The Political Thread

[TordelBack]

Never once was I presented with a bill. Never once was it even considered too expensive to save my worthless hide.

The politicians and corporate interests who advocate dismantling of the NHS are not the people who are dependent on it.  Otherwise it would be as inviolate as executive bonuses and ministerial pensions.    

...a milion pounds wasted through inefficiencies is a scanner or some life-saving drugs or some doctors and nurses. 

You don't think that million pounds (and the rest) isn't just going to go on corporate bonuses in the private companies?  I do agree that there's surely room/need for reform, but I don't believe that the scrutiny of private companies is going to be any easier than a process of reform within the organisation as it exists.

Anyhow, I should stop offering opinions on health services that are none of my business.  I've plenty to give out about with regard to the one on my doorstep.

[Old Tankie]

Of course you were presented with a bill, it went under the heading of "Taxes" and perhaps if the NHS was more efficient it would have the resources to save many more worthless hides!!

[The Legendary Shark]

Most taxes go towards paying off the national debt. Virtually none of the money you pay in taxes goes towards actual services like the NHS. It's all paid for out of interest bearing, privately created loans - hence the need to return to socially created, interest free money.

It's not rocket surgery.

[Old Tankie]

Can't agree with you there, Sharky.  The Government in total takes far more in Income Tax, VAT, Inheritance Tax, Savings Tax, Insurance Tax, etc. etc. than it borrows; although I agree the borrowing is horrendous, that's why we need efficiencies in the public services.

Tax doesn't have to be taxing!

[The Legendary Shark]

UK Tax income 2009-2010 = £519.8bn


UK new borrowing 2009-2010 = £159.8bn (not including existing deficit of £1000.4bn)

Uk Government spending 2009-2010 = £669.26bn



159.8bn + 1000.4bn + 669.26bn = 1829.46bn

1829.46bn - 519.8bn = 1309.66bn

Therefore, more is owed than can be paid back through taxation, leading to more borrowing, leading to higher taxation, leading to more borrowing, leading to higher taxation... This is the real driver behind inflation.

[Emperor]

Just 'cos someone does a nifty little rap, doesn't make something true.  The NHS definitely needs reforming

I'm sure it does, but it doesn't need privatisation - it might be a nifty little rap but the key is that he is also spot on with his analysis of NHS reforms. How many people really look at American healthcare and think they'd prefer that to the NHS?

The Tory government are using the economic crisis for a "disaster capitalism" ram raid on important parts of the state, all to benefit big business. What'll be interesting to see is if they can sell this to the British people - polls do show a slim majority supporting the need for cuts (so the Tory spin that this is all down to Labour's profligate spending, rather than a global economic crisis seems to be working), but will that be sustained when it turns out the "fair" cuts aren't and we aren't all in this together.

Save the NHS campaign:  http://38degrees.org.uk/

I too heard some of the BBC's coverage yesterday. Several times I heard reporters, upon interviewing members of the crowd, say stuff like "but, there is no alternative to cuts, is there?"

Yes, BBC, there is an alternative. A huge great stonking alternative that would solve not only public service cuts but reinvigorate every area of the world. It's an alternative that isn't new and has been proven to work. The alternative that allowed Caesar to build a world-spanning empire. The alternative that allowed Abraham Lincoln to fight the War of Independence.

It's simple: Take away from the banks the power to create and control the money supply and return that power to the people via their governments. The only people who will lose out under this system are a handful of bankers and hedge fund managers - and I think they're already rich enough to cope with being forced to exist on a couple of pounds less caviare a month. It's not as if using public money instead of private money will throw anyone into poverty, for Christ's sake - just the opposite.

http://www.positivemoney.org.uk/

Blood pressure returning to normal. Soap box sagging. Frustration easing...

Somehow, I knew you'd say that

Personally, I'd rather start by cutting down on tax avoidance and tax evasion - for every pound spent on this we get 30 back, and yet the number of people working at HMRC is being cut (and was cut before under Labour too, so it is not a party political point - they are both in thrall to those with deep pockets).

The NHS has saved my life at least twice.

Never once was I presented with a bill. Never once was it even considered too expensive to save my worthless hide.

I will be writing to my MP about this first thing tomorrow. Rest assured it won't happen again

[The Legendary Shark]

I will be writing to my MP about this first thing tomorrow. Rest assured it won't happen again

Heh, I wouldn't worry about it. Me and Her Maj will probably both be disposed of cheaply and efficiently by certain "dark forces," so it won't cost you a penny! 

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article823072.ece

[The Legendary Shark]

Is it possible to get out of debt for free?

Maybe it is...

http://www.getoutofdebtfree.org/

(I don't know if any of this works or not, but if anyone tries it I'd love to know how you get on. I'd try it myself, but I have no debts.)

[House of Usher]

The NHS has saved my life at least twice.

Never once was I presented with a bill. Never once was it even considered too expensive to save my worthless hide.

Of course you were presented with a bill, it went under the heading of "Taxes" and perhaps if the NHS was more efficient it would have the resources to save many more worthless hides!!

If Shark was presented with the bill, under the heading of 'taxes,' then so were you and I. I have never been at death's door and have never been treated in hospital except as an out patient, so it's arguable that I have paid more into the NHS (but arguably not all areas of state funding that go through the treasury) than I have taken out. You and I have probably paid for Shark's life to be saved: he hasn't borne the cost alone. That, surely, is the point of the NHS. It's nit-picking to contest claims that the NHS is or isn't free. It is free 'at the point of delivery,' regardless of how we collectively pay for it.

