A few days ago I hosted an interesting seminar in the House of Lords on “Tackling Transmission of Healthcare-Associated Infections”.  The purpose of this was to bring together policy-makers on the subject from within the Department of Health, representatives from the voluntary sector and involved service users, researchers and legal experts, front-line NHS practitioners, and a number of Parliamentary colleagues to discuss what has been achieved and what are likely to be challenges in the future.

There were some interesting points made in the discussion, such as the need to empower patients to challenge doctors and nurses about whether they have washed their hands, and some excellent comments such as “Anyone who doubts Darwin should look at how pathogens respond to antibiotics”.

However, I was particularly pleased to hear a contribution from Sandra Barrow, the leader of the Department of Health’s Healthcare Associated Infection (HCAI) Technology Programme.  She described how the Programme is aiming to speed up the process of identifying useful technological innovations that can help deal with HCAIs, encouraging front-line NHS staff to work with industry to develop innovations, and then fast-tracking the evaluation process so that innovations can be utilised more rapidly.

The Programme recognises that small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) will often provide the most innovative ideas, but may also face the greatest difficulty in getting their ideas developed and adopted in the NHS.  The Programme has involved workshops involving 500 frontline NHS staff and a road show engaging with a similar number of SMEs to identify the most promising technologies for reducing and preventing HCAIs.  Several hundred ideas and products emerged from this process which have then been assessed by an expert panel to identify a short-list of products that are being evaluated in eight showcase hospitals.

The ideas emerging include innovative air disinfection technology, new infection detection techniques and the use of nano-technology to provide anti-bacterial protection layers for surfaces.

What excited me about this was the way it recognised that SMEs are a key engine for innovation and the way in which emerging innovations were being rapidly appraised and assessed for early adoption.

The approach being taken, like the INSTINCT programme designed to harness new innovative technologies to address challenges in counter-terrorism, demonstrates how Government can work with industry, especially SMEs, to make the best of British scientific ideas.

• Since 1997 overall crime is down 36%; domestic burglary is down 54%; vehicle related crime is down by 57%; and violent crime is down 41%
• a new flexible points-based system to ensure only those economic migrants who have the skills our economy needs can come to work in the UK
• Police numbers up by 16,000 since 1997, alongside more than 16,000 Police Community Support Officers
• Every community now has its own dedicated neighbourhood police team, easily contactable by the people who live in that community and working with them to agree local priorities and deal with people’s concerns
• Equalised the age of consent and repealed Section 28

• 900,000 pensioners lifted out of poverty
• 500,000 children lifted out of relative poverty and measures already in train will lift a further 500,000 children out of poverty
• free TV licences for over-75s
• the New Deal has helped over 2 million people into work
• over 3 million Child Trust Funds have been started

• The National Minimum Wage – uprated annually – brenefiting at least a million people per year
• The shortest waiting times since NHS records began; whatever your condition, you will not have to wait more than 18 weeks from GP referral to the start of hospital treatment
• Three million more operations carried out each year than in 1997, with more than double the number of heart operations
• Over 44,000 more doctors
• Over 89,000 more nurses

Scott Charney, the Microsoft Vice President in charge of Trustworthy Computing, is speaking today at the RSA Conference in San Francisco.  He is re-stating both Microsoft’s commitment to “End-to-End Trust” but also the need for business, government and the public to work together to ensure that those using the internet are safe and secure.

The message is an important one: responsibility for internet security has to be shared.  The House of Lords Committee on Personal Internet Security, on which I sat, reported nearly three years ago and used a road transport analogy to make the point: safe road use requires responsible behaviour by drivers and pedestrians, but cars need to have safety features embodied in them, roads themselves need to be well-maintained and properly lit, there need to be laws regulating safe behaviour on the roads (speed limits etc) and those laws need to be properly enforced.

If anything the message has become even more important since our Committee reported.  More and more commercial and personal interactions take place on line.  Social networking sites are booming and an increasing proportion of commerce is conducted via the internet.

The threats to security have also become more pronounced.  The threats are no longer from isolated individuals, but from organised crime and it is also becoming abundantly apparent that some nation states are operating in the same way to infiltrate commercial and government networks for their own purposes.

And the technology itself is developing.  Cloud computing is becoming the norm and this presents its own challenges.  Certainly, this has raised the issue of security for many people (although it is not automatically a given that the security of data held in a cloud is necessarily worse than if it is held on your own servers, particularly if it turns out that they are inadequately protected).

So how do we move forward?

Partnership is certainly essential.  Governments have to work together in setting an international framework for collaboration and for law enforcement.  And at a national level they must also work with IT service providers and with business in general.

But above all, the individual user must be at the heart of all this.  Sensible security arrangements that make sense to the individual have to be devised.  It needs to be acknowledged that most individual users of the internet, whether they are trying to do their weekly shopping or organise their social lives, are rushed and busy.  Moreover, they are not technological experts.  They have inadequate levels of knowledge, so an error message or system alert that makes sense to an IT professional will probably be gibberish to most of us.

And critical to all of this is the need for robust identity management.

Surely, it is not too much to ask that people can feel confident that their personal details are secure, that they can communicate with others secure in the knowledge that the person or organisation with which they are communicating is who it says it is, and that when they are asked to identify themselves they need reveal no more about themselves than is necessary for the transaction concerned.

If today’s discussions at the RSA Conference take us further towards those objectives, we will be making real progress and we can all feel more hopeful that a trusted and secure internet environment is being built.

I see that my MPA colleague James Cleverly has fallen (despite being a Tory) into the typical trap that usually catches the LibDems of having a Pavlovian reaction every time the words “counter-terrorism” or “anti-terrorism” are seen.

He has repeated the myth that the UK Government wrongly used counter-terrorist powers to freeze the assets of Icelandic banks when it looked as though British citizens and institutions might suffer when the banks appeared to be about to default.

The powers used were in the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001.

LibDems and James Cleverly should notice that, although the Act’s title contains the magic word “anti-terrorism”, it is also about “crime and security”.

The specific power used was the freezing power and the Act specifies the following:

“(1) The Treasury may make a freezing order if the following two conditions are satisfied.

(2) The first condition is that the Treasury reasonably believe that—

(a) action to the detriment of the United Kingdom’s economy (or part of it) has been or is likely to be taken by a person or persons, or

(b) action constituting a threat to the life or property of one or more nationals of the United Kingdom or residents of the United Kingdom has been or is likely to be taken by a person or persons.

(3) If one person is believed to have taken or to be likely to take the action the second condition is that the person is—

(a) the government of a country or territory outside the United Kingdom, or

(b) a resident of a country or territory outside the United Kingdom.

(4) If two or more persons are believed to have taken or to be likely to take the action the second condition is that each of them falls within paragraph (a) or (b) of subsection (3); and different persons may fall within different paragraphs.”

Even a LibDem (and especially someone who is usually more sensible – like James Cleverly) might recognise that these powers are not about combatting terrorism.  They are more general powers and are about protecting the UK economy and/or the property of UK nationals.

The question that James Cleverly has to answer – I don’t expect a coherent response from the LibDems – is why repeat something that is wrong and more particularly is he against protecting the UK economy and the property of British citizens?

There is always a surreal air about aspects of the Annual Dinner hosted by the (unelected) Lord Mayor of London in the City’s Mansion House for the (elected) Mayor of London and the “Governing Bodies of London”.  And tonight’s was no exception.

The surrealism began with a Grace from the Lord Mayor’s Chaplain that seemed to be based entirely on a song by Noel Coward – an innovation too far even for the New Model Conservative Leader of Hammersmith and Fulham, Stephen Greenhalgh, or at least for his phone which warbled its protest whilst the Chaplain was speaking (Greenhalgh tried ineffectually to silence it..).

Meanwhile nearby, discontent simmered amongst Mayor Johnson’s Deputy Mayors about the seating arrangements: why had (unelected) Deputy Mayor Sir Simon (rumoured soon to be Lord) Milton been given such a prominent seat allocation, compared with the two other (elected) Deputy Mayors?  (Milton was at the centre of the top-table at the left hand of God himself or more precisely at the left hand of  Stuart Fraser, the (unelected) Chairman of the Corporation’s Policy and Resources Committee.)

And then, of course, there was the speech from Mayor Boris Johnson himself.  Surreally praising those present for braving the snow and ice – the snow and ice itself being a tribute to the success of the team from City Hall that had gone to the Copenhagen to reverse global warming (“How successful they were and so quickly”).

He then moved rapidly on to an argument that the success (sic) of London in coping with the snow and ice was itself a metaphor for the success that London was having in weathering the recession(sic, sic).

This elided into a paeon of praise for the decision he had himself announced that in future all the data held by the GLA would be made freely available on the internet.  This in itself would transform the economic prospects of London (if not the Universe).

