The Minister of State, Department of Health (Norman Lamb)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I wish to make a statement about Winterbourne View.
The scandal that unfolded at Winterbourne View was devastating. We were all rightly shocked, angered and dismayed by the appalling abuse uncovered by the “Panorama” programme in May 2011. Straight after the programme was aired, my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Burstow), commissioned an in-depth review to ensure that we learned the lessons and took action. Today, I am publishing the review’s final report.
The abuse at Winterbourne View was criminal. Staff whose job was to care for people instead routinely mistreated and abused them. Management allowed a culture of abuse to flourish. Warning signs were not picked up by health or local authorities, the residents’ families were not listened to, and the concerns raised by a whistleblower went unheeded. The fact that it took a television documentary to raise the alarm speaks volumes.
The abuse that was uncovered at Winterbourne View is only part of the story. This case has made us look again at how we care for one of society’s most vulnerable groups. Winterbourne View hospital provided care for people with either learning disabilities or autism, together with either mental health problems or challenging behaviour. Around the country, at any one time, there are about 15,000 people with similar needs, about 7,000 of whom live with their families. Of the remainder, many live in the community, but about 3,400 are in in-patient settings. Their behaviour can sometimes pose a risk to themselves, and sometimes also to others. There will therefore be times when they require intensive treatment and support.
However, hospitals are not where people should live. There are far too many people with learning disabilities or autism in hospital, and they are staying there for too long—sometimes for years. We should no more tolerate people being placed in inappropriate care settings than we would people receiving the wrong cancer treatment. What is necessary is nothing short of a fundamental change of culture.
We have known for more than a decade that, with the right support, the vast majority of such people can live happy, fulfilled lives, close to their families and in their own communities. I saw that at Tower Hamlets just this morning. Much of what we know works in this area is based on the pioneering work of Professor Jim Mansell. Professor Mansell helped to set up our review and supported us right up until his death in January this year. I pay tribute to him for his tireless work in this area and for the huge contribution that he has made to improving people’s lives.
We know what change is needed; it is now time to ensure that it happens. Today, we are setting out how we will address poor care and abuse, and ensure that excellent care becomes the norm. First, we need to send a clear message to those who provide care. Owners, boards of directors and senior managers must take responsibility for the quality and safety of their services. When they fail, they should feel the repercussions.
A number of front-line staff at Winterbourne View rightly received criminal convictions, but the case revealed weaknesses in our ability to hold to account those who are higher up. We will address that. We will examine how corporate bodies and their boards of directors can be held to account under law for the provision of poor care and for any harm that is experienced by people using their services. We will also explore whether we can ensure that directors are “fit and proper persons” to oversee care, including through consideration of their record with other providers.
We will also tighten regulation. The Care Quality Commission will include reference to the best model of care in its revised guidance about compliance, and will consider it as part of the regulation and inspection of services from April next year. The CQC will also check whether all providers are following the established national guidance or similar good practice, including by carrying out unannounced inspections involving people with learning disabilities or autism and their families. Where standards are not met, it will take enforcement action.
Secondly, we will tackle the wider failings. We must stop people being placed in hospital inappropriately and ensure that services are commissioned which properly meet people’s needs. That requires the NHS and local government to work together.
All current hospital placements will be reviewed by 1 June 2013, and everyone who is there inappropriately will be moved to community-based support as quickly as possible and no later than June 2014. We will also ensure that in future health and care commissioners design services that allow people to live safely with support in their communities, with the individual and their family included in the development of their care plan. By April 2014, every area will have developed an agreed plan to ensure that that group receives high-quality care. As a result, we expect to see a dramatic reduction in hospital placements.
The report sets out specific actions that we will take to support that high-quality care, including tackling the excessive use of physical restraint, addressing concerns about the over-use of antipsychotic and antidepressant medication, and improving safeguarding arrangements. We will support a positive and open culture in which staff provide excellent care but feel able speak out when care is poor. We will support providers to achieve that, including in relation to staff training.
