Comment from John Spencer, president Association of Personal Injury Lawyers (APIL) ahead of third reading of Lord Saatchi’s Medical Innovation Bill in the House of Lords on Friday 23 January:
“We’ve heard a lot of expert voices from the House of Lords with concerns about the impact of this Bill on patient safety. If peers pass the Bill on Friday, it’s critical that we see detailed scrutiny when it reaches the House of Commons. MPs must listen to the recommendations from experts within the medical, patient, research, and legal communities, as despite the work of many peers, essentially, the Bill still allows doctors to do whatever they like.
“This Bill does not even achieve what Lord Saatchi set out to do, yet Parliamentary time has had been spent having to discuss how to protect patients from its consequences. There is no evidence that the Bill is necessary and MPs must not allow its undoubtedly laudable aims to be a passport to bad law. The patients they serve deserve no less”.