National Health Service (Procurement, Patient Choice and Competition) (No. 2) Regulations 2013 (SI 2013/500)
To revoke the original Regulations, the substitute Regulations have to come into effect no later than 1 April. The compressed timetable inhibited the Committee’s normal scrutiny process and, to enable the Committee to report before the House rises for the Easter recess, we conducted a short targeted consultation addressed to the organisations which made submissions to us about the original Regulations. In addition, we received a number of unsolicited submissions from individuals. In spite of the very short deadline, we have received some constructive and thoughtful comments on the substitute Regulations for which we are grateful. They are published in full on the Committee website and quoted selectively below.We regret that some were unable to contribute because the timescale prevented them giving a considered view of some highly technical changes to the legislation. As we have made clear before, not least in our report on the Government’s new approach to consultation, the Committee has no doubt that policy-making is improved by effective and genuine consultation, and we are firmly of the view that the Department has allowed insufficient time to set this system up properly and enable thorough scrutiny. This instrument is drawn to the special attention of the House on the ground that it may imperfectly achieve its policy objective.
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As a general point, it seems to us that implementation of the policy underlying the Regulations has been left too close to the intended implementation date. The original Regulations were laid on 13 February, only seven and a half weeks before coming into operation and allowing little time for familiarisation and training staff, particularly when so many other changes are happening simultaneously. We are assured that the regulator, Monitor, which will be overseeing the operation of this legislation, intends to put its guidance out for consultation in March, but, at the time DH
responded to our questions on 14 March, that had not happened. The Monitor guidance may resolve or aggravate the doubts expressed but neither the Committee nor the health sector had access to the proposed guidance when considering the proposed legislation. We do not regard this as good practice.
Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee
