Twenty years ago, I brought forward a similar bill addressing the issue of 'bed blocking' where patients who are medically fit for discharge remain in acute hospitals, causing harm and burden to the NHS. Today's context remains severe congestion in health and social care with an estimated £1.5 billion annual cost due to unnecessary prolonged hospital stays. My recent family experience highlighted the inadequacy of current systems and has driven me to reintroduce this bill which proposes mandatory certification by lead clinicians, defining delayed discharges as over 48 hours post-certification, establishing it under patient safety regulations, implementing financial penalties on local authorities, centralising funding transfers, publishing league tables of NHS trust performance every three months, requiring the Care Quality Commission to investigate poor performers and fast-track final-day patients.