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Thames Water fined for “entirely foreseeable” pollution
Jonathan Grimes
On 20 February 2013, The Law Commission published an analysis of responses received to its Consultation Paper on the Regulation of Health and Social Care Professionals. In advance of the Government response, Sarah Harris and Julie Norris look at the range of responses submitted and consider where the battle lines may be drawn.
Introduction
The analysis document details the responses received by the Commission during the consultation period (1 May 2012 to 31 May 2012) and describes the views of consultees in relation to each of the 111 provisional proposals and 66 consultations advanced. 192 submissions were received from a wide range of consultees, including relevant Government departments, professional regulators, the Care Quality Commission, defence organisations, unions, patient representative groups, local authorities, NHS Trusts, legal practitioners, individual health and social care practitioners and patients. The results make fascinating reading; although complete consensus is predictably absent, on certain topics, a clear majority view emerges, making predictions about the course that may eventually be proposed and even adopted, possible.
Below we summarise each section of the lengthy report. For those wanting a snapshot of what the future of health and social care regulation might look like, and assuming the Law Commission adopt the majority view on the main issues consulted upon, reform is likely to bear the following features:
General
The Statute
Registers
Fitness to Practise
One of the tensions most apparent in the responses is between the desire of consultees to preserve that which they regarded as good about their own current regimes and the obvious drive for more consistency between the operations of the regulators. Any Government response (whether in the terms suggested above or not) is likely to see some consultees having to accept new ways of functioning that are unfamiliar and perhaps even unwelcome. What is also apparent is that the wholesale root and branch reorganisation that some may have been expecting to follow the Consultation, looks unlikely to result. Much good practise exists already in many of the regulatory authorities; it rather looks like it may just be a case of sharing and codifying it.
Co-authored by Sarah Harris, Barrister
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Jonathan Grimes
Laura Sylvester
Hannah Eales
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