NHS Risk Register

David Rutley Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Andrew George]

I agree with the right hon. Gentleman and I have signed the early-day motion supporting the release of the register. The biggest ever reorganisation of the NHS is being undertaken and it is best not to do that in the dark. It is best to have as much information available as possible. I am not suggesting that we are completely in the dark—[Interruption.] I am just saying that it is best to cast as much light as possible upon the information, so that we can have an informed debate, rather than a semi-informed one. He makes a good point about that.

I guess that publication will eventually result from this process, and I do not think it will help the Secretary of State or the Government if it is dragged out rather than conceded. If and when that happens, the Opposition and people who oppose the Bill will inevitably highlight worst-case scenarios and throw them at the Government, and the Government will inevitably look at the best-case scenarios. The nature of political debate will not be improved by this process, but I hope that debate will be better informed.

Much of the debate throughout the course of the Bill’s progress, a process in which I have been involved through the Select Committee and elsewhere, has been about trying to anticipate the effects of the reforms. It would be far better to try to anticipate these things on the basis of the best information given by people who are inside the service and providing that advice. That is why I believe the risk register should be published. The impact assessment perhaps represents the selected highlights of that process. [Interruption.] The Secretary of State may intervene on me, if he wishes to do so.

The underlying core concern—this is in the nature of how we examine these issues—is about whether publishing the risk register will negatively affect the technical delivery of Government policy and services or whether it will affect the political prospects of a party or those in government. The nature of this debate means that we assume that if publication is being resisted, it will have political rather than technical consequences. Obviously, if we thought that the risk register’s publication would have technical consequences for the effective delivery of government—that is the primary point that the Secretary of State is advancing—we would clearly need to think carefully about the release of such information.

[David Rutley (Macclesfield) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman remind the House of the criteria the former Secretary of State used when he rejected publishing the register in 2009?

[Andrew George]

I am grateful for that intervention, because it plays into my next point, which is on my general concern about the nature of Opposition day debates. It is not that I think that Opposition parties should not have the opportunity to debate issues, but such debates tend to over-dramatise the political tribalism of this House. It is in the nature of government that when in government people tend to have to face up to and take unpopular decisions, whereas in opposition they tend to avoid them. Equally, on this issue, those in opposition tend to say that they would be more open, because they look at the matter from a different perspective and take the view that they would have more open government. When people come into government, they tend to err on the side of seeing good technical reasons for why they cannot engage in the process of open government.