And then after a brief digression on how his heart goes out to those poor MPs caught up in the expenses scandals “for buying themselves a pepperami” (sic) and how the GLA decision, if adopted by Parliament, would have averted the scandal because the afore-mentioned pepperamis would not have been purchased.  At least, I think that was the argument.

Finally, the great champion of openness informed his audience that he could tell us that he had seen the proposed 2012 Olympics mascot but that he couldn’t tell us anything about it – we were not permitted to know whether it was an animal or not, what its gender was, or its sexual orientation.  All he could say was that it would be “a howling success”.  And what is more, if by the time it is unveiled in May, Gordon Brown has been sent to a salt-mine (there was a sub-theme of the evening relating to salt and grit) the Olympics mascot will be temporary Leader of the Labour Party.  Now as everyone knows, if the Leadership of the Labour Party becomes vacant, the post is automatically filled by the Deputy Leader of the Party until a successor is elected – so presumably this was Mayor Boris Johnson’s way of telling us that the 2012 Olympics mascot will in fact be the Right Honourable Harriet Harman MP.

As the Governing Bodies of London filed out of the Mansion House into the snow and ice (which amazingly still remained), you could hear the murmur of confusion/buzz of excitement about the sweeping vision of London’s future that they had just heard from Mayor Johnson.

The Parliamentary Information Technology Committee (PITCOM), of which I am the Honorary Treasurer, has produced a useful briefing summarising the key issues about the increasing reliance of the critical national infrastructure (CNI) on technology and the crucial importance of ensuring that that technology is resilient and adequately protected.

The potential vulnerability of the CNI to a variety of threats and the need to raise the level of protection and readiness of the UK to respond to attacks are highlighted.  The briefing also emphasises the importance of partnership between the Government and the private sector to mitigate risks, particularly given the extent to which major parts of the CNI are under private ownership and may not automatically prioritise the national interest above short-term commercial interests.

The briefing should be essential reading for all Parliamentary candidates and anyone else interested in national security.

I am delighted to hear that Baroness Cathy Ashton is to be the new EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs.  Typically, there has been some sniping from Tory Euro-phobes like Timothy Kirkhope MEP, demonstrating yet again that the Conservative Party have difficulty understanding what the term “national interest” means in the context of the European Union.

Why is this good news?

Firstly, it is recognition of the hugely impressive work she has put in as EU Trade Commissioner – following on the similarly impressive role played by her predecessor, Lord Peter Mandelson.

Secondly, the new role is going to be pivotal in the EU and may at least initially turn out to be more significant than the part played by the new President and having a Briton right at the heart of the EU will ensure that the UK is not sidelined.

This is particularly important now that the Conservative Party have taken themselves out of the Centre-Right mainstream by the bizarre decision to withdraw their MEPs from the EPP grouping.  In the event (remote, of course) of there being a Conservative Government after the next General Election, it will be important for the UK’s standing in Europe that the UK is not seen as being only represented by swivel-eyed phobics.

Thirdly and most importantly, she will do a good job.  She demonstrated as Leader of the Lords that she could build consensus (she was genuinely a Leader of the whole House and not just of the Labour benches), and as a Minister that she could master complex detail (steering hugely complicated and difficult pieces of legislation through the House – not least the Bill ratifying the Lisbon Treaty).

My only regret is that this means that she will remain on “Leave of Absence” from the House of Lords while she remains in post.

And, of course, I also feel sorry for her husband Peter Kellner, who was one of my local Labour Party members when I held my first political office as a Party Branch Secretary when I was still at school almost 40 years ago.  I bumped into him a few weeks after Cathy’s appointment as EU Trade Commissioner, greeting him with the words “When did you last see your wife?” and detected a whiff of sadness when he replied defensively “Sunday night”.

Parliament has been prorogued. The 2008/9 Parliamentary Session ended on 12^th November 2009 and the new Session begins with the Queen’s Speech on 18^th November 2009.  I suspect the 2008/9 Session will be remembered for the expenses and other scandals that engulfed both House rather than for the legislation enacted during it.  However, some major Bills were passed and became Acts of Parliament.  These included the:

• Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act:  this provides a statutory framework for and a right for 16-18 year-olds to apprenticeships; gives employees a right to request time-off for training; gives local government responsibility for funding education and training for 16-18 year olds; changes school inspection arrangements; creates a new parental complaints service; and strengthens accountability.
• Banking Act:  this provides a permanent system for dealing with failing banks; and gives the Bank of England a new “financial stability” objective.
• Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Act:  this changes the rules on naturalisation; gives new functions (and new duty to safeguard children) to the UK Border Agency; and introduces powers to control all those arriving in the UK from the rest of the Common Travel Area.
• Business Rate Supplements Act:  this gives upper tier local authorities (in London, the Greater London Authority) the power, following consultation, to levy an additional business rate for economic development purposes (including Crossrail in London).
• Coroners and Justice Act:  this reforms and updates the law on coroners; extends the laws on child pornography to cover non-photographic images; increases the flexibility on hearing evidence from vulnerable witnesses etc.
• Health Act:  this gives statutory force to the new NHS Constitution and sets out the responsibilities of patients and staff; introduces direct payments for health services to give patients greater control over the services they receive; makes provision for more information on service quality to be made available to patients and others; and introduces new measures to protect young people from the harm caused by smoking.
• Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act: this makes provisions to encourage the greater involvement of people in local authority decision-making; creates an obligation on councils to respond to petitions; establishes a new body to represent the interests of tenants; and places a new duty on local authorities to assess economic conditions in their area and to work with Regional Development Agencies to produce a single regional strategy.
• Marine and Coastal Access Act:  this reforms the law on marine regulation, fisheries management and marine conservation; and enables the creation of a walkable route around the English coast.
• Parliamentary Standards Act: this created the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority.
• Policing and Crime Act: this strengthens police accountability; creates an offence of paying for sex with trafficked or coerced women; tightens regulation of lap-dancing clubs; and amends police powers for dealing with young people drinking in public.
• Political Parties and Elections Act: this strengthens the powers of the Electoral Commission; alters the definition of election expenses; and requires greater clarity on the source of political donations.
• Welfare Reform Act: this abolishes Income Support and moves all claimants on to either Jobseekers’ Allowance or, if sick, on to Employment and Support Allowance; introduces a new regime of sanctions for non-attendance at JobCentres; and provides additional powers for the enforcement of child maintenance arrears.

In addition, the House of Lords spent seven full days debating the Postal Services Bill, which would have enabled a minority stake in the Royal Mail Group to be sold whilst ensuring that the Group remained in public ownership, would have transferred the Royal Mail’s historic pension deficit to the Government and would have created a regulatory regime for the postal services sector under OFCOM.  In the event, the Bill, having passed all its stages in the Lords, was introduced in the House of Commons and then abandoned.  The Bill has now fallen with the end of the Parliamentary Session. Three major Bills that have had their Second Reading debates and some Committee discussion in the House of Commons have been the subject of Carry Over motions, which means that they have not fallen with the end of the Parliamentary Session and their progress through Parliament can be resumed in the new Session.  These are the:

• Child Poverty Bill:  this would give statutory force to the Government’s 1999 commitment to eradicate child poverty by 2020, placing a duty on Ministers to meet income poverty targets and requiring the regular production of a child poverty strategy.
• Constitutional Reform and Governance Bill:  this would end “by-elections” to replace the remaining hereditary peers that sit in the Lords when they die; would make it possible for members of the Lords to resign or to be suspended/expelled; introduce a new Parliamentary process for the ratification of Treaties; establish a statutory basis for the running of the civil service; end the Prime Minister’s role in appointing senior judges; introduce new rules on protests around Parliament and a variety of other constitutional adjustments.
• Equality Bill:  this would harmonise and extend anti-discrimination legislation; would place a unified duty on public bodies; extend discrimination protection to the membership of private clubs; require employers to review and publish gender pay differences within their organisations; extends age discrimination legislation outside the workplace; and much else besides.

The number of defeats suffered by the Government this session is the lowest in any full session since the Labour Government was elected in 1997.  This session the Government was defeated on 24 occasions (out of 89 votes in total).  Last session there were 29 defeats.   By contrast there were 45 Government defeats in the 2006/7 session and 62 in the 2005/6 session.  To put these numbers in context: the last Conservative Government under John Major suffered only 62 defeats in the entire 1992-97 Parliament.

Labour now has 212 members in the Lords and is the largest Party, but this only amounts to 30% of the total membership of 705.  There are 190 Conservative peers (27%), 183 cross-benchers (26%), and 71 LibDems (10%) – the remainder comprise 26 Church of England bishops/archbishops and 23 non-affiliated or other. The reality of these numbers is that the Government does not have an automatic majority to carry through its legislation.  At any one time, the opposition parties can combine to defeat the Government, particularly as a significant proportion of the cross-benchers will usually vote with the opposition, depending on the issue.