Creating a positive culture means listening to and involving people and their families. At Winterbourne View, families’ concerns were ignored. However, we must go further than heeding warnings or complaints and ensure that people and their families are involved at every stage of their care, and that they get the support they need, including advocacy support. We will make these changes as quickly as possible.
The organisations responsible for delivering change share our commitment to making it happen and are working nationally and locally across health and social care. A concordat signed by more than 50 organisations sets out the specific actions that each organisation commits to deliver. The NHS Commissioning Board and Local Government Association will come together to lead a joint improvement programme, with financial support from the Department of Health, to ensure delivery of the changes. I will chair a programme board to oversee that progress is made.
Winterbourne View fills us all with sorrow and anger but we are using it as a spur to make things better. Some places are already getting things right—I have seen some of them for myself, including at Tower Hamlets this morning, and the report discusses many more. They show what can, and should, be done for all, and that a better life for people with learning disabilities and autism is possible. I regard it as a national imperative that we transform care for those with learning disabilities or autism and behaviour that challenges, and I commend this report to the House.
Liz Kendall (Leicester West) (Lab)
I would like genuinely to thank the Minister for advance sight of his statement and the briefing I received earlier today. Members on both sides of the House were appalled and angered by the terrible incidents at Winterbourne View, and we share a determination to ensure that all necessary steps are taken to prevent a similar tragedy from happening again. Our goal must be to ensure that everyone with a learning disability or autism, including those with challenging behaviours, receives high-quality, decent and humane care and support, and that we finally end the practice of sending people to long-stay institutions, far away from their family and friends.
The Minister has announced a number of welcome measures that are a step in the right direction, but I remain concerned that some of the proposals are not clear or strong enough to guarantee the fundamental changes that people with learning disabilities urgently need. The NHS mandate published two weeks ago states there should be
“a substantial reduction in reliance on inpatient care.”
Can the Minister give a figure for that reduction? Without one, that laudable aim will be open to such wide interpretation that it risks appearing meaningless. Similarly, the Government say they want every local area to provide “appropriate” care and support. Will the Minister tell the House who will define what care is “appropriate” and how that will be measured?
How will the Minister ensure that all local commissioners have the necessary skills to make these changes? That was a problem with 150 primary care trusts, yet in future there will be 212 clinical commissioning groups. Those can, of course, draw on expertise in local councils, but the authorisation process for CCGs does not even mention learning disabilities as an area in which competence is required. If this is such an urgent national imperative for the Government, will the Minister explain why that is the case?
Some parts of the country continue to use long-stay institutions because they have not developed alternative care in the community and at home. In a time of constrained resources, when we need to make the best use of taxpayers’ money, there should be one budget for people with learning disabilities, not separate budgets for NHS and council care. Will the Minister explain how he will make that happen on the ground? For example, will he require the NHS Commissioning Board to instruct CCGs to provide funding to local councils if they are slow to do so or if they refuse?
The serious case review of Winterbourne View said that light-touch regulation by the Care Quality Commission was not appropriate for closed establishments, and that they should be treated as high-risk institutions, requiring frequent, unannounced probing investigations. The review says that the investigations should involve speaking to residents’ families and patients, and in particular to people who have left the institution, who may feel more able to speak out. The CQC recently completed a focused programme of inspections of long-stay institutions. Will that specific programme continue along the lines the serious case review recommends? Will the Government, in their review of the use of restraint, consider banning t-supine restraint, as the serious case review recommends?
One of the most disgraceful aspects of Winterbourne View is that vulnerable people were neglected and criminally abused while the hospital’s owners, Castlebeck, charged huge fees and made huge profits. The serious case review says that Castlebeck made decisions about profitability, including shareholder returns, over and above decisions on the effective and humane delivery of treatment. The average weekly fee for residents at Winterbourne View was £3,500—the fee rose to £10,000 for one patient. The review could not determine how much of that money went back into the hospital and how much was creamed off for profit because of the company’s complex financial structure—Castlebeck is owned by private investors based in Jersey and Geneva. That has made it virtually impossible to hold the company to account. Will the Minister confirm that the company has so far failed to meet two of the serious case review’s key recommendations —that it should fund therapeutic services for all ex-Winterbourne View patients, and that it should pay for the costs of the serious case review, which have so far been borne entirely by the taxpayer?
I welcome the Government’s commitment to examining how corporate bodies and their boards of directors can be better held to account. As a first step, will the Minister consider requiring private companies to publish the names of their owners, the members of their boards, and the details of their financial structures, before they can be licensed and registered to provide publicly funded care? The excuse that such information is too commercially sensitive should not be acceptable when the care of vulnerable people is at stake, and when it is paid for using substantial amounts of taxpayers’ money.
How we care for the most vulnerable people is the hallmark of a decent society. I do not doubt the Government’s commitment to addressing this issue. I hope they listen to our concerns and strengthen their proposals, so that people with learning disabilities get the decent and humane care and support we would all wish for our families and friends.
Norman Lamb
I thank the shadow Minister for her contribution and appreciate the welcome she gives for the main thrust of the Government’s response. This is a moment when everybody must come together to be clear that a change of culture is necessary from top to bottom. This is not a party political issue. The culture must change, and everyone within the system—from top to bottom—must recognise their personal responsibility to achieve that.
The shadow Minister raised a point about the mandate. One very good thing about the mandate is that it gives us accountability and transparency in the system for the future, and enables us to hold the NHS Commissioning Board and other parts of the system to account on delivering what is in it.
The hon. Lady asked how we will measure success in relation to the reduction in numbers in long-stay institutions. There must be a focus on assessing an individual’s personal care needs—that is what counts. The arbitrary setting of a target on numbers would be completely inappropriate when we should be focusing on the needs of individuals. The guidance we have received is that while there are 3,400 people in in-patient facilities of one sort or another, we are talking about probably reducing that down to 300 or 400 people. That is the best assessment that has been made, but I stress again that it must be based on assessment of individual needs.
The hon. Lady rightly makes the point about the skills of commissioners. One of the big failures has been that of commissioners properly to look after the interests of highly vulnerable people. The programme, which will be led by the Local Government Association and the NHS Commissioning Board and funded by the Department with between £2 million and £5 million of support, will be there to provide support and guidance to ensure that local commissioners get this right. We should applaud the parts of the country where this is being done brilliantly at the moment. They can demonstrate best practice to areas that need to change.
The hon. Lady asked whether the Commissioning Board will hold CCGs to account. The answer is, absolutely. This is part of the transparency of the new system and they must deliver on what they will be required to do.
I agree with what the hon. Lady said about the budget. The report makes it clear that the starting point should be that pooled budgets are the appropriate way forward. This is patchy at the moment. If there are not pooled budgets, they should explain why. In my view, there is no good justification for not pooling the resources of the NHS and social care to ensure the best and most appropriate care for individuals. There is also a duty for the two sides—social care and NHS—to work together. The health and wellbeing boards help to bring them together, and that is valuable.
The hon. Lady asked about Care Quality Commission inspections. Unannounced visits will continue, and they will include people with learning disabilities and their families, so that their perspective is gained. This is not a time-limited programme—it will continue. I think that the CQC recognises that this is an area that requires focus because of the vulnerability of the individuals concerned.
On physical restraint, we will look at all elements, including those mentioned by the hon. Lady, so that the best possible guidance is given to ensure that the excessive use of restraint, which currently happens in too many places, comes to an end.
