HC Deb 12 December 1994 vol 251 cc716-7

Queen's recommendation having been signified—

Motion made, and Question proposed, That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Health Authorities Bill, it is expedient to authorise—

  1. (1) the payment out of money provided by Parliament of—
    1. (a) any expenditure of the Secretary of State under the Act, and—
    2. (b) any increase attributable to the Act in the sums payable out of money so provided under any other Act, and
  2. (2) the payment into the Consolidated Fund of sums received by the Secretary of State by virtue of the Act.—[Mr. Malone.]

10.15 pm
Mr. Rhodri Morgan (Cardiff, West)

I wish to make some points about the credibility of a money resolution to a framework Bill such as this. The Opposition want to know how a Bill—which is essentially of a take-powers kind—which contains almost no specifics about the number of health authorities that it will create, can be absolutely definite about the savings that it will provide. Although the Bill estimates that money will be saved, it fails to show how that saving will be achieved. The Bill contains no details about how it will save £3 million in Wales; it makes no reference to where that money will come from.

The Bill contains categories of alleged savings for both England and Wales, but it does not address the major issues of a sectoral merger between the family health service authorities and district health authorities on the one hand, and geographical mergers on the other. How much money will be saved by each of those entirely separate aspects of the Bill? If the Bill is about savings, why do we have a money resolution?

That brings me to my final point: if there is a money resolution—in other words, the Government have to spend money in order to save it—is the Minister talking about a massive redundancy bill to deal with the existing chief executives of regional health authorities and those for the joint authorities which have been set up already? I hope that the Minister will respond to that point.

When the Minister sets up completely new health authorities, will the present chief executives of joint health purchasing authorities—which have already been set up on a non-statutory basis—be guaranteed their jobs? Their jobs will be remarkably similar to those which have been set up on a non-statutory basis— [Interruption.]

Madam Speaker

Order. Let us have some quiet in the House; an hon. Member is on his feet.

Mr. Morgan

Madam Speaker, I am grateful for your attempts to get a bit of 'ush—as they used to say in ray part of the world.

This is an important point because it affects directly how much the Bill will cost the Government in the short term. Will the Government give the existing chief executives of the joint purchasing authorities any kind of promise that they will retain their job after the Bill is passed, or will they have to reapply for their jobs, as I understand is the case?

Using the powers in the Bill, the Government will appoint a new board and a new chairman of each new merged health authority, and they will be entirely responsible for appointing the new chief executives. If they choose not to reappoint the existing chief executives, there will be a massive redundancy bill. However, if they say, "In the general spirit of things, we will re-appoint the existing chief executives, although now on a statutory basis"—obviously there will be no redundancy bill. Is the calculation in the Bill of the huge cost that is to be spent by the Government to save money based on a redundancy estimate for the present chief executives of the joint purchasing authorities that are already in place, or is there an assumption, or even a promise to those chief executives, that they will keep their jobs?

Mr. Malone

There is no such assumption. The hon. Gentleman can proceed on that basis.

Question put and agreed to.