Health and Social Care Update

Lord Singh of Wimbledon Excerpts

Monday 22nd March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, I hear my noble friend’s message loud and clear and he has made the case both persuasively and thoughtfully. He is a little ahead of events. It is not possible for us to put in any form of certification or mandation until the vaccine has been offered to absolutely everyone in the country. However, he will know that the Cabinet Office has a review process in place that is looking at exactly the dilemma he has spoken to.

[Lord Singh of Wimbledon (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I congratulate the Government on the success of their vaccination programme. We should also applaud the way that the NHS has responded to the pandemic in reorganising priorities and efficiently facilitating the vaccine rollout. Does the Minister agree that the controversially privatised NHS Supply Chain has done less well in the provision of PPE and that the Government’s track and trace programme has also been found wanting? According to the National Audit Office, some of its consultants have been paid thousands of pounds a day for sitting at home with very little work.

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for his tribute to the NHS, both the front-line staff and those who have organised the vaccine rollout. He is right to say that this has been a huge national achievement. However, I do not accept the characterisation he has made of other aspects of our pandemic response, including the provision of PPE, which, by the way, involved a huge global competition for extremely rare materials and led to a massive increase in domestic production. I also do not agree with his characterisation of the test and trace programme, which has developed into becoming one of the largest testing programmes in the world. It is now extremely effective, with tracing completion rates above 90%.