Foundation hospitals, freed from whitehall control, and moves to end bed-blocking were two of the centrepieces of the Queen's Speech for this parliamentary session. The proposals, part of the Health and Social Care, and Community Care bills respectively, are also likely to face tough parliamentary opposition over the year ahead.

Championed by the Health Secretary Alan Milburn, the proposal to reward the best-performing hospitals in England remains central to the government's drive to reform the huge NHS bureaucracy. The government is determined to rebut suggestions that it is seeking to micro-manage local hospitals by Whitehall diktat and the plans will "devolve power and resources to frontline staff" - allowing doctors and nurses to take more decisions about service delivery. However critics have said that having abandoned the "internal market" introduced by the previous Conservative administration, Labour is setting about creating its own "two tier" health service.

Bed blocking is also seen as a major obstacle to delivering improvements in waiting times in many hospitals and the Community Care Bill aims to address this. Controversial proposals could see local councils "fined" if they fail to provide sufficient long term care places for elderly patients, preventing them from being moved out from hospital wards after their treatment. But to sweeten the pill, Health Secretary Alan Milburn announced that he would transfer £100 million-a-year over the next three years from the NHS to the social services budget. Milburn said he hoped the move would assist councils facing fines in the early years of the policy.

The only other piece of specific health legislation, the NHS (Wales) Bill, is less controversial, although there are elements contained in other bills that also impact on public health policy. The Licensing Bill, which aims to introduce stricter controls over the sale of alcohol to minors, also proposes more flexible opening hours for public houses. Although this measure is aimed at promoting a more "mature" drinking culture, by encouraging people to drink at a steadier pace, similar moves have seen a rise in "binge drinking" in Scotland.

Additionally the Draft Housing Bill aims to tackle poor housing conditions in the rental sector by replacing the existing fitness standard with an evidence-based rating system - and so "help tackle poor conditions for the most vulnerable people".

Measures are also being introduced to tackle the link between drugs and crime in the Criminal Justice Bill, which would introduce a new presumption against bail for those tested positive for class A drugs who refuse to go into treatment.

One of the biggest omissions from the government's legislative agenda was a bill to overhaul mental health care and treatment. After a sustained campaign by mental health professionals and civil liberties groups, ministers have decided to allow more consultation on the proposals contained in the Draft Mental Health Bill, published last June. Based on 2000's White Paper, Reforming the Mental Health Act, this draft bill proposed the first major overhaul of the mental health system since the 1950s and aimed to bring the current service up to date and in line with new patterns of care and drug treatments. Despite its exclusion it is widely believed that the government will introduce a revised bill later in the legislative session.