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Conservative election poster 2010

A few recent news articles about the UK’s Conservative and Liberal-Democrat(Conservative) coalition government – the ConDem’s – brutal attack on the National Health Service.

 

‘Chickens coming home to roost’ as number of debt-ridden NHS trusts rise

The Audit Commission report highlighting the increasing number of NHS organisations in debt shows that “chickens are coming home to roost” for David Cameron, Unite, the largest union in the country, said today (Thursday, 20 September).

Unite’s head of health, Rachael Maskell said: “We now know why the risk register into the coalition’s so-called NHS reforms never saw the light of day, despite the best efforts of the Information Commissioner, Christopher Graham.
“The financial risks of Cameron’s reforms have resulted in trusts rapidly sinking into debt, leaving them ripe for accelerated privatisation.

“Services are being rationed which means patients have to wait longer or travel further for treatment which, in turn, puts the public at greater risk. No wonder Cameron exercised the Cabinet veto to stop the risk register being published.

“The new health secretary, Jeremy Hunt is on holiday in France, sipping fine wine, when he should be at his desk getting to grips with the chaos left by his predecessor, Andrew Lansley. The chickens are coming home to roost.”

The Audit Commission reported that the number of NHS trusts and foundation trusts in deficit increased from 13 in 2010/11 to 31 in 2011/12. Thirty nine NHS trusts reported a poorer financial position in 2011/12 than in the previous year, and 18 NHS trusts and foundation trusts received financial support from the Department of Health.

Increasing use of “zero-hours” contracts in Britain’s National Health Service

“Zero-Hours” contracts, which restrict workers to on call working, no guaranteed income or employment rights have been widely implemented across the National Health Service (NHS). The Independent recently reported that zero-hours contracts are increasingly being used “in core services such as cardiac, psychiatric therapy, respiratory diagnostics and adult hearing” describing this as “a key change to the fabric of NHS employment.”

Zero-Hours contracts are part of the Conservative/Liberal Democrat government’s plans to drive down wages and working conditions across the NHS and prepare it for full privatisation. The Independent report identifies the concerns of critics and experts, who warn of a “G4S-style” fiasco within the NHS, referring to the inability of private security firm G4S to provide the required amount of staff at the London Olympics due to the scandalous pay and conditions offered.

NHS workers have already suffered a two year pay freeze, attacks on pensions and increases in the retirement age. They will now be in danger of losing welfare benefits that top up their salaries, such as child tax credits. Qualification for these requires a person to work a minimum 16 hours a week. According to the Citizen Information Board workers on zero-hours contracts “are protected by the Organisation of Working Time Act 1997 but this does not apply to casual employment.”

The protection offered by the Act is nothing but a rubber a stamp for slashing wages even further.

If a worker “under a zero-hours contract works less than 25 percent of their hours in any week they are entitled to be compensated. The level of compensation depends on whether the employee got any work or none at all. If the employee got no work, then the compensation should be either for 25 percent of the possible available hours or for 15 hours, whichever is less. If the employee got some work, they should be compensated to bring them up to 25 percent of the possible available hours.”

But as the report in the Independent outlined, the contracts being offered by the NHS Trusts and private firms “do not guarantee any specified number of hours”. NHS workers will be on call but will have no guarantee on hours, pay or employments rights and will only get paid for the actual time spent at work—meaning they are “in work, but not always at work” as one expert explained.

…

NHS faces £8bn cuts ‘after next election’

The National Health Service could face cuts of almost £8bn immediately after the next general election, according to the first analysis of the Government’s own figures as it draws up another round of spending reductions.

In a report published today, the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) think tank reveals the stark choices facing all three main parties at the 2015 election. Although most attention has focused on George Osborne’s plan for a further £10bn of welfare cuts, that would not ease the pressure on other budgets such as health, education, defence and law and order.

David Cameron has pledged to increase NHS spending by more than inflation every year but that might not be extended beyond the election. The Chancellor has already conceded that more cuts will be needed in the first two years of the next parliament because he will not clear the deficit as quickly as he originally planned after the economy went back into recession.

According to the IPPR, the Government’s fiscal targets imply real terms cuts of 3.8 per cent in 2015-16 and 2016-17 – higher than the 2.3 per cent average reduction now being implemented across Whitehall departments. Unless the NHS pledge is extended – a move the Treasury may oppose – its budget would be cut by £7.8bn in 2016-17. If the cuts were spread evenly, education spending would fall by £3.8bn, defence by £1.7bn, local government by £1.6bn and the Home Office by £500m.

…

£20bn opportunity for private sector in NHS

Changes in healthcare policy and pressures on public finances represent a “£20bn opportunity” for the private sector to increase its NHS provision, according to a research report out this week.

A report by Catalyst, the corporate finance adviser, said the private sector is becoming increasingly involved in delivering healthcare services as the NHS struggles to cope with the demands of an ageing population and the need to make efficiency savings of £20bn by 2015.

It said there is a significant opportunity for the private sector in primary and secondary care in particular, markets it estimates to be worth around £20bn.

The report noted that while the private sector currently delivers a very small proportion of primary and secondary care, “if the Government is to manage funding pressures and achieve improved outcomes for patients this will need to increase”.

