§ Mr. HammondTo ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to his answer of 27 March 2000,Official Report, column 60W, for what reasons he was unable to act prior to presentation of the Waterhouse Report to Parliament to extend the Consultancy Index to include people named in that report. [116951]
§ Mr. HuttonThe Waterhouse Report is over 1,000 pages long and names hundreds of individuals with no easy means of identifying specific individuals and the findings made against them. The conclusions of the 7W Tribunal in relation to each of the individuals named had to be considered with great care by the Wales Office, Department of Health and other Government Departments to ensure that appropriate action was taken in the light of these conclusions. It was also important to establish the legal basis on which the Consultancy Index could be specially extended to include the names of people who had not been referred by their employer. We took immediate and determined action on receipt of the Waterhouse Report to achieve these tasks.