Website of the Department of Health

What does the Health and Social Care Bill do?

The Health and Social Care Bill contains four key policy areas:

Care Quality Commission

The Care Quality Commission will be a new integrated regulator for health and adult social care bringing together existing health and social care regulators into one regulatory body, with tough new powers to ensure safe and high quality services.

• Care Quality Commission

Professional regulation

The reform of professional regulation will enhance public and professional confidence in the system of professional regulation and strengthen clinical governance as part of the Government's response to the Shipman Inquiry.

• Professional regulation

Public health protection measures

The public health protection part of the Bill provides a comprehensive set of public health measures to help prevent and control the spread of serious diseases caused by infection and contamination.

• Public health protection measures

Health in Pregnancy Grant

The Health in Pregnancy Grant will be a one-off payment to expectant mothers ordinarily resident in the UK, to help with the costs of a healthy lifestyle, including diet, in the later stages of pregnancy.

• Health in Pregnancy Grant

The Health and Social Care Bill also includes a number of smaller measures:

• The transfer of the global sum for pharmaceutical services
• Powers to extend membership of NHS indemnity schemes
• The extension of direct payments
• Changes to the National Assistance Act 1948
• The creation of a power for the Secretary of State to give financial assistance to social enterprises
• The creation of the National Information Governance Board for Health and Social Care
• The abolition of the National Biological Standards Board and the transfer of its functions to the Health Protection Agency
• Legislative cover for performance management and routine feedback to parents as part of the National Child Measurement Programme

Impact assessments for the Health and Social Care Bill

To accompany the Bill, the Department of Health has published impact assessments for those areas of the Bill which met the cost threshold for requiring an impact assessment.  Impact assessments are tools to examine the potential effects, including costings, of the measures proposed by Government departments.

The cover note for the impact assessments explains which parts of the Bill required an impact assessment and why.  It also sets out why the Department considers that those measures not requiring an impact assessment will not have an adverse impact on equality.

• Impact assessments for the Health and Social Care Bill

The Government's response to the report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights

The Joint Committee on Human Rights (JCHR) has published three reports on its legislative scrutiny of the Health and Social Care Bill. The Government sent a response to the first two of these reports to the Chair of the Committee on 16 April 2008.

• Health and Social Care Bill - the Government's response to the report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights

Secondary legislation

• The Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Registration of Regulated Activities) Regulations 2009. Statutory Instrument 2009 No. 660 (opens new window)
• The Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Commencement No.9, Consequential Amendments and Transitory, Transitional and Saving Provisions) Order 2009 - Statutory Instrument 2009 No. 462 (opens new window)
• The Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Commencement No.9, Consequential Amendments and Transitory, Transitional and Saving Provisions) Amendment Order 2009 - Statutory Instrument 2009 No. 580 (opens new window)
• SI - 2008 No. 3168 (C.143) - The Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Commencement No.6, Transitory and Transitional Provisions) Order 2008 (opens new window)

Queries on the Health and Social Care Act 2008

The implementation of the Act is the responsibility of the individual policy teams. If you have any queries about the Act, please contact the relevant policy team through:

• Contact us