Health Bill [HL]

I thank the Committee for being prepared to put up with a bit more of me at this time of night. I promise that I will be Trappist the next time we meet; that is an absolute promise. I am sad that we are so late in the day, because Amendment 70 is quite important. This is about continuing care payments. Noble Lords will have heard the noble Lord, Lord Darzi, reiterate the points made by the department about top-ups for drugs and its response to the Richards review. An ongoing source of contention has been the level at which the NHS provides continuing care and accommodation. It is a particular issue for older people, but it also applies to other client groups. This is to do with perhaps one of the few occasions when healthcare takes place not in an individual’s home or a hospital, but in a residential home or a care home. It is important to stress that this is that person’s home; it is where they live while they happen to receive healthcare. The problem is that sometimes the NHS is willing to only pay a certain level of hotel costs. That means that older people in particular may not be able to go into a home that either is of a quality or a standard that they want, or is not near their relatives. The amendment seeks to establish that people who are in receipt of continuing healthcare can make a top-up to that to enable them to receive that healthcare in a home that they wish to be in, but which the NHS may perhaps not fund or not fund to that level. We are talking about a group of people whose needs are such that they cannot manage some of the more creative arrangements used by other people in order to get round their health problems because they are restricted in mobility. The amendment could make an immense difference to a small but significant group of people. Therefore, I beg to move.