Health and Social Care Bill

I support the amendments with a pessimistic heart, given the reception for the previous group of amendments. I support the noble Baroness particularly on Amendment No. 30, because in many cases local authorities have shut up shop and gone home when it comes to assessing the needs of older people who are, for example, returning home from hospital. Providing a list of private care services is about all that they do. I have experienced that personally. If we are to hold local authorities to be ultimately accountable for the quality of social care that they deliver in the local area, so that we have some ability to take them to task when someone is not getting an assessment or is getting an inappropriate assessment, the Care Quality Commission should be able to look at the decisions that have been made locally that have allowed such circumstances to arise. The amendment is, therefore, attractive.