It said that landmark contracts awarded to providers such as Circle, Virgin Care and Serco show growing “recognition from the public sector that leveraging the private sector’s ability to invest capital and use more efficient delivery models is necessary for the Government to reduce costs while improving the quality of healthcare”.

Justin Crowther, director at Catalyst and co-author of the report, said: “Despite many challenges, the private sector is increasingly providing healthcare services, whether paid for by the taxpayer or directly by consumers at the point of use.

“Whether this is to turn around underperforming hospitals, operate GP surgeries, deliver community services or create centres of excellence in areas such as pathology, [NHS] commissioners are increasingly using the skills and capital of the private sector.”

 

NHS privatisation: Compilation of financial and vested interests

 

 

“We do want to break up the NHS. We don’t want to privatise it, we want to break it up.” Nick Clegg.

 

Nick Clegg’s demand for the NHS to be broken up

…

Opponents said the comments about the NHS, in a 2005 interview in the Independent, showed that Mr Clegg had no understanding of the way the health service works.

In the interview, carried out while Charles Kennedy was leader and two years before Mr Clegg took the job, he said: ‘I think breaking up the NHS is exactly what you do need to do to make it a more responsive service.’

Asked whether he favoured a Canadian or European-style social insurance system, he said: ‘I don’t think anything should be ruled out. I do think they deserve to be looked at because frankly the faults of the British health service compared to others still leave much to be desired.

‘We will have to provide alternatives about what a different NHS looks like.’

Under a social insurance system, members pay into an insurance scheme, either themselves or through an employer, to guarantee their healthcare. It means that those who pay into a more expensive scheme can get better care.

Under the NHS, however, everyone pays into the same scheme through taxes – and is then guaranteed care that is ‘free at the point of use’.

In the interview, Mr Clegg said ‘defending the status quo’ is no longer an option. Instead, he called on his party to ‘let its hair down’, ‘break a long-standing taboo’ and be ‘reckless’ in its thinking.

‘We do want to break up the NHS,’ he said. ‘We don’t want to privatise it, we want to break it up. Should the debate be taboo? Of course not, absolutely not.’

A year earlier, Mr Clegg had contributed to the notorious Orange Book in which those on the right of the party discussed how policies should change under Mr Kennedy’s leadership. The conclusion of the book outlines in more detail the type of insurance scheme he was outlining.

‘The NHS is failing to deliver a health service that meets the needs and expectations of today’s population,’ it said.

John Lister, of the lobby group Health Emergency, said: ‘These comments show Mr Clegg does not understand the NHS. He seems to be ignorant of the fact that social insurance schemes in Europe are far more expensive.’

Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said: ‘The NHS is one of Britain’s most loved institutions. People will be worried that Nick Clegg wants to “break it up”.’ [!!! That’s Andrew Lansley pretending that the NHS is safe in Tory hands before the election !!!]

 

How the Orange Bookers took over the Lib Dems

…
What Britain now has is a blue-orange coalition, with the little-known Orange Book forming the core of current Lib Dem political thinking. To understand how this disreputable arrangement has come about, we need to examine the philosophy laid out in The Orange Book: Reclaiming Liberalism, edited by David Laws (now the Chief Secretary to the Treasury) and Paul Marshall. Particularly interesting are the contributions of the Lib Dems’ present leadership.

Published in 2004, the Orange Book marked the start of the slow decline of progressive values in the Lib Dems and the gradual abandonment of social market values. It also provided the ideological standpoint around which the party’s right wing was able to coalesce and begin their march to power in the Lib Dems. What is remarkable is the failure of former SDP and Labour elements to sound warning bells about the direction the party was taking. Former Labour ministers such as Shirley Williams and Tom McNally should be ashamed of their inaction.

Clegg and his Lib Dem supporters have much in common with David Cameron and his allies in their philosophical approach and with their social liberal solutions to society’s perceived ills. The Orange Book is predicated on an abiding belief in the free market’s ability to address issues such as public healthcare, pensions, environment, globalisation, social and agricultural policy, local government and prisons.

The Lib Dem leadership seems to sit very easily in the Tory-led coalition. This is an arranged marriage between partners of a similar background and belief. Even the Tory-Whig coalition of early 1780s, although its members were from the same class, at least had fundamental political differences. Now we see a Government made up of a single elite that has previously manifested itself as two separate political parties and which is divided more by subtle shades of opinion than any profound ideological difference.
…

27/11/13 Having received a takedown notice from the Independent newspaper for a different posting, I have reviewed this article which links to an article at the Independent’s website in order to attempt to ensure conformance with copyright laws.

I consider this posting to comply with copyright laws since
a. Only a small portion of the original article has been quoted satisfying the fair use criteria, and / or
b. This posting satisfies the requirements of a derivative work.

Please be assured that this blog is a non-commercial blog (weblog) which does not feature advertising and has not ever produced any income.

dizzy

Continue ReadingNHS news review

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Conservative election poster 2010

A few recent news articles about the UK’s Conservative and Liberal-Democrat(Conservative) coalition government – the ConDem’s – brutal attack on the National Health Service.

 

TUC: six months left to save the NHS

A leading trade unionist has claimed there are just six months left to prevent the NHS from ending as we know it.

