HL Deb 04 March 1952 vol 175 cc466-74

Constitution, etc., of Council

2.—(1) The General Dental Council shall consist of sixteen members together with one further member for each authority which is for the time being a dental authority.

The Ancillary Dental Workers Committee

14.—(1) The Ancillary Dental Workers Committee shall consist of the President and eight other members of the Council and six persons who are not members of the Council.

5.0 p.m.

LORD STAMP moved to add to Paragraph 2 (1): save that for the University of London there shall be two further members The noble Lord said: I beg to move the Amendment standing in my name. I am doing so at the request of the authorities of the University of London, and with the approval of the Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals. They feel that, in view of the fact that London University has far greater responsibilities than any other dental authority in the field of dental education and examinations, it is entitled to greater representation than the others. It has five separate dental schools and trains over 1,000 students—over one-third of the total for the country—compared with the next largest authority, Dublin, which trains about 350 students, and with the smaller authorities which train only about 80 students. While, of course, it is not suggested that membership should be on a proportionate representation basis, the claim of London University for special consideration in the form of one additional representative on the General Dental Council seems to me to be most reasonable. The resultant alteration in the ratio of elected to nominated full Council members—that is, from 9 to 23 on the one hand, to 9 to 24 on the other—and the increase of the total membership that would result, seems to me to be quite trivial, and I cannot imagine any dissatisfaction being expressed by any of the other interested parties on that account. I beg to move.

Amendment moved— Page 22, line 11, after ("authority") insert the said words.—(Lord Stamp.)

THE EARL OF ONSLOW

I should say to the noble Lord straight away that I have great pleasure in accepting his Amendment. The Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals have discussed it with us, and they do not appear to be jealous on behalf of the other bodies. We feel that it is a very proper Amendment, and we are very grateful to the noble Lord for bringing the matter to our attention.

LORD STAMP

I am greatly obliged to Her Majesty's Government for meeting the wishes of London University in this matter.

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

LORD WOOLTON

This Amendment is designed to cure what we recognise to be a defect in the Bill. The Bill provides that the members of the Council to be elected every five years shall take office on a day corresponding to the day on which the Council is established in the present year. That date may, in fact, turn out to be very inconvenient for the purpose of the election, and the Amendment therefore enables the Council itself to fix a convenient date for the purpose of holding its elections. I beg to move.

Amendment moved— Page 22, leave out lines 36 to 44 and insert— 3.—(1) Elections to fill all the elected members' seats shall be held before the establishment of the General Dental Council so as to enable the persons elected to assume membership on its establishment, and at the expiration of five years from such date in the year nineteen hundred and fifty-two as the Council may fix, and at the expiration of each succeeding period of five years, all the persons who are then elected members of the Council shall retire together; and elections shall be held accordingly before the end of each of the said periods."—(Lord Woolton.)

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

LORD WOOLTON

This is consequential. I beg to move.

Amendment moved— Page 23, leave out lines 18 to 26 and insert— 4.—(1) Nominations to fill nominated members' seats shall be made before the establishment of the General Dental Council in time to enable the persons nominated to assume membership on its establishment, and at the expiration of three years from such date in the year nineteen hundred and fifty-two as the Council may fix, and at the expiration of each succeeding period of five years, all the persons who are then nominated members of the Council shall retire together; and nominations shall be made accordingly before the end of the three-year period and of each five-year period."—(Lord Woolton.)

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

LORD MILNE moved to add to Paragraph 9: (4) A person shall not be qualified for appointment as auditor of the accounts of the Council unless he is a member or in the case of a firm all the partners are members of one or more of the following bodies:—

The noble Lord said: This Amendment should stand in the name of myself and my noble friend Lord Latham, the name of Lord Saltoun having been left inadverteritly on the the Order Paper. My noble friend Lord Latham is unable to be present to-day. He asked me to convey to the Committee his regret, but his absence in no way signifies his withdrawal of support. I feel that the Committee should know that I am speaking upon a subject in which I have a certain interest, in that I am myself a member of one of the bodies named in the Amendment. The purpose of this clause and of similar clauses in other Acts is not to create a monopoly in favour of certain bodies, but to ensure that where, by Acts of Parliament, funds are set up or corporate bodies emerge, the auditors of such funds or bodies should be properly qualified to carry out their duties.

