My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, for tabling these amendments to Clause 5 and for her characteristically clear introduction. As noble Lords may remember from Second Reading, I, too have concerns about Clause 5 in my role as chair of the Professional Standards Authority. I said then that there had been a misunderstanding of the role of the authority and that I was afraid that the Bill would make our objectives unclear and narrow the scope of our work. I was also concerned lest the Bill would in any way make it less clear that the primary and overarching role of the Professional Standards Authority is public protection. The Minister said then that his officials were happy to continue discussions, and I am pleased to say that there have been helpful conversations and meetings with the noble Lord promoting the Bill, the Minister and his officials. I am grateful for the care and attention that have been given to our concerns.
None the less, I take the opportunity that the noble Baroness’s amendment gives me to ask the Minister again to clarify that the Professional Standards Authority will never be required to prioritise the objective of promoting public confidence in the professions over its primary purpose of protecting and promoting the health, safety and well-being of patients, service users and other members of the public. In other words, could there ever be circumstances in which public confidence might conflict with public health, safety and well-being? Such circumstances might be where the authority identified a poorly performing regulator. If the Minister could give me this clarification, it would help the authority address any arguments that might in future be raised that it should conceal a regulator’s poor performance or otherwise prioritise the objective in new paragraph (b) over that in new paragraph (a).
The confusion about the hierarchy between the objectives in new paragraphs (a) and (b) may have arisen because of the conflation of the PSA’s role with that of the regulators which it oversees. It may have arisen also because Clause 5 does not follow the Law Commission’s recommendation, which proposed a clear main objective for the authority followed by two general objectives. Although the Minister has acknowledged the role of the authority as an overseer of the regulators, it would be helpful if he could provide an assurance that under Clause 5 the main and primary aim and
focus of the authority will continue to be to promote the health, safety and well-being of patients, service users and other members of the public.