Mr. T. WILSONasked the Comptroller of the Household, as representing the National Health Insurance Commissioners, whether he is aware that dissatisfaction has been expressed by panel doctors at the constitution of the new Advisory Committee, owing to the inadequate medical representation; and whether, as Section 58 of the National 974W Insurance Act, 1911, specially provides for at least two medical members of the Advisory Committee while only one place has been granted to the profession, he intends to reconsider the position?
§ Sir EDWIN CORNWALLI have reconstituted the Advisory Committee to the National Health Insurance Joint Committee, and have reduced the total membership from 168 to about thirty, in order to save expense and obtain a more workmanlike body. I am prepared to add one or two more doctors to the Committee, or, alternatively to appoint a small separate Medical Advisory Committee, and I am at present in consultation with representatives of the medical profession on the subject.
§ Mr. YEOasked the Comptroller of the Household, as representing the National Health Insurance Commissioners, whether, as he proposes to set up under Section 58 of the National Insurance Act, 1911, an Advisory Committee for approved society work on which there is to be one doctor and also a separate Advisory Committee for dectors, he will state which Committee will take precedence, and why; and whether he will state the number of occasions on which the old Advisory Committee met; the subjects discussed; the number of times that the advice given was adopted by the Incurance Commissioners; the number of times that it was not adopted, and why, with the points in dispute; and the regulations introduced which were not submitted to or approved by the said Committee?
§ Sir E. CORNWALLUnder Section 58 of the National Insurance Act, 1911, it is provided that an Advisory Committee shall be appointed for the purpose of giving advice and assistance to the Commissioners in connection with the making and altering of Regulations. The Committee has hitherto consisted of 168 members, and has proved to be expensive and unwieldy in its working, and it is now proposed that the number of members should be reduced to about thirty. The object in considering the appointment of a small separate medical Advisory Committee is to secure more effective and convenient co-operation between the Commissioners and the medical profession in the administration of the Act generally, and not merely in connection with the making and altering of Regulations, which 975W is the only statutory function of the Advisory Committee, and I do not see how any question of precedence can arise. The former Advisory Committee held, in all, forty meetings, and discussed from time to time the making and altering of various Regulations; the meetings took the form of conferences with the Minister and the Joint Committee, and due regard was paid on all occasions to the advice and assistance given by the members of the Committee. Meetings of the Committee would no doubt have been more frequent, but for the inconvenience of summoning so many members from all parts of the Kingdom, and for the fact that the cost of calling a meeting amounted to about £600.