Andrew Lansley offers 'pause to listen' on health bill

The government will press ahead with the health and social care bill but will listen to those who have concerns, according to the health secretary Andrew Lansley.

In a statement to the House of Commons on 4 April, he said there could be amendments to the bill but that the government would maintain the broad thrust of the changes it plans for the NHS.

"Our desire is to move forward, with the support of doctors, nurses and others who work in the NHS," he said. "We recognise that this speed of progress has brought with it some substantive concerns, expressed in various quarters. Some of those concerns are misplaced, or based on mispresentations. But we recognise that some are genuine."

Lansley said that government will "take the opportunity of a natural break in the passage of the bill to pause, to listen and to engage with all those who want the NHS to succeed". He added that this will lead to further amendments to the bill, and tried to dispel fears about the future of emergency services.

"Choice, competition and the involvement of the private sector should only ever be a means to improve services for patients, not ends in themselves," he said. "Some services, such as accident and emergency and major trauma, will clearly never be based on competition. And people want to know that private companies cannot cherry pick NHS activity."

He added that GP groups must be transparent and accountable, both nationally and locally, the latter through links to local authorities' health and wellbeing boards. But the central parts of the bill will remain.

Lansley pointed out that following the announcement of a further 43 GP commissioning consortia last week, there are now 220 groups representing 45m patients – or 87% of the country – involved in the pathfinders.

Updated map of all GP commissioning consortia

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