Health and Social Care Bill

I support the amendments, particularly Amendment No. 51. Along with other noble Lords, I had the interesting experience of sitting through the Mental Health Act as it went through Parliament recently, which was a salutary and sobering experience. Perhaps one of its most important aspects was an issue that was dealt with principally in this House rather than in another place: the continuing practice of admitting children and adolescents to adult wards. Many noble Lords from all sides of the House worked hard with the Government to deal with that issue, perhaps one of the worst issues that we knew of—that and the fact that mixed-sex wards are still found more in the mental health field than in any other part of the health service. That poses a great threat to people’s safety. It is therefore of undisputed importance that detailed information is made publicly available, particularly information such as the number of children on adult wards. I say this in support of the noble Baroness, Lady Murphy. I suspect that the Minister may respond by saying that there is an expectation that the minimum data set for mental health will collect all the relevant statistics on mental health patients. That may be true, but there is no requirement that that be made immediately available to the CQC. It is therefore not clear that that information-gathering exercise will of itself be adequate. That is an important reason why the noble Baroness’s amendment should be taken seriously.