The TUC’s John Lister, Director of Health Emergency, insisted efforts to resist the controversial Health and Social Care Act must be increased before it is too late.

Mr Lister said an “urgent clarion call” is needed to “resist the privatisation, cuts, closures and wage reductions”.

He said that the Act aims to “fragment the NHS, marketise it, commercialise it and privatise the services that offer profits, while leaving the rest as an underfunded, understaffed shambles.”

Despite being at the heart of the health reforms, Mr Lister claims that GPs “will be in the hot seat for future cutbacks.” “In reality all of these plans are cash-driven, cynical efforts to meet Lansley’s £20bn target for ‘efficiency savings’,” he said.

The activist has now called for a “firm rejection of the Act” by union members, increased publicity to raise “public alarm” over the proposed reforms and a planned demonstration as a “landmark” to “highlight the lethal threat the coalition poses to the health service.”

“We need to get people aware, angry, campaigning and reclaiming our NHS before the private sector reclaims the bits they have wanted since 1948 and dumps the rest into permanent crisis,” he said.

Commenting on the appointment of the new Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, Mr Lister added that Andrew Lansley’s replacement has “all of the neoliberal politics” of his predecessor but “none of his declared attachment to the NHS”.

“He has made none of Lansley’s conciliatory gestures and promises to GPs during the progress of the Bill through Parliament and will no doubt find all of its worst proposals most congenial,” he said.

“His appointment as part of a rightward lurch by Cameron seems likely to result in accelerating the implementation of the Bill, while no doubt briefly diverting the energies of the British Medical Association and others who will feel obliged to give him the benefit of the doubt for a few weeks, wasting a bit more time before recognising the need to crank up the fight.”

 

TUC to support consultants’ resistance to NHS regional pay

By Francesca Robinson 

The TUC has voted to ’strongly’ resist moves to introduce regional pay into the NHS after a debate led by hospital consultants.

Regional pay would lead to a cut in take home pay, Eddie Saville general secretary of the Hospital Consultants and Specialists Association, told the trade union movement’s annual conference in Brighton.

After years of pay freezes and an attack on their pensions, this latest development had driven consultant morale down to an all time low. “Hospital consultants tell me that some may opt to go early, some have even said they will leave the UK altogether,” said Saville.

In the South West, 20 NHS trusts have formed a pay cartel which has drawn up a package of 28 proposals which include cuts to on-call payments for consultants, slashing time for supporting professional activities by 80% and reducing sick pay and annual leave entitlements.

“Regional pay means two hospital consultants or specialists with the same experience and same skills doing the same job but getting different levels of pay simply because they work and live in different parts of the country.

…

BMA calls regional pay proposals ‘shortsighted’

 

South West NHS trusts proposing to introduce regional pay and conditions have been accused of being “short-sighted” and making plans to “undermine the national ethos of the NHS”.

The British Medical Association (BMA) said the 20 trusts in the region which plan to fix the pay, terms and conditions of health workers in the South West would also waste resources and could make it harder for some areas to recruit high-quality staff. Proposals put forward include cutting pay and increasing hours.

In a new paper, the BMA describes the measures as “short-sighted”, saying they could lead to demoralised staff and an increase in regional variations in quality of care.

Dr Mark Porter, chairman of council at the BMA, said: “If this initiative is allowed to go ahead, other regions are likely to follow suit, taking us further away from a truly national health service. We do not want to see skills drain away from certain areas of the country, particularly in more remote regions.

“This is a distraction from serious attempts to address the massive financial challenges facing the NHS.

“Instead of wasting resources on short-term measures for which there is no evidence, and that will only serve to demoralise staff, we should focus on ways to genuinely improve efficiency and quality.”

…

GPs say NHS treatments rationed because of costs

 

A THIRD of GPs believe that health authorities are rationing NHS treatments because of costs, according to a survey.

Despite orders not to limit services, 35 per cent of general practitioners said that primary care trusts are restricting access to a number of treatments.

The poll, conducted by GP Magazine among 682 GPs, found that primary care trusts are rationing operations for hernia, joint replacement and varicose veins.

There were also restrictions on fertility treatments – such as IVF – and tonsillectomies, and access to some drugs.

GPs believe that health commissioners are also raising thresholds so most patients are not eligible for treatment, the magazine suggests.

In June, it emerged that pressure to save money had left 90 per cent of primary care trusts restricting certain procedures, including hip, knee and cataract operations and weight-loss surgery.

…

Cuts raise HIV care fears

Health professionals warned today that the quality of care given to HIV sufferers may plummet after Tory NHS “reforms” take effect next year.

The British HIV Association revealed that two-thirds of its members are worried the changes ushered in by the Health and Social Care Act will fragment services provided to patients.

From April 2013 commissioning will be split between the NHS Commissioning Board responsible for HIV treatment and local authorities, which will commission sexual health and genito-urinary medicine services including prevention and testing.

 

Thousands of elderly left suffering by ‘cruel and random’ eye surgery rationing

Thousands of elderly people are having to put up with deteriorating sight because they are denied cataract surgery on the NHS by ‘cruel and random’ rationing, campaigners warn.Some health trusts offer the procedure only to patients whose sight is so poor it has led to them having a fall, research has found.

Nearly half of health trusts ration operations, with many turning patients away unless they can no longer drive, read or recognise their friends.