In moving this Amendment, I have the support of the societies named. It is unfortunate, and may be inconvenient, that one society cannot speak for all, but it must be realised that, important though it is, the profession is yet young and has not yet achieved one unified control. All the societies named, however, share, as I do, one common plea, and that is that for a pubic audit to be effective it must be carried out by a person who, by reason of his training, is fully qualified for the task, and, being a member of a recognised society whose standards of excellence are known anti jealously guarded, he may be counted upon to work without partiality and up to the highest level of professional conduct. Clearly, this is highly desirable in this case, where public and private funds are intermingled and where any question arising out of the appointment of a person not so qualified might be somewhat embarrassing to the party making the appointment. The insertion of this sub-paragraph is designed to obviate this and to strengthen and amplify Paragraph 9 (3) above.

I will not take up the time of the Committee by reciting the dozen or so Public Acts, or the many Private Acts, in which, his or a similar paragraph has been inserted. Suffice it to draw the attention of the Committee to a similar instance—namely, the Legal Aid and Advice Act, 1949, in which the Law Society are required to keep special accounts of the Legal Aid Fund. In that Act the qualification of the auditor of the fund is laid down in terms similar to those of the Amendment. Similarly, in the National Health Service (Amendment) Act it was laid down that one of the societies named should be repre- sented on the arbitration tribunal set up to decide cases of hardship among assistants as a result of the Act. In conclusion, I would say that in this Bill, which is intended to regulate the dental profession and fix it upon a firm foundation, and where it might be said that the fund set up is more of a private than a public nature, it would seem to be logical that the reasonable wishes of another profession which is also attempting to preserve its high standard should be given every consideration. I beg to move.

Amendment moved— Page 24, line 41, at end insert the said sub-paragraph.—(Lord Milne.)

THE EARL OF ONSLOW

Though personally quite sympathetic with the noble Lord's suggestion, at the moment I am unable to accept his Amendment, as it is felt that it is undesirable to lay down specific bodies that may change from time to time and thereby necessitate legislation to alter this particular Bill. Therefore it is felt better that it should be left to the regulations to specify the bodies which the noble Lord suggests.

LORD MILNE

I am not greatly convinced by the noble Earl's reply, because it would seem to be extremely simple, should the bodies change, for the change to be carried out by Act of Parliament, and a clause might be put into the Bill providing for that eventuality. I feel, also, that if there is not some statement in this Bill that professionally qualified bodies will be used, we shall not know which body the Privy Council will select as auditor of the fund. I believe that if the paragraph that I have suggested as an Amendment to this Bill were inserted, what is now permissive would then be statutory, and the profession would know that under this Bill only members of properly qualified societies would be used. However, I do not consider it a great point, and if I could have some assurance from the Government that these wishes will be considered I shall be pleased to withdraw my Amendment.

5.10 p.m.

LORD SALTOUN

As my name appears on the Marshalled List above this Amendment, I should like to take the opportunity of explaining why I have withdrawn my support from it. As a matter of fact, I thought I had asked for my name to be taken off the Marshalled List. My reason for withdrawing my support was that I received from the noble Earl, Lord Onslow, a letter in very much the same terms as those in which he has just spoken. That letter I duly circulated to my noble friends. In it the noble Earl said that he thought that the matter would be better covered by regulation made by the Privy Council. If I may so far deal with his letter, I would say that the paragraph was couched very much in the subjunctive. I quite realise, and the noble Earl, no doubt, does also, that Her Majesty's Government cannot give directions to the Privy Council. I should like to ask the Government whether they have reasonable hope that the regulations will be in the proper form.

LORD WOOLTON

I think that as Lord President of the Privy Council I may give the noble Lord the assurance that we are not likely to put unqualified people on to this work.

VISCOUNT STANSGATE

Would it be possible for the regulations to be laid, so that the noble Lord could be satisfied?

LORD WOOLTON

I think it would.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

THE EARL OF ONSLOW

This Amendment and the two following it are designed to secure that in appropriate cases the President of the General Dental Council may appoint one or two additional members of the Council to be members of the Disciplinary Committee. This might be advisable, for instance, where the case of an Irish dentist was being investigated by the Disciplinary Committee at a time when there was no Irish standing member on the Committee. I beg to move.

