Section 42: Short title, interpretation, commencement and extent
189.Section 42 gives the short title of the Act and makes provisions for commencement and extent. It provides that all sections of the Act will be brought into force by order made by statutory instrument except sections 38 to 41 and those conferring order or regulation-making powers on the Secretary of State which will come into force on Royal Assent. Subsections (2) and (4) also contain definitions of certain terms used in the Act.
Note on drafting assumptions
190.There are a number of points at which this Act amends provisions of the 1977 Act which have already been amended by the Health Act or the HSC Act. Not all of the relevant amendments, however, have yet been brought into force. For the purposes of this Act, the following method of dealing with such amended provisions has been adopted:
191.Where it is known that the amendment will not have been brought into force before this Act receives Royal Assent, then this Act amends the amending provision in the HSC Act and the Health Act. This applies, for example, in the case of the amendments to section 10 of the Health Act in paragraph 68 of Schedule 2 and the amendments to section 40 and Schedule 3 to the HSC Act in paragraphs 78 and 81 of Schedule 2.
192.Where it is known that the amendment will have been brought into force before this Act receives Royal Assent, then this Act amends the 1977 Act as amended. This applies, for example, in the case of the amendments to section 97 of the 1977 Act (as amended by sections 1 and 2 of the HSC Act) made by section 7 of the Act.
193.Where, at the time of drafting, it was not yet clear whether the amendments would have been brought into force before this Act receives Royal Assent, then this Act also amends the 1977 Act as amended rather than the amending provision. This applies, for example, in the case of the amendments to section 29B of the 1977 Act (as amended by section 15 of the HSC Act) made by paragraph 5 of Schedule 2 to the Act. In these cases, where the relevant amendments have not in fact been brought into force at Royal Assent, commencement orders for the two sets of amending provisions will be arranged so that any amendments made by the earlier Act which are further amended by this Act are brought into force before those further amendments. These further amendments should then be taken as applying to the text of the 1977 Act as it stood at the date of their commencement.