[House of Usher]

I take your point about some private companies lapping it up when they get public sector contracts, TB, there would obviously have to be strict controls.  But I have to disagree with you when you say that in "an inefficient system the casualties tend to be costs"; a milion pounds wasted through inefficiencies is a scanner or some life-saving drugs or some doctors and nurses.  That's why I think there needs to be reforms.

The point of the Tories' proposed NHS 'reforms' (so-called) is not savings or efficiency. The point is to create business opportunities for the private sector and to dismantle the welfare state into the bargain.

[Old Tankie]

But, Ush, the private sector is already heavily involved in the NHS.  When I have my NHS funded eye test done, it's done in a private sector opticians; when I take my NHS prescription to be filled, it's done in a private sector chemist; when I go to my brand-new local hospital, it's being paid for by a PFI agreement; when I go for my NHS dental treatment, it's done by a private sector dental firm.  Many NHS operations, in the last few years, have been carried out in private sector hospitals.  All these things have been done under a Labour government!!

If certain things can be done better by the public sector, that's great, and if other things can be done better by the private sector, that's also great.  No political dogma here!

[House of Usher]

If certain things can be done better by the public sector, that's great, and if other things can be done better by the private sector, that's also great.  No political dogma here!

Anyone who has worked in the spurious business of performance measurement, as I briefly and reluctantly did, will know that 'better' depends upon which of innumerable and antagonistic criteria you choose, and the subjective weighting you place upon them. The game can easily be rigged to produce the result you are looking for.

[Leigh S]

If certain things can be done better by the public sector, that's great, and if other things can be done better by the private sector, that's also great.  No political dogma here!

Anyone who has worked in the spurious business of performance measurement, as I briefly and reluctantly did, will know that 'better' depends upon which of innumerable and antagonistic criteria you choose, and the subjective weighting you place upon them. The game can easily be rigged to produce the result you are looking for.

As Ush says, you have to ask what is better - where is the evidence that private is better? My dealings with priavte secotr and public sector seem to show similar levels of competency, except when it comes to calling in the debt of course!  I work with someone who used to work for a company that had a contract with the jobcentres to gain a bounty on finding people work, and they basically claimed the credit for anything that moved, whether theyd been involved with the search for work or not.  The financial motivation in doing so is obvious, and might make them appear better (although its my understanding that these private sector schemes have never been any more successful than the inhouse ones).  If one bunch of people can do it for their wages and another for the wages and a bounty, which is more efficient?

[Professor Bear]

The problem with selling off chunks of the NHS is that there will - for the sake of profit - be those who get shortchanged by the service provided.  The NHS needs to solve its problems with reform, not simply sell off difficult areas so they're no longer under the auspices of league tables and thus technically one in the 'win' column. I may be missing something, but when has ignoring or hiding from a problem ever made things better?

When I have my NHS funded eye test done, it's done in a private sector opticians; when I take my NHS prescription to be filled, it's done in a private sector chemist; when I go to my brand-new local hospital, it's being paid for by a PFI agreement; when I go for my NHS dental treatment, it's done by a private sector dental firm.  Many NHS operations, in the last few years, have been carried out in private sector hospitals.  All these things have been done under a Labour government!!

Your situation and means are not necessarily the uniform experience, though if you can get an optician or dentist that accepts NHS patients you're way ahead of a great many people.  The private sector accepts a certain quota of NHS patients and then they close their books, so in small communities with maybe one or two dentists some patients have to do without.  The last time a dentist opened around here there were people sleeping in cars the night before the place first opened in order to register as NHS patients.  Myself, I'm unemployed and use a private dentist because I can't get registered anywhere as an NHS patient.  Can't afford it, but what other option do I have?
Private sector chemists are also like any shop - service and stock is variable.  I avoid certain chemists in the town because they are quite terrible, but one of them is situated next door to the only clinic, and I can only imagine what choice that offers to elderly or invalid patients.  As for "Brand new hospital" lucky you!  They're making new hospitals?  Not around here - they're shutting down as many accident and emergency centers as possible in an attempt to eventually centralise emergency care in Belfast, which for some is a journey of several hundred miles.

I work with someone who used to work for a company that had a contract with the jobcentres to gain a bounty on finding people work, and they basically claimed the credit for anything that moved, whether theyd been involved with the search for work or not.

My little brother was fucking livid to discover that those guys in the local Job Center were claiming to have gotten him trained and out of work even though they'd done fuck all for him.  He went out and did volunteer work with the Citizen's Advice in the town for the whole time he was unemployed - as much to avoid boredom as to get training - and used that as a reference to get a civil service job.  The Job Center was never a factor as they actually ruled out sending people to the CAB quite some time ago, as so many local businesses were complaining to the council that their employees were insisting on their legal rights after visiting the CAB offices so they were denied any kind of support from the council to the point that my mate's mum actually used to be the CAB from her own front room.
Not that I'm saying this instance of private sector laziness and outright lying is in any way the norm.  I imagine everywhere else it's a well-oiled machine.

[House of Usher]

The problem with selling off chunks of the NHS is that there will - for the sake of profit - be those who get shortchanged by the service provided.  The NHS needs to solve its problems with reform, not simply sell off difficult areas so they're no longer under the auspices of league tables and thus technically one in the 'win' column.

More likely it'll be the 'easy' bits that are sold off - the more routine and easily broken down into cost units and therefore the easiest to be made to turn a profit. How it works is you get a clerical, medical or industrial procedure that costs the NHS £45 to do. You work out a way to do it for £37 - using inferior materials, speeding it up or using less well trained staff, paid lower wages. You bill the NHS £45 for it, and you pocket £8. Voila.