I entirely agree. There were moves towards that when the Healthcare Commission, which was responsible at that stage and manifestly failed in the
case of Mid Staffordshire, was replaced by the Care Quality Commission—an understanding by the previous Government that progress needed to be made in ensuring the quality and safety of care. That progress has been maintained and accelerated under the present Government.
I was referring to the 2013-14 report. One of my hon. Friend’s new clauses specifically provides that safety should be a part of such reports. Indeed, the report goes into detail over the way in which the CQC has inspected for safety. On page 12, for instance, it gives an example of a wide variation in the ratings on safety and four other measures—effective, caring, responsive and well led—for each department in a particular hospital. The ratings for safety range from inadequate to good, which shows that even within a trust or a hospital, there is a wide range of safety performance. The CQC is therefore already fulfilling what my hon. Friend is seeking in these two new clauses.
Of course, the same might be argued for clause 1 itself: why is it necessary when the CQC is now implementing the Secretary of State’s requirement to ensure that providers “cause no avoidable harm”? The reason is that, without clause 1, a Secretary of State would not have that obligation. While I cannot imagine a Secretary of State who would not consider safety and “no avoidable harm” as top priorities, experience and indeed the CQC’s own report from which I have quoted show that some of the organisations for which the CQC has the responsibility for regulation have not, and might still not, take safety seriously enough.