Welfare Reform Bill

My Lords, I hope that I can reassure the noble Baroness further. When I talk about Atos Origin doctors I mean medically qualified doctors. I will expand on that further if I may. Appointment by the Secretary of State will ensure that any healthcare professional carrying out a work-focused health-related assessment is suitably qualified to carry out all aspects of that assessment and has been trained to the standard that the Secretary of State considers appropriate. If the healthcare professional does not have the appropriate qualifications or has not been trained to the appropriate level, he or she will not be approved to carry out the assessments. The healthcare professionals will receive training to equip them with the skills needed to identify the health-related barriers to work and possible health interventions which will be required when conducting work-focused health-related assessments. I turn now to Amendment No. 89. Clause 61 relates to the use of healthcare professionals in social security benefit assessments and covers a range of benefits. However, the definition of a healthcare professional is also referred to in Clause 10(8), which relates specifically to the new benefit, ESA. It is important that we maintain a consistent position throughout the legislation. I understand the concerns which have been expressed about the need to ensure that only appropriate healthcare professionals are used to carry out assessments. We all agree that only properly trained healthcare professionals with appropriate skills should be used to carry out medical examinations. As I have said, we have the added security and safeguard that all healthcare professionals must be approved by the Secretary of State before they can undertake medical examinations. We have no plans to use healthcare professionals who are not members of a regulated profession. Bearing that and the Government's commitment towards regulating more healthcare professions in mind, we agree with the principle behind the amendment proposed by noble Lords and believe it would be appropriate to look again at the way we have approached the structure of the legislation here. I believe that we are able to meet the concerns that have been raised, while retaining flexibility to use other professionals from regulated professions, should it prove appropriate to do so to address any skills gap which may be identified in the future. With the House's agreement, we would like to take away Clauses 61 and 10 and consider further an alternative wording which would address noble Lords' concerns. We discussed this at some length in Grand Committee and my noble friend has written to the noble Lord, Lord Oakeshott. I believe that we will be able to return at Third Reading with a practical solution which will meet noble Lords’ concerns. I shall deal with one point about the training that all healthcare professionals get in assessing mental health conditions. We will ensure that that remains up to date and effective. For ESA, there will also be assessments of people with learning difficulties, many of whom are currently exempt from undergoing a PCA. We shall ensure that people get the appropriate training. As for appeals, most of them take place because the relevant information is unavailable to the decision-maker at the time of the decision. That is something that we discussed in Committee. I hope that, given the suggestion that I have made, the noble Baroness will withdraw the amendment.