Patient Safety Commissioner for Scotland Bill (6 October 2022)

Summary

The Scottish Government has published a new Bill to establish a Patient Safety Commissioner for Scotland. This article provides an overview of the remit, accountability, powers, and responsibilities of the new Commissioner that are proposed in this Bill.

Content

In September 2020, the Scottish Government formally announced that it would appoint a Patient Safety Commissioner for Scotland. This was in response to one the key recommendations set out in the First Do No Harm report, published earlier that year by the Independent Medicines and Medical Devices Safety Review (also known as the Cumberlege Review). The Scottish Government subsequently set up a Patient Reference Group to discuss and provide input into developing the initial proposals and published these for public consultation on 5 March 2021.

Remit

Following the public consultation, the Scottish Government has now set out proposals to establish the role of a Patient Safety Commissioner in a new Government Bill. This will be examined by Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs) who will discuss and scrutinise the Bill before deciding if it should become law.

The bill proposes that the new Patient Safety Commissioner will:

• support system-wide improvement in the safety of healthcare.
• promote the importance of the views of patients and members of the public in relation to the safety of healthcare.

This is a broader remit than the new Patient Safety Commissioner for England, who took up post in September 2022 and whose role is restricted to the promotion of the safety of patients and the importance of the views of patients in relation to medicines and medical devices.

The Patient Safety Commissioner for Scotland’s remit will cover all healthcare providers operating in Scotland, including NHS, NHS-contracted and independent healthcare providers.

Accountability and term limit

The new Patient Safety Commissioner will be appointed by nomination from the Scottish Parliament and will be accountable to, but independent of, the Scottish Government.

The post holder will serve a single term of a maximum eight years in duration. The length of the term will be determined by the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body, in an approach that mirrors the terms and conditions of other parliamentary commissioners (such as the Children’s and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland).

Powers and responsibilities

It is proposed that:

• patients and the general public will be able to raise concerns and relate their experiences directly to the Commissioner. However, the Commissioner will not undertake complaints casework or advocacy on behalf of individual patients, their families or carers.
• the Commissioner will be able to carry out their own formal investigations into patient safety-related concerns where they decide there is a need for such an investigation.
• organisations and staff will be legally required to provide requested information by the Commissioner within a stated period of time. Organisations or staff members who fail to comply with written requests for information can be publicly named or referred by the Commissioner to the Court of Session for consideration as a potential contempt of court.
• the Commissioner will be required to make reports on the findings of their formal investigations to the Scottish Parliament, and will make recommendations to which the organisations concerned are legally required to respond within a set period of time.
• when carrying out a formal investigation, the Commissioner will have the power to require that organisations and individuals provide the Commissioner with confidential information which may include identifiable or anonymised patient information.

Related reading

• Patient Safety Learning: Patient Safety Commissioner for Scotland Consultation Response (9 June 2021)
• Scottish Parliament: Explanatory notes relating to the Patient Safety Commissioner for Scotland Bill (6 October 2022)
• Scottish Parliament: Policy Memorandum relating to the Parliament Safety Commissioner for Scotland Bill