On Castlebeck, I absolutely agree that it should consider financial support for the costs incurred following the scandals uncovered in its care settings. The hon. Lady rightly points out the responsibility that goes with charging an average of £3,500 per week per patient. One of the great failures of the current system is that there is not sufficient corporate accountability to ensure that people are held to account when things go wrong. When we consider proposals to address that lack of corporate accountability, we will look at the hon. Lady’s transparency proposal on publishing a lot more information about financial structures. Indeed, in the consultation we announced a fortnight ago on the follow-up to Southern Cross, we are proposing that there should be transparency regarding financial structures and that that information is shared to ensure that we avoid being caught by surprise, which is what happened under the system in operation when Southern Cross crashed, leaving many people in an unacceptable state of anxiety.
Jack Lopresti (Filton and Bradley Stoke) (Con)
May we have an assurance, first, that local agencies, such as the police and local government, have to take a large chunk of responsibility for this situation occurring in the first place and, secondly, that there will never be a repeat of the situation where the local council can fail to pick up on up to 40 alerts over several years? That could have avoided much of the pain and suffering at Winterbourne View.
Norman Lamb
I agree absolutely. One of the great scandals of this whole saga has been the extent to which local authorities and primary care trusts let people down. The father of a patient at Winterbourne View told me how the concerns he raised were ignored, how he watched as his son became more zombie-like because of the use of antipsychotic drugs and how he felt guilty himself—how shocking that a parent ends up feeling guilty through no fault of his own. He was powerless to do anything. It is shocking that public authorities let people down in that way. That is why I say that everyone in the system has to step up to the plate and recognise the need for a complete change of culture to recognise that everyone with learning disabilities has exactly the same rights as the rest of us.
Grahame M. Morris (Easington) (Lab)
I thank the Minister for his statement and hope that he will reflect on some of the questions posed by my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester West (Liz Kendall), who made a powerful case for private providers being subject to freedom of information requests—I draw his attention to early-day motion 773, which embodies that principle.
On the failings that brought about this terrible tragedy, the Care Quality Commission was overly concentrating on process rather than its main job of ensuring that the required standards were met and looking at quality and risk profiles. There was a big disconnect between the perceptions of carers and families and the views of the CQC. Fundamentally, unless we address the lack of resources, will we not see a series of these disasters in the future?
Norman Lamb
In the aftermath of Southern Cross, we have seen the need for much greater transparency in these large corporate bodies to ensure that we know exactly what their financial structures are like and where the risk exists. The hon. Gentleman mentioned funding. The great scandal is that we are spending vast sums of public money putting people at risk and into inappropriate care settings. Visiting places such as Tower Hamlets, we discover that the right care package for individuals—most often, supported living in their own community—is much cheaper and gives them a quality of life they never experienced in these institutions. This is not about money, therefore, but about the system stepping up to the plate and ensuring that individuals are respected in their own right.
Paul Burstow (Sutton and Cheam) (LD)
The Minister is absolutely right that transparency is essential, but there is also a recognition—I think—that that is not sufficient; accountability is essential as well. In this case, the company, Castlebeck, has hidden in the shadows and left everyone else to take the blame. I welcome what he has said about corporate responsibility, therefore, but I urge him—and commend to him—to make a much closer examination of the corporate legal framework to ensure that there is a corporate legal offence. It is not good enough for the thugs who did this to be in the dock and receive a criminal conviction; the company itself has a criminal responsibility, and it should be held to that standard and brought to court as well.
Norman Lamb
I commend my right hon. Friend for the work he did on this subject. When I started this job, it struck me that there was an absence of effective corporate accountability in the law and that that had to be addressed. I was determined to ensure that the Government response addressed that issue head on. In doing that, we need to look both at the regulatory framework—issues such as whether there could be a fit-and-proper persons test for those on the boards of companies—and at the criminal law. It is striking that in the Winterbourne View case the authorities determined that it was not possible, under existing law, to bring prosecutions. I am absolutely clear, however, that responsibility rests at the top of the company for facilitating this sort of outrage. That is why the law needs to change. We need to look both at criminal offences and the regulatory framework.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
May I press the Minister on one aspect? Will he look much more closely at the role of the third sector, particularly charities, in providing services? Hollybank school and community in Mirfield in west Yorkshire, close to my constituency, does a brilliant job. Does he recognise that, in considering the report, it is the quality of management that one worries about and the fact that the most vulnerable people in our society are so often looked after by poorly trained people on the minimum wage working 12-hour shifts? That is often at the heart of the problem.
