NHS Reorganisation

My first question to the Secretary of State was about the proposal that the NHS commissioning board will be able to award bonuses to the GP consortia that it deems to be adopting innovative measures. The Bill states:"““The Board may make payments as prizes to promote innovation in the provision of health services.””" That means bonuses within the NHS based on innovation, which is anathema to the NHS and not what we want for it. This is indicative of the Bill as a whole. Central to the reforms are increasing competition across the NHS and opening it up to providers from the private and voluntary sectors. The Government claim that increasing competition drives down costs and improves quality, but there is evidence from across the world—in the US and Europe—that that is not the case. It does not improve quality at all in health care systems. Although I am glad to see that the Government have reversed their position on price competition, as of yesterday they were still wedded to establishing Monitor as a powerful economic regulator with the duty to promote competition. As has been pointed out, our health services will be subject to EU competition law for the first time. By forcing these GP consortia to put any services out to competitive tender—even if they are working well and patients and the public are happy with them—the Bill encourages ““any willing provider”” to—