…

NHS privatisation: Compilation of financial and vested interests

 

 

“We do want to break up the NHS. We don’t want to privatise it, we want to break it up.”  Nick Clegg.

 

Nick Clegg’s demand for the NHS to be broken up

…

Opponents said the comments about the NHS, in a 2005 interview in the Independent, showed that Mr Clegg had no understanding of the way the health service works.

In the interview, carried out while Charles Kennedy was leader and two years before Mr Clegg took the job, he said: ‘I think breaking up the NHS is exactly what you do need to do to make it a more responsive service.’

Asked whether he favoured a Canadian or European-style social insurance system, he said: ‘I don’t think anything should be ruled out. I do think they deserve to be looked at because frankly the faults of the British health service compared to others still leave much to be desired.

‘We will have to provide alternatives about what a different NHS looks like.’

Under a social insurance system, members pay into an insurance scheme, either themselves or through an employer, to guarantee their healthcare. It means that those who pay into a more expensive scheme can get better care.

Under the NHS, however, everyone pays into the same scheme through taxes – and is then guaranteed care that is ‘free at the point of use’.

In the interview, Mr Clegg said ‘defending the status quo’ is no longer an option. Instead, he called on his party to ‘let its hair down’, ‘break a long-standing taboo’ and be ‘reckless’ in its thinking.

‘We do want to break up the NHS,’ he said. ‘We don’t want to privatise it, we want to break it up. Should the debate be taboo? Of course not, absolutely not.’

A year earlier, Mr Clegg had contributed to the notorious Orange Book in which those on the right of the party discussed how policies should change under Mr Kennedy’s leadership. The conclusion of the book outlines in more detail the type of insurance scheme he was outlining.

‘The NHS is failing to deliver a health service that meets the needs and expectations of today’s population,’ it said.

John Lister, of the lobby group Health Emergency, said: ‘These comments show Mr Clegg does not understand the NHS. He seems to be ignorant of the fact that social insurance schemes in Europe are far more expensive.’

Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said: ‘The NHS is one of Britain’s most loved institutions. People will be worried that Nick Clegg wants to “break it up”.’ [!!! That’s Andrew Lansley pretending that the NHS is safe in Tory hands before the election !!!]

 

How the Orange Bookers took over the Lib Dems

…
What Britain now has is a blue-orange coalition, with the little-known Orange Book forming the core of current Lib Dem political thinking. To understand how this disreputable arrangement has come about, we need to examine the philosophy laid out in The Orange Book: Reclaiming Liberalism, edited by David Laws (now the Chief Secretary to the Treasury) and Paul Marshall. Particularly interesting are the contributions of the Lib Dems’ present leadership.

Published in 2004, the Orange Book marked the start of the slow decline of progressive values in the Lib Dems and the gradual abandonment of social market values. It also provided the ideological standpoint around which the party’s right wing was able to coalesce and begin their march to power in the Lib Dems. What is remarkable is the failure of former SDP and Labour elements to sound warning bells about the direction the party was taking. Former Labour ministers such as Shirley Williams and Tom McNally should be ashamed of their inaction.

Clegg and his Lib Dem supporters have much in common with David Cameron and his allies in their philosophical approach and with their social liberal solutions to society’s perceived ills. The Orange Book is predicated on an abiding belief in the free market’s ability to address issues such as public healthcare, pensions, environment, globalisation, social and agricultural policy, local government and prisons.

The Lib Dem leadership seems to sit very easily in the Tory-led coalition. This is an arranged marriage between partners of a similar background and belief. Even the Tory-Whig coalition of early 1780s, although its members were from the same class, at least had fundamental political differences. Now we see a Government made up of a single elite that has previously manifested itself as two separate political parties and which is divided more by subtle shades of opinion than any profound ideological difference.
…

Continue ReadingNHS news review

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Conservative election poster 2010

A few recent news articles about the UK’s Conservative and Liberal-Democrat(Conservative) coalition government – the ConDem’s – brutal attack on the National Health Service.

GPOnline Editorial: Time for the new health secretary to listen to GPs

Few GP tears are likely to be shed at the departure of Mr Lansley, whose Health and Social Care Act became law earlier this year.

Mr Hunt’s promotion is curious because health is not a subject in which his expertise is renowned and he has also been under recent pressure for his handling of the BSkyB takeover bid.

There have also been changes at the top of the BMA. GPonline last week revealed that retired GP Dr Kailash Chand, an outspoken critic of Mr Lansley’s vision, had been elected deputy chairman. Dr Chand was uncompromising about Mr Lansley’s two-year reign as health secretary, describing him as doing an ‘utterly miserable job’.

Away from the corridors of Richmond House, Westminster and BMA House, 212 clinical commissioning groups covering the entirety of England are undergoing authorisation by the NHS Commissioning Board to take over from PCTs from April 2013. The BMA and other unions are at loggerheads with the government over proposed NHS pension changes and ministers are expected to give the go-ahead imminently to revalidation of GPs.

There’s a great deal for the BMA and the RCGP, thanks to the profile-raising work of its chairwoman Professor Clare Gerada, to discuss with Mr Hunt.

