My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Cumberlege. She posed a very tough question to the Minister. I could not help reflecting on her report and the issues around surgical mesh, where we clearly had a situation where for some women the surgical mesh operation was successful and seemed to be effective, but for others it had devastating consequences.
The question of a threshold is surely very important. I doubt very much that the medical device regulation we have is up to dealing with it. It would be good to know from the Minister how the Government will take forward discussions in this area, which of course involves ethical as much as safety considerations. Generally, though, I very much welcome the government amendments. I think that my noble friend’s amendments add to the debate.
I have always wanted the UK to be safe in terms of medicine and medical devices and outcomes, but I also want this country to be attractive to pharmaceutical and medical device companies to research, develop and launch their products in the UK. The UK’s record in the current crisis, in the development of both vaccines and treatments, is second to none. I hope that it will be a huge boost to our future attractiveness. But as I have raised on a number of occasions, one of the big problems we have in this country is the general slowness of the NHS to adopt new medicines and new treatments. If we really are to be attractive and have a favourable climate, we have to get around that. We have to be seen, particularly post Brexit, as not only a place that has fantastic scientists and clinicians, and a very good science base—in fact, a brilliant one—but where the NHS is itself innovative, forward thinking and keen to use new medicines and treatments. That is a huge challenge. It would be good to hear the Minister respond and spell out how he thinks we can make this country safe, but attractive too.