Amendment moved— Page 25, line 17, leave out ("the Council may, at the request of the President") and insert ("the President may").—(The Earl of Onslow.)

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

THE EARL OF ONSLOW

The next Amendment is consequential. I beg to move.

Amendment moved— Page 25, line 19, leave out ("registered dentists who are").—(The Earl of Onslow.)q

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

THE EARL OF ONSLOW

The next Amendment is also consequential. I beg to move.

Amendment moved— Page 25, line 19, after ("be") insert ("additional").—(The Earl of Onslow.)

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

5.15 p.m.

LORD HENLEY moved, in subparagraph (1) of Paragraph 14, to substitute "eight" for "six." The noble Lord said: The Amendments standing in my name all hang together. Those numbered 58, 59, 61, and 62, on the Marshalled List are all consequential on Amendment 60, so perhaps I may deal with them en bloc. The object of these Amendments is to secure representation on the Ancillary Dental Workers Committee for local authorities who employ dental officers in connection with health services that are provided by them. I am aware that there is nothing in this Bill which requires local authorities to employ ancillary dental workers of the kind employed in the New Zealand scheme. Local authorities are responsible, however, for the dental treatment of expectant mothers and young children, and especially for the provision of dental services for school children, and we have had the greatest difficulty in providing these services in recent years owing to the shortage of dentists. This is well-known to the public, and there will be very strong pressure to ensure that local authorities do employ these ancillary dental workers to help in these services. I am sure that it is quite right and necessary that they should do so, as it is most important that the school dental service should be restored to its previous fairly good state of efficiency, and there is no other way in which the school children can receive a thorough dental treatment, especially in rural areas. I am aware, also, that there is provision in the Bill for representation by two dentists who are employed either under the national scheme or under a local government scheme on this work. But I do not feel that that is adequate representation. One of these dentists, presumably, will have had experience only of the national scheme and will not have had experience of working under local authorities. The work under the local authorities is very varied, and the local authorities have much greater experience than anyone else of the conditions of work in the schools and clinics. They know better than anyone else can what services are required for children, so I hope that it will be possible for the Government to accept this Amendment. I beg to move.

Amendment moved— Page 25, line 38, leave out ("six") and insert ("eight").—(Lord Henley.)

LORD WOOLTON

I greatly regret not to be able to accept the noble Lord's Amendment. If he will be good enough to look into it he will see that the membership of the Ancillary Dental Workers Committee as proposed in the Bill has been very carefully balanced between the dentists and the laymen, in order to secure that there shall always be a majority of dentists. The effect of the Amendment would be to reduce that majority to one. In the Bill, we have provided for nine dental members and six lay members. The proposals of the noble Lord would mean nine dental members and eight lay members. It is a principle running throughout the Bill that the control of the qualifications and work of the dental ancillary workers shal1 be in the hands of the dental profession. The proposed Amendment would not, I am afraid, give sufficient assurance of a majority to the dentists. The Minister will gladly consult the local authorities before appointing the three members who are to be appointed by the Health Departments acting jointly, two of the three being registered dentists who are or have been employed in the provision of the national and local authority health services. I am afraid that my reply will not give any satisfaction to the noble Lord, but the Bill as drafted is designed to emphasise the importance of securing a majority for the dental profession in the Ancillary Dental Workers Committee. I hope that, as that is such an important feature of the Bill, the noble Lord will be good enough to let it so remain.

LORD HENLEY

The reason why the suggested number of additional members was two, I think, was that the two main branches of local government authority might be represented. The Association of Municipal Corporations and the County Councils Association might have been bodies chosen by the Minister to recom- mend. But in view of this, would it be possible for the number of representatives to be cut down to one, so that the local authorities might have some direct representation on this body, as their relation with the majority of dentists should be a close one?

LORD WOOLTON

Perhaps the noble Lord will allow me to, discuss that with the Minister, because I do not feel competent to make a promise on his behalf in this matter.

LORD HENLEY

I thank the noble Lord and beg leave to withdraw my Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

First Schedule, as amended, agreed to.

Remaining Schedule agreed to.

House resumed.