Health and Social Care Bill

My Lords, I have sat for many hours with my noble friend Lord Owen on this Bill. We both have an appreciation of the health service that came from our parents. My noble friend's father was a medical practitioner while my mother and grandmother spoke of how things were before the National Health Service came into being. I have no desire to do any disservice to the health service. In fact, in the amendments put before this House, I voted contrary to the wishes of the Government. Yet, on this matter, there is a point that information passed between civil servants and their Ministers should be kept confidential. The argument has been put about the Information Commissioner. Is anyone suggesting that the Information Commissioner is doing something wrong? The answer is no. The Information Commissioner works from a piece of legislation that both our Houses gave him. That basically says that if information is in data—in written form—then it should be made public. What will now happen is that when Ministers go to get advice, they will not get written advice. Ministers and other high officers of state are entitled to advice from their civil servants or officials. They get confidential advice. Freedom of information does not cover all information, only written information. No one can force a Minister or any other officeholder to hand over information given orally. That is exactly what will happen now: information will be given orally. That is not helpful to the quality that we look for. When a civil servant or officer puts something down in a document, they give a lot of thought to it. As the noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, said, there are several people behind that document when it is published. It is there for the Minister or officer to look at. On this matter, I cannot support my noble friend Lord Owen. I support the Government. There was a previous debate on this matter. It was stated that the previous Labour Government should give the risk register for, I think, the third runway at Heathrow. Justine Greening was the MP who pushed for that. First, the Government did not hand over that information in a matter of minutes. It took a long time for them to hand it over. Secondly, this was leading up to a general election where parliamentary incumbents around Heathrow and parliamentary candidates in the Labour Party were deeply worried about that risk register. I have been very supportive of my friends in the Labour Party, and they know that. In fact, I have a better voting record with the Labour Party than some of its card-carrying members. However, they should ask themselves when the road to Damascus came about. It did not come about two years ago. Every time I granted an Urgent Question to a Minister or to the House, there was a Minister complaining that they did not want to give information to the House but would rather give it to a television studio. I have had a great deal of criticism—costly criticism—about going to an appeal, so I know about appeals.