Norman Lamb
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that question and completely agree that we have to address the issue of skills. It is worth pointing out that there are some fantastic providers in the voluntary sector, and in the private sector as well. We should applaud that and recognise that there are many well trained people on low wages providing a fantastic quality of care, but there are also places where that is not the case. That needs to be addressed.
I absolutely agree with the hon. Gentleman that we should look closely at the voluntary or not-for-profit sector. I had a meeting recently with the head of Shared Lives, an organisation that places people with learning disabilities into people’s homes. Surprise, surprise—when people are treated with dignity and treated as human beings, their behaviour improves and sometimes all the complex problems subside. There is an awful lot we can do. In the new year I will bring together the providers of the best care available so that we can learn the lessons from them.
Sir Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con)
As patients had come from different parts of the country to Winterbourne, there was a sense that they had got lost in that locality. Whatever happens, it is a tragedy that it took a television programme to discover all this. We are now going to have health and wellbeing boards and HealthWatch. Can my hon. Friend tell the House how, between them, they can ensure that they inspect and have a grip to ensure that something like this never happens in my county of Oxfordshire? It has never happened there because the structures of local government and health and social services are constantly monitoring and inspecting whatever is happening in our areas, irrespective of whether they are delivering health or social care.
Norman Lamb
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. He is absolutely right. The new structure provides far greater local accountability than we have ever had. One of my great criticisms of the old primary care trusts is that they are, in effect, completely unaccountable to their local communities. Health and wellbeing boards scrutinising what clinical commissioning groups and the local authority are doing can be very powerful. He also mentioned HealthWatch. Like its predecessor organisations, the local involvement networks or LINks, it will have the power to go into all care and health settings and inspect what is going on, often behind closed doors. We encourage HealthWatch to use those powers to shine a light on what is happening in some of those places.
Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)
The Minister has rightly referred to the amount of money paid for patients in Winterbourne View, but does he also recognise that good-quality care in a community is also expensive and requires a lot of highly trained staff? Given the cuts to local authority budgets, is he convinced that sufficient resources are available, even if budgets are pooled? When he knows how many patients need to be transferred back into the community, will he commit to come to the House to make a statement on whether the right resources are available?
Norman Lamb
I thank the hon. Lady for that question. What was striking when I visited Tower Hamlets this morning and talked to the leaders on the health and local authority sides was that, despite being the third most deprived borough in the country, Tower Hamlets is one of the lower spenders on institutional care because it is doing things the right way. Tower Hamlets has not referred a single person from the borough to an assessment and treatment centre for three whole years. Tower Hamlets has demonstrated not only that that is possible, but that it often ends up costing much less to provide the right care in the community—[Interruption.] Well, that is what the borough leaders find. That is what I have been told by them and by many other people in the sector. An individual should have the care that they need, and if the cost of that package in the community is substantial, it should be met. We should never compromise on that. All I am saying is that the overall cost of providing the right kind of care in the community often looks lower, when compared with those institutions in which the cost is extraordinarily high—as much as £3,500 per week per patient.
Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)
The Minister mentioned unannounced inspections. Will they involve speaking at random to patients at the centres? Linked to that point, some hospitals around the country have a whistleblower policy that allows people who work in them and others to take their concerns to senior officials in confidence.
Norman Lamb
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. I am quite sure that those inspections will involve talking to the people in those settings. The fact that the Care Quality Commission is saying that it will involve people with learning disabilities and their families in those inspections will help to ensure that they have a human face. My hon. Friend also mentioned whistleblowing. It is essential that individuals feel able to blow the whistle when they see examples of abuse or neglect. Indeed, the Government have funded a helpline for any whistleblower in either the health or the care setting to ensure that people can always get access to guidance on how to go through the proper process of blowing the whistle on unacceptable standards of care.
