Commissioning
further issues, fifth report of session 2010-11, Vol. 1: Report, together with formal minutes
Description:... The Health Committee reports that the Government's plans to reform NHS commissioning need to be significantly changed. Representatives of nurses, hospital doctors, public health experts and local communities should all be involved as decision makers alongside GPs in NHS commissioning. They believe it is vital to make these changes to enable the NHS to meet the unprecedented challenge it faces of finding 4% annual efficiency savings over the next four years. The Committee proposes that Local Commissioning Boards, where GPs will form a majority of membership, should have places should be reserved for representatives from: professional social care; local authority; nursing; hospital medicine; public health, nominated by the Director of Public Health. The Committee believes that local authority scrutiny of health services should continue and welcomes the extension of local authorities' health scrutiny powers. Boards of NHS Commissioners should be required to meet in public and publish their papers, and be held to account by the new NHS National Commissioning Board through a clear system of authorisation and assurance. Local commissioning bodies should be referred to as "NHS Commissioning Authorities" rather than GP consortia. The Committee believes that its own proposals would mean that there is no need to proceed with the establishment of Health and Wellbeing Boards, nor to separate the commissioning of primary and secondary care - as currently proposed in the bill. The Committee proposes that NHS Commissioning Authorities should be responsible for commissioning primary, secondary and community healthcare, as well as for creating robust links with social care.
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