Mr Lansley spent many years shadowing the health secretary and it seems likely that his opinions may have been more firmly entrenched than Mr Hunt’s. The BMA and the RCGP should waste no time in seeking to put their views to a fresh pair of ears.

NHS staff in fear of pay cuts

 

HEALTH workers believe that plans to introduce regional pay and conditions would have a “devastating” impact on their lives.

A survey by union Unison of 1,000 NHS employees in the South West showed almost all were concerned about the prospect of pay cuts, increased hours and performance-related pay being introduced by a group of 20 health trusts, including Bristol and Weston’s hospital trusts.

Unison describes the South West NHS Pay Consortium as a cartel and says some members it surveyed would have to cut down on essentials such as food, and might not be able to pay their mortgage, if their wages were cut following years of pay freezes.

The union was due to lobby MPs today on the “dangers” of introducing regional pay and conditions.

Christina McAnea, Unison’s head of health, said: “This survey shows that the South West pay cartel’s plans could push health workers in the region to breaking point. They are worried about the impact on their families, but also what these changes would mean for their patients.”

…

 

UK politicians gain from privatising National Health Service

 

Social Investigations, an independent news blog offering research on political matters of social interest, has compiled an extensive list of British MPs and members of the House of Lords who are set to gain from the ongoing privatisation of the National Health Service.

As this year’s Health and Social Care Bill was being debated and voted on in both houses, more than 200 parliamentarians held financial interests in businesses involved in private health care.

Hedge fund boss John Nash, chairman of Care UK, has over the past five years donated £203,500 to the Conservative Party. Back in 2009, it was a donation by Nash of £21,000 that helped fund Andrew Lansley’s “personal office”—from 2010 until this week, health secretary in the Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition.

Last year, some 96 percent of Nash’s Care UK’s business, amounting to more than £400 million, came from public money channelled via the NHS. City firm Sovereign Capital, also founded by Nash, runs a string of private health care firms.

Lansley was also sponsored by other players in the health care industry. In 2008, he received a donation from Julian Schild used to support his office in his capacity as shadow secretary for health. Julian Schild’s family made £184 million in 2006 by selling hospital bed-maker Huntleigh Technology.

Landsley’s wife, Sally Low, according to a February 2011 article by the Daily Telegraph, is the founder and managing director of Low Associates. Her company web site boasted pharmaceutical companies SmithKline Beecham, Unilever and P&G among its clients. This information was swiftly removed amid her insisting that her company does not work with corporations that have an interest in the health sector.

Social Investigations highlighted another influential Tory donor as Nash’s business partner, Ryan Robson. To date, Robson has donated a total of £252,429 to the Tories, £50,000 of which was given to position himself as a member of the party’s “Leader’s Group”, a cash-for-access club.

Back in 2010, Prime Minister David Cameron, shortly after taking office, gave private care home tycoon Dolar Popat a peerage. Lord Popat is reported to have donated £209,000 to the Conservative Party. Of this figure, £25,000 was registered as a donation a week after the Tories’ health reforms were unveiled.

Fellow Tory Lord Ashcroft has also gained from the government’s NHS recruitment freeze. Over the last three years, his company Medacs has benefited to the tune of £7 million by providing agency staff to cover the 28,610 jobs lost as a result of Lansley’s ban on NHS recruitment.

The Labour Party has its own ties to private health care. McKinsey & Co, which drew up many of the proposals finally accepted into the Health and Social Care Bill, paid David Miliband, Labour MP for South Shields and brother of the current Labour leader, Ed Miliband, £10,000 in February 2010 for a speech at a Global Business Leaders Summit. This was the same year that he was positioning himself for the leadership of the Labour Party in a contest lost to his brother. In March 2011, he received a further £10,044 from the same company for travel expenses and accommodation in Singapore.

Alan Milburn, the former health secretary under Labour, was a consultant for Alliance Medical’s parent company. Alliance Medical runs diagnostic services for the NHS, including in Birmingham and Falkirk. In 2008, his registered parliamentary interests highlight that he was a member of Lloyds pharmacy’s Healthcare Advisory panel and was paid in the region of £30,000.

Also in 2008, Milburn was a member of the European Advisory Board of Bridgepoint Capital Limited, the private equity firm that acquired Care UK.

Labour’s Lord Peter Mandelson was also registered as late as May 2012 as a senior advisor to an international advisory investment bank known as at Lazard Ltd, which holds corporate interests in private health care.

Since 2004, the Liberal Democrats have received donations to the tune of £440,000 from Alpha Healthcare Ltd. In 2010, the year they entered into coalition with the Conservatives, £125,000 was donated to fund Nick Clegg’s party by Alpha Healthcare. In 2004, the director of the company, Bhanu Choudhrie, made two donations of £10,000, and a further £20,000 in 2008. His father, Sudhir Choudrie, in 2006 made donations totalling £95,000. This donation was gratefully received by the Liberal Democrats, despite several cases being filed by the Confederation of British Industry alleging his use of manipulation and bribery in defence purchases.

These are the politicians the trade unions insist can be persuaded to turn away from privatisation and preserve the NHS by applying a little moral pressure.

 

 

“We do want to break up the NHS. We don’t want to privatise it, we want to break it up.”  Nick Clegg.

