Lord Hunt Promise, debate on Discharges etc Act 2003

10 Mar 2003 : Column 1182
Committee, I said that the Government were considering those points. We have not 
yet reached a conclusion. I shall take into account the further points made today. I 
have no doubt that we shall discuss the matter again at Third Reading. 
I hope that noble Lords will accept that, although I am still prepared to consider the 
issues concerning bank holidays and weekends, I shall not give a commitment tonight. 
I am certainly wary of putting anything on the face of the Bill to suggest that we are 
moving away from the minimum compliance period. We are aware that the aim of the 
Bill may pose real challenges for statutory organisations. However, delaying 
individuals' discharge from hospital inappropriately can have a very negative effect on 
their future lives. Therefore, we need to be careful that we do not allow statutory 
agencies to make excuse after excuse after excuse and to walk away from what the 
Bill is intended to achieve. 
I turn to Amendments Nos. 38 and 47, which appear to want to introduce a complaints 
procedure for both NHS and social services which must be completed before the 
patient is discharged. I wish to repeat a point I have already made; namely, that the 
Bill does not affect the right of an individual to make a complaint to the NHS or 
social services about the care he or she has received. We shall make it clear in 
guidance that any complaints by patients about the NHS decision on whether or not 
they are eligible for fully funded continuing NHS healthcare should be dealt with 
promptly before any dispute under this part of the Bill commences. We have already 
discussed the steps we shall take to ensure that those decisions are made promptly and 
at the correct stage in the discharge process. If such a complaint arises after the 
Section 2 notice has been given—the steps we are taking, and the step I announced in 
a previous debate will mean that that should be the exception rather than the rule—the 
social services authority will at that point effectively assess the patient as not needing 
any community care services from it because he or she needs continuing services 
from the NHS instead. That means that the delayed discharge clock will not start and 
the patient will remain in hospital until the dispute about eligibility for continuing 
NHS care has been resolved.