gone against Cameron and Lansleys will here to push something that will hopefully get the ‘moderating Tories’ message through.
This really opens a path for us to start looking like the ‘nice lib dems’ tempering the ‘nasty Tories’. I hope more of this stuff continues.
The Channel 4 News report Chris Squire mentioned is now online here:
http://www.channel4.com/news/catch-up/display/playlistref/260511/clipid/260511_clegg_26
This marks the latest in a succession of Clegg/LibDem friendly headlines in the Daily Mail over the last week or so. Have we bought them or something?
Not to forget Janet Daley in The Telegraph
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/janetdaley/100089647/nick-clagg-says-something-useful-on-the-nhs/
As well as Jackie Ashley in The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/may/26/nick-clegg-nhs-reform
Something in the London water perhaps?
I welcome Nick’s speech and the firmer line he’s taking on the NHS bill.
However, other health news is less reassuring: http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/may/24/abortion-sexual-health-coalition
I don’t know if the Guardian is just painting an unnecessarily gloomy picture or if the change of tone from the government is genuine, so I thought I’d post it here in the hope that people more knowledgeable than me would comment… I’m particuarly uncomfortable with the reports at the end of the article re. anti-abortion charities providing crisis pregnancy counselling under the auspices of the ‘Big Society’ agenda (and Catholic groups providing sex education…)
The only clear and unabiguous position at this point in time is to demand the withdrawal of this Bill and, if that proves impossible to negotiate with our coalition partners, to vote against it.
We have opened the (public) negotiations at possibly Nick Clegg’s desired outcome. Naive. With Lansley and others fighting their corner it means that any outcome is actually likely to be weaker than our starting point. That is how negotiations work.
Despite the views quoted above from surprising sources in the media, the true test will be what the public and especially health professionals think amidst the hurly-burly of a heated campaign articulated as change = privatisation, privatisation bad (as Rad Lib wrote elsewhere).
Our weakness in winning this debate is again the toxicity of our Leader especially with regards to trust.
On these pages a number of people have talked about the polls suggesting we are making progress on this issue, but all I can find is polling by YouGOv in mid-April which showed that when asked about trust in Nick Clegg to make the right decision on Health 60% said they trusted him not a lot/not at all and only 39% said they trusted him a little/a lot,
Public opinion does not change hugely over four weeks. When a message changes the reception of it lags behind and is mediated through people’s view on the trustworthiness of the messenger. This, therefore, is not a great platform from which to take the lead in representing the Lib Dem proposals on Health.
Talking to anyone in the Health Service at the moment will persuade you that they are weighed down by bureaucracy – all of it created by the requirements of an internal market. Their dedication means that they work over time to ensure these non-patient-care requirements do not diminish the service to patients and clients. This leaves them stressed and exhausted – not the best conditions for realising their true potential as carers and healers.
What they are looking for is someone to lead the campaign to free them of these restraining bureuacratic burdens. We need a ‘saint’ and have one in Baroness Williams.
What an opportunity.
I agree with Bill.
If we end up with a shabby compromise that Nick manages to sell to half the Lib Dem MPs, in order to secure a thin majority in the HoC for the revised Bill, I still doubt whether it will clear the Lords.
A lot depends on how determined (and angry post AV) Nick Clegg actually is. If he really is now playing the LD votes in the Commons, what he is putting foreward are requirements not negotiating points.
But I do agree that politically the best result would be withdrawal of the Bill and starting again (following the resignation of Lansley).
Tony Greaves