 

Nick Clegg’s demand for the NHS to be broken up

…

Opponents said the comments about the NHS, in a 2005 interview in the Independent, showed that Mr Clegg had no understanding of the way the health service works.

In the interview, carried out while Charles Kennedy was leader and two years before Mr Clegg took the job, he said: ‘I think breaking up the NHS is exactly what you do need to do to make it a more responsive service.’

Asked whether he favoured a Canadian or European-style social insurance system, he said: ‘I don’t think anything should be ruled out. I do think they deserve to be looked at because frankly the faults of the British health service compared to others still leave much to be desired.

‘We will have to provide alternatives about what a different NHS looks like.’

Under a social insurance system, members pay into an insurance scheme, either themselves or through an employer, to guarantee their healthcare. It means that those who pay into a more expensive scheme can get better care.

Under the NHS, however, everyone pays into the same scheme through taxes – and is then guaranteed care that is ‘free at the point of use’.

In the interview, Mr Clegg said ‘defending the status quo’ is no longer an option. Instead, he called on his party to ‘let its hair down’, ‘break a long-standing taboo’ and be ‘reckless’ in its thinking.

‘We do want to break up the NHS,’ he said. ‘We don’t want to privatise it, we want to break it up. Should the debate be taboo? Of course not, absolutely not.’

A year earlier, Mr Clegg had contributed to the notorious Orange Book in which those on the right of the party discussed how policies should change under Mr Kennedy’s leadership. The conclusion of the book outlines in more detail the type of insurance scheme he was outlining.

‘The NHS is failing to deliver a health service that meets the needs and expectations of today’s population,’ it said.

John Lister, of the lobby group Health Emergency, said: ‘These comments show Mr Clegg does not understand the NHS. He seems to be ignorant of the fact that social insurance schemes in Europe are far more expensive.’

Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said: ‘The NHS is one of Britain’s most loved institutions. People will be worried that Nick Clegg wants to “break it up”.’ [!!! That’s Andrew Lansley pretending that the NHS is safe in Tory hands before the election !!!]

 

How the Orange Bookers took over the Lib Dems

…
What Britain now has is a blue-orange coalition, with the little-known Orange Book forming the core of current Lib Dem political thinking. To understand how this disreputable arrangement has come about, we need to examine the philosophy laid out in The Orange Book: Reclaiming Liberalism, edited by David Laws (now the Chief Secretary to the Treasury) and Paul Marshall. Particularly interesting are the contributions of the Lib Dems’ present leadership.

Published in 2004, the Orange Book marked the start of the slow decline of progressive values in the Lib Dems and the gradual abandonment of social market values. It also provided the ideological standpoint around which the party’s right wing was able to coalesce and begin their march to power in the Lib Dems. What is remarkable is the failure of former SDP and Labour elements to sound warning bells about the direction the party was taking. Former Labour ministers such as Shirley Williams and Tom McNally should be ashamed of their inaction.

Clegg and his Lib Dem supporters have much in common with David Cameron and his allies in their philosophical approach and with their social liberal solutions to society’s perceived ills. The Orange Book is predicated on an abiding belief in the free market’s ability to address issues such as public healthcare, pensions, environment, globalisation, social and agricultural policy, local government and prisons.

The Lib Dem leadership seems to sit very easily in the Tory-led coalition. This is an arranged marriage between partners of a similar background and belief. Even the Tory-Whig coalition of early 1780s, although its members were from the same class, at least had fundamental political differences. Now we see a Government made up of a single elite that has previously manifested itself as two separate political parties and which is divided more by subtle shades of opinion than any profound ideological difference.
…

Continue ReadingNHS news review

NHS news review

Spread the love

Conservative election poster 2010

A few recent news articles about the UK’s Conservative and Liberal-Democrat(Conservative) coalition government – the ConDem’s – brutal attack on the National Health Service.

“Low Staffing” partly to blame for child’s death

 
The parents of a seven-year-old boy who died following heart surgery have been told Bank Holiday staff shortages at an NHS hospital were partly to blame.

Luke Jenkins, from St Mellons in Cardiff, died in hospital on Good Friday after suffering cardiac arrest.

Luke, who was born with a congenital heart defect, had undergone successful corrective heart surgery at Bristol Children’s Hospital.

He was expected to make a full recovery, but he died within a week.

An investigation by University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust classified the incident as ‘catastrophic’ and found a catalogue of avoidable errors contributed to Luke’s death, along with clinical patient factors.

The report identified there to be ‘low and unsafe nurse staffing’ for a cardiac high dependency unit.

…

Pro-NHS ad warns Jeremy Hunt ‘we’re watching you’

 

Campaign group 38 Degrees has taken out a full page ad in today’s Daily Telegraph to warn new health secretary Jeremy Hunt not to do “our NHS any further harm”.

38degrees warn Jeremy Hunt about the NHS
38degrees warn Jeremy Hunt about the NHS

 

 

“We do want to break up the NHS. We don’t want to privatise it, we want to break it up.”  Nick Clegg.

 

Nick Clegg’s demand for the NHS to be broken up

…

Opponents said the comments about the NHS, in a 2005 interview in the Independent, showed that Mr Clegg had no understanding of the way the health service works.

In the interview, carried out while Charles Kennedy was leader and two years before Mr Clegg took the job, he said: ‘I think breaking up the NHS is exactly what you do need to do to make it a more responsive service.’