John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab)
I welcome many of the steps that the Minister has announced today in response to the shameful scandal at Winterbourne View. He says that he wants those who are high up in the organisations to be held to account. Does he therefore accept the argument put forward by my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester West (Liz Kendall) that now is the time to regulate for the best business standards, as well as for the best care standards? He also says that he wants to use regulation to secure higher and tighter standards. Will he ensure that, in putting those standards in place, any regulation of physical restraint deals not only with the excessive use of such restraint but with the appropriate use of the best techniques and with the best training?
Norman Lamb
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his welcome for the broad thrust of my proposals, and for his questions. On standards of business in the sector, it strikes me that the levels of corporate accountability seem to be significantly lower in this sector than in many others. How bizarre is that, in a sector in which the protection of individuals is absolutely vital? In our response to Southern Cross and to this case, we will require owners to adopt a much more transparent approach and to disclose details of their financing arrangements. We are introducing that level of engagement and transparency as well as addressing the need for accountability. The right hon. Gentleman also asked about restraint, and we will certainly look at the appropriate methods of restraint. It should really be used only for the protection and safety of an individual or of others. It should not be used for chastisement or punishment, as appears to have been the case in some locations. That is completely unacceptable.
John Pugh (Southport) (LD)
One of the big problems is the fact that many local authorities house vulnerable people at a considerable distance from their families. What element of the proposals will constrain that unfortunate practice?
Norman Lamb
I thank my hon. Friend for that question. He is absolutely right that one thing uncovered, both at Winterbourne View and in the Care Quality Commission survey of similar institutions, was that people were sometimes placed hundreds of miles away from their families. That still continues; that is what we have to address. My hon. Friend asks about what in the proposals will address that and ensure that it does not happen. Every part of the system is signed up through the concordat to changing what has been an unacceptable practice. People will be held to account. I said in my statement that I will chair a programme board throughout this period of change, and we will publish regular updates so we can, in a sense, hold to account every primary care trust or clinical commissioning group and every local authority that fails to change in the way expected.
Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)
I welcome the Minister’s pledge—made twice during his statement—that the Government will go ahead with a review of those “inappropriately placed” and to make it available by 2014. Will there be any element of advocacy during the review, including that endorsed under the Disabled Persons (Services, Consultation and Representation) Act 1986? Finally, do the Government think it possible—if not by this means, by other means—to consider the fairly large number of people inappropriately placed in prison?
Norman Lamb
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his important questions. First, we want to ensure that advocacy is available to help those families and individuals, ensuring that they are placed in appropriate settings and away from these long-stay institutions that we all find completely unacceptable. I very much agree with him on that, and I find myself in agreement with him again on prisons. We shall come forward next year with some clearer proposals on approaches to diversion—assessing someone’s needs before they end up in prison, diverting them, if at all possible, to much more appropriate settings.
Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)
I was not sure I heard the Minister correctly when he said that the average fee was £3,500 a week, which is £182,000 a year. Is it not possible to pay some of the caring staff slightly more and demand not only the highest level of skills, but the highest level of compassion for that level of fee from the state?
Norman Lamb
I thank my hon. Friend for that question. He is absolutely right that an extraordinarily high sum was being paid to put people at risk of abuse —and to be abused, as it turned out in Winterbourne View. Pay rates are not ultimately the responsibility of Government, but one would hope that responsible organisations look to train their staff to a high standard—that is absolutely a prerequisite and they will be held to account by the Care Quality Commission for proper training—and, wherever possible, to provide better pay rates so as to ensure that people are rewarded for the incredibly important work in our care sector.