Asked whether he favoured a Canadian or European-style social insurance system, he said: ‘I don’t think anything should be ruled out. I do think they deserve to be looked at because frankly the faults of the British health service compared to others still leave much to be desired.

‘We will have to provide alternatives about what a different NHS looks like.’

Under a social insurance system, members pay into an insurance scheme, either themselves or through an employer, to guarantee their healthcare. It means that those who pay into a more expensive scheme can get better care.

Under the NHS, however, everyone pays into the same scheme through taxes – and is then guaranteed care that is ‘free at the point of use’.

In the interview, Mr Clegg said ‘defending the status quo’ is no longer an option. Instead, he called on his party to ‘let its hair down’, ‘break a long-standing taboo’ and be ‘reckless’ in its thinking.

‘We do want to break up the NHS,’ he said. ‘We don’t want to privatise it, we want to break it up. Should the debate be taboo? Of course not, absolutely not.’

A year earlier, Mr Clegg had contributed to the notorious Orange Book in which those on the right of the party discussed how policies should change under Mr Kennedy’s leadership. The conclusion of the book outlines in more detail the type of insurance scheme he was outlining.

‘The NHS is failing to deliver a health service that meets the needs and expectations of today’s population,’ it said.

John Lister, of the lobby group Health Emergency, said: ‘These comments show Mr Clegg does not understand the NHS. He seems to be ignorant of the fact that social insurance schemes in Europe are far more expensive.’

Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said: ‘The NHS is one of Britain’s most loved institutions. People will be worried that Nick Clegg wants to “break it up”.’ [!!! That’s Andrew Lansley pretending that the NHS is safe in Tory hands before the election !!!]

 

How the Orange Bookers took over the Lib Dems

…
What Britain now has is a blue-orange coalition, with the little-known Orange Book forming the core of current Lib Dem political thinking. To understand how this disreputable arrangement has come about, we need to examine the philosophy laid out in The Orange Book: Reclaiming Liberalism, edited by David Laws (now the Chief Secretary to the Treasury) and Paul Marshall. Particularly interesting are the contributions of the Lib Dems’ present leadership.

Published in 2004, the Orange Book marked the start of the slow decline of progressive values in the Lib Dems and the gradual abandonment of social market values. It also provided the ideological standpoint around which the party’s right wing was able to coalesce and begin their march to power in the Lib Dems. What is remarkable is the failure of former SDP and Labour elements to sound warning bells about the direction the party was taking. Former Labour ministers such as Shirley Williams and Tom McNally should be ashamed of their inaction.

Clegg and his Lib Dem supporters have much in common with David Cameron and his allies in their philosophical approach and with their social liberal solutions to society’s perceived ills. The Orange Book is predicated on an abiding belief in the free market’s ability to address issues such as public healthcare, pensions, environment, globalisation, social and agricultural policy, local government and prisons.

The Lib Dem leadership seems to sit very easily in the Tory-led coalition. This is an arranged marriage between partners of a similar background and belief. Even the Tory-Whig coalition of early 1780s, although its members were from the same class, at least had fundamental political differences. Now we see a Government made up of a single elite that has previously manifested itself as two separate political parties and which is divided more by subtle shades of opinion than any profound ideological difference.
…

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Conservative election poster 2010

A few recent news articles about the UK’s Conservative and Liberal-Democrat(Conservative) coalition government – the ConDem’s – brutal attack on the National Health Service.

 

 

38degrees warn Jeremy Hunt about the NHS
38degrees warn Jeremy Hunt about the NHS

 

Lansley was crap

There should be no sentiment about Andrew Lansley’s departure as health secretary, no matter how hard he worked, how gutted he is to lose the Tory health brief after nine years or how much he cared about the health service. By every measure of high political office, he was a disaster and he deserved to be sacked.

As a strategist, he failed to look for the most pragmatic way to achieve his desired outcome. He simply would not recognise that taking a wrecking ball to NHS structures – at a time of intense financial stress, rising demand and the necessity for widespread changes to clinical practice – was foolish. He compounded this mistake by imposing a structure that resembles a London tube map. Compare that with Michael Gove’s pragmatic approach of bending the existing academy programme to his will.

As a politician, Lansley managed to turn virtually every interest group against him, gave the opposition almost limitless opportunities to attack and lost the confidence of the public. He was so inept that even after the extraordinary spectacle of “the pause” – when the government just about managed to get the policy back into some sort of order – he again careered into a political ditch as it went through the Lords. Sharp, charming health minister Earl Howe had to tow him out.

Lansley was a shocking communicator, from ill-tempered media interviews to the hectoring tone he adopted with the professions. His idea of consultation was to repeat what he had said in the hope that this time you would finally concede he was right. Ridiculing managers as “bureaucrats” was just one indicator of his ineptitude – alienating with a single word the very people who had to implement his reforms.

…

 

NHS pay cuts will lead to exodus of health workers, say nurses

NHS hospitals that impose pay cuts on staff will see health professionals leaving in protest and the quality of care coming under threat as a result, nurses’ leaders claim.

Care in the south-west of England, where 20 NHS trusts are seeking to bring in local pay rates, will suffer if the plan goes ahead, according to the Royal College of Nursing (RCN).

The trusts are taking a reckless gamble because the region’s sizeable elderly population and falling number of nurses mean it is badly placed to cope with a “skills drain” of NHS staff angry at having their pay cut, it says.

Health unions, including the British Medical Association which represents doctors, are furious that the trusts have formed a cartel in an attempt to bring in localised pay rates, fewer holidays and reduced sick leave, as part of their efforts to cope with flat budgets and contribute to a £20bn NHS-wide savings drive. They fear that, if successful, the move by the South-West Pay, Terms and Conditions Consortium could erode the NHS’s long-established system of national bargaining and agreed pay scales.

The consortium has told staff that unless they accept changes that the RCN calls “draconian”, the jobs of 6,000 of the 68,000 staff employed by the 20 trusts could go. Pay typically takes up about 65% of a hospital trust’s budget.

In a briefing analysing the potential impact of the move, which the RCN has sent to the 20 trusts, it warns: “Reducing the pay, terms and conditions of staff in the south-west is not the only choice that employers have, and this course of action is highly likely to negatively impact on patient care. Not only is there a real risk that staff will be forced to leave the NHS, but it will also be difficult to recruit, and the morale of remaining staff will be damaged further.”

In an accompanying letter, Dr Peter Carter, the RCN’s chief executive, adds that the move “will create a skills deficit in the region that will impact on the ability of trusts to provide high-quality care” and will increase rather than reduce staffing costs because it will involve extra bureaucracy and constant negotiation.

…

 

“We do want to break up the NHS. We don’t want to privatise it, we want to break it up.”  Nick Clegg.

 

Nick Clegg’s demand for the NHS to be broken up

…

Opponents said the comments about the NHS, in a 2005 interview in the Independent, showed that Mr Clegg had no understanding of the way the health service works.

In the interview, carried out while Charles Kennedy was leader and two years before Mr Clegg took the job, he said: ‘I think breaking up the NHS is exactly what you do need to do to make it a more responsive service.’

Asked whether he favoured a Canadian or European-style social insurance system, he said: ‘I don’t think anything should be ruled out. I do think they deserve to be looked at because frankly the faults of the British health service compared to others still leave much to be desired.

‘We will have to provide alternatives about what a different NHS looks like.’

Under a social insurance system, members pay into an insurance scheme, either themselves or through an employer, to guarantee their healthcare. It means that those who pay into a more expensive scheme can get better care.

Under the NHS, however, everyone pays into the same scheme through taxes – and is then guaranteed care that is ‘free at the point of use’.

In the interview, Mr Clegg said ‘defending the status quo’ is no longer an option. Instead, he called on his party to ‘let its hair down’, ‘break a long-standing taboo’ and be ‘reckless’ in its thinking.

‘We do want to break up the NHS,’ he said. ‘We don’t want to privatise it, we want to break it up. Should the debate be taboo? Of course not, absolutely not.’

A year earlier, Mr Clegg had contributed to the notorious Orange Book in which those on the right of the party discussed how policies should change under Mr Kennedy’s leadership. The conclusion of the book outlines in more detail the type of insurance scheme he was outlining.

‘The NHS is failing to deliver a health service that meets the needs and expectations of today’s population,’ it said.

John Lister, of the lobby group Health Emergency, said: ‘These comments show Mr Clegg does not understand the NHS. He seems to be ignorant of the fact that social insurance schemes in Europe are far more expensive.’

Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said: ‘The NHS is one of Britain’s most loved institutions. People will be worried that Nick Clegg wants to “break it up”.’ [!!! That’s Andrew Lansley pretending that the NHS is safe in Tory hands before the election !!!]

 

How the Orange Bookers took over the Lib Dems

…
What Britain now has is a blue-orange coalition, with the little-known Orange Book forming the core of current Lib Dem political thinking. To understand how this disreputable arrangement has come about, we need to examine the philosophy laid out in The Orange Book: Reclaiming Liberalism, edited by David Laws (now the Chief Secretary to the Treasury) and Paul Marshall. Particularly interesting are the contributions of the Lib Dems’ present leadership.

Published in 2004, the Orange Book marked the start of the slow decline of progressive values in the Lib Dems and the gradual abandonment of social market values. It also provided the ideological standpoint around which the party’s right wing was able to coalesce and begin their march to power in the Lib Dems. What is remarkable is the failure of former SDP and Labour elements to sound warning bells about the direction the party was taking. Former Labour ministers such as Shirley Williams and Tom McNally should be ashamed of their inaction.

Clegg and his Lib Dem supporters have much in common with David Cameron and his allies in their philosophical approach and with their social liberal solutions to society’s perceived ills. The Orange Book is predicated on an abiding belief in the free market’s ability to address issues such as public healthcare, pensions, environment, globalisation, social and agricultural policy, local government and prisons.

The Lib Dem leadership seems to sit very easily in the Tory-led coalition. This is an arranged marriage between partners of a similar background and belief. Even the Tory-Whig coalition of early 1780s, although its members were from the same class, at least had fundamental political differences. Now we see a Government made up of a single elite that has previously manifested itself as two separate political parties and which is divided more by subtle shades of opinion than any profound ideological difference.
…

Continue ReadingNHS news review