Mrs Anne McGuire (Stirling) (Lab)
Before I became an MP, I worked with parents of learning disabled adults to establish supported community care homes, as those parents would have done anything rather than allow their adult children to go into institutional care. I welcome the Minister’s comments today. There is an emphasis on process, which is important, but does he agree that there is a challenge in the wider cultural sense? As long as we do not give those with learning disabilities the respect to which they are entitled as equal members of society, we almost create an environment in which people think they can with impunity do the sort of things they did in Winterbourne. Will the Minister work with the Minister for Disabled People, the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the hon. Member for Wirral West (Esther McVey) and look at how we can challenge those attitudes, which are sadly still around in the 21st century?
Norman Lamb
I thank the right hon. Lady for that. She is absolutely right in what she says about institutional care. I keep mentioning Tower Hamlets, as it was rather inspirational to visit and see how things are done there. I was told that Tower Hamlets has one of the lowest rates of children going into care because of the support for families that it provides, preventing that from ever being necessary.
As for the right hon. Lady’s second point, she is absolutely right: this is moment that demands a change of culture, not just in the health and care system but in society as a whole. There must be a change in all our attitudes. We will make progress only if we understand the fundamental point that someone with learning disabilities has exactly the same rights as anyone else, and should be treated with dignity and respect.
Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire) (Con)
We are for ever reading in reports such as this about poor behaviour in social care. In the last year or so, we have had Southern Cross and then Winterbourne View, which is probably the most shocking example of all. We greatly welcome the measures that the Minister has announced, but can he tell us what arrangements exist to enable us to share the knowledge that we have gained and the lessons that we are learning with the Welsh Government? I am sure that there are very good examples that we can pass over Offa’s Dyke, and that Wales has very good examples from which we can learn.
Norman Lamb
I know that some people from Wales were placed in Winterbourne View. This issue is important and relevant to Wales, Scotland, England and Northern Ireland. I would encourage officials of the devolved Administrations and the United Kingdom Government to liaise closely in order to ensure that the lessons that we are learning here can be applied elsewhere, and that good lessons from Wales and elsewhere can be learned in England.
Mr George Mudie (Leeds East) (Lab)
The Minister is a very humane man, and I entirely accept the fine things that are in the report. However, we are ultimately responsible for the proper treatment of vulnerable people, both in hospitals and in care homes, and fine words go only halfway. We have seen people in that sector take advantage of and abuse vulnerable people who cannot speak or fight back.
One of the key points raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester West (Liz Kendall) concerned unannounced inspections, which the Minister seemed to suggest were a matter for local authorities or other public bodies. Can he tell us whether real resources will be put into that part of the operation? Whatever has been signed up to, vulnerable people have been treated so badly that we should be ashamed. If we do not provide resources that will enable us to know that someone independent has the power to enter premises at any time or on any day and inspect the treatment of vulnerable people who are in our care, we cannot be taking this issue seriously.
Norman Lamb
Let me respond first to the hon. Gentleman’s observation about fine words by saying that this is just the starting point. It does not do the job; it merely sets out the scale of the ambition that is necessary to address a national scandal. It is good that all parts of the system are signed up to it, because that gives it a better chance of success. I will chair a national programme board that will keep a close watch on what goes on and hold every part of the system to account.
The hon. Gentleman spoke of the horrors of what goes on in some care homes and in hospitals, but we must remember the horror of family members who went to local authorities or the NHS to complain and were ignored. That, in a way, is just as scandalous, and it must be addressed.
I have talked to the chief executive of the Care Quality Commission, David Bearn, who has confirmed that he has enough resources to maintain a programme of unannounced inspections. They will continue; they must continue, and they must include people with learning disabilities and their families. I mentioned the role of HealthWatch earlier. In every local area, its representatives will have the power to go into these places to see for themselves what is going on behind closed doors. That too will introduce a new accountability.
The final point I would make is that we are developing the idea of online quality indicators for every care and health setting, with user reviews so that individuals who have been in those care settings and their families can give their views. That scale of transparency can be transformational in driving up standards.