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Thread: UK General ELection 7 May 2015
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05-03-2015 #51
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Re: UK General ELection 7 May 2015
Flattered as I am, I would be genuinely amazing if I could correctly predict the outcome. This is the closest election on polling results we have had, particularly as the polls are based on up to date census information, whereas in the past this has not always been the case. One enigma is the 'Shy Tory' -those Tory voters who are shy of admitting to pollsters that they will vote Tory, but how this translates into seats -rather than votes- is the unanswered question. Unless in the last few days an unexpected event happens or someone makes a major gaffe, little will change.
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05-03-2015 #52
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05-05-2015 #53
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Re: UK General ELection 7 May 2015
Privatisation of the NHS is an emotive subject, but also one that needs to be set in context, because we have always had a fusion, however uncomfortable, between the private and the public sectors. From the beginning, the Labour Govt of 1945 had to concede the right of physicians to practice private health care and for the insurance companies to offer private health insurance packages. And it is beyond doubt that the pharmaceutical industry has made billions from the NHS but as they have been amongst the top sources of funds for research and development in pharmaceuticals it could be argued that they also put a lot back into the NHS.
Since Mrs Thatcher came to power in 1979 there have been reforms to the NHS which included the 'internal market reforms' and the 'private finance initiative' -both maintained by the Labour government, and which were intended to improve efficiency. In fact, the result has been that while in 1983 the NHS spent 5% of its budget on administration costs, it now spends 15%.
The right of private firms to bid for contracts from the NHS was amended by the Coalition government so that the cap imposed by Labour of 2% was raised by the coalition to 49%. But in fact the number of new contracts issued under the PFI when Labour was in power had reached 5% by 2010 and under five years of coalition has reached 6% so that both Labour and the Conservative-Liberal Democrat Coalition have a record of supporting Private Finance Initiatives in the NHS meaning that it is disingenuous of the Tories to make claims about privatisation when they have raised the threshold of private opportunity, and in Labour's case a combination of lies and spin.
Strictly speaking, none of the parties support the wholesale privatisation of the NHS, whereas partial privatisation by stealth has been government policy since 1988. Or it could just be an acknowledgement that the NHS on its own cannot provide everything and that it needs private sources of investment even if this means private firms benefit from the NHS, but as noted above, this has always been the case with pharmaceuticals, and also medical suppliers (eg surgical instruments, machinery).
Of greater concern at the moment -but hardly mentioned at all, is that part of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership -TTIP- which the EU and the USA are negotiating -in secret- and which is intended to give US corporations access to the single market of the EU through a major amendment to regulatory barriers. The general argument is that this will weaken the regulations developed in the EU on issue such as job security, health and safety and the environment, because these regulations are weaker in the USA than in the EU and parity is a key feature of the TTIP. Although the government has said that TTIP will not be used to guarantee US firms access to NHS contracts because public services in the EU will be protected, the UK's Trade Minister Lord Livingstone has said talks on the NHS are 'on the table' -
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/...u-9779688.html
Another worry is that TTIP will include Investor-State Disputes Settlement clauses which in theory could allow US firms to sue the governments of the EU if government policies undermine the profit made from contracts -one example given is of the Swedish energy firm Vatenfall taking the German government to court because of its decision to phase out nuclear power, though this appears to relate to an existing contract with that company and a demand for compensation. But if ISDS went through it could mean the government not imposing carbon emissions levels on firms linked to TTIP if it meant reducing the profits of the trade inviting the US firm to sue the British government -for imposing on firms a policy that came from a democratically elected government...clearly this will or should become a matter of open discussion soon.
Last edited by Stavros; 05-05-2015 at 01:22 AM.
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05-06-2015 #54
Re: UK General ELection 7 May 2015
Based on this analysis NHS can only offer its citizen/patients higher quality care by continuing the trend towards partial privatization. The issue facing voters is to chose the ruling party who can strike the right balance by assuring NHS will not succumb to the private sector forces that will be exerted on it by its interaction with for-profit vendors (many in the U.S. apparently). That invisible hand thing Adam Smith spoke about can be might persuasive.
I believe Obamacare has failed at this. Yes we have more people covered but far too often cost factors at American hospitals override medical judgement when deciding treatment options.
You guys might not get another shot at getting this right. I hope you don't fuck it up.
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05-06-2015 #55
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Re: UK General ELection 7 May 2015
I think a common problem is that the costs of delivery tend to be related more to the bureaucracy involved than the actual costs of the medicine and the labour. The cost of a cortisone injection comes in at about £12 at your local doctor's surgery where it costs £120 in the local hospital -because the running costs of a hospital are that much more costly, reflecting that rise in admin costs I mentioned in the earlier post -the running costs of a hospital in the US are far higher than in the UK which suggests that this is a crucial area that soaks up funding which would otherwise be spent on actual medicine.
You might think that in an age of computing administration would be easier and cheaper to deliver, but in fact the medical care sector has been left behind -various attempts to integrate NHS computing so that a patient's records can be accessed anywhere in the system have failed, at a cost of millions of pounds. It is probably cheaper and more efficient for NASA to send a probe to Mars than it is to run a general hospital.
The anxiety that people have is that charges will be introduced in the NHS because of the pressures it is under, particularly on funding. It is a cardinal rule in election campaigns that parties seeking power do not pledge to increase either income tax or national health contributions, even if the logic on costs says otherwise; or, if taxes are to be raised it will always be on the rich as nobody cares about them. Private finance in one form or another has always been there because the NHS alone cannot provide services and also manufacture bandages, syringes, heart monitors and so forth. In fact a year after the NHS was created the Act of Parliament was amended to allow the NHS to impose prescription charges -Nye Bevan, the Minister who steered the NHS act through the Commons in 1948 resigned in protest- though actual charges were not introduced until 1952 and since then have been amended to exclude the unemployed, students, people over 60 -and abolished completely in Wales and Scotland. Nevertheless, there is a fear that people may be charged say £5 to visit their GP or a Casualty department.
There is an argument that if people lived healthier lives a degree of pressure on the NHS would be relieved -people convinced they are dying would not be rushed to Casualty in an ambulance when in fact they have belly ache; casualties on weekends are busy with people who can't handle their drink or get into fights. On another level, while many more people are living beyond the age of 80, many of them are also in better health than their counterparts say 20 years ago. My generation smoked less than our parents so that smoking related illnesses are less common in our cohort, but it seems if you reduce a chronic problem in one area, another one emerges -alcohol abuse and obesity related illnesses are taking up more resources than they were 20 years ago and are now more common in the 30-40 year age group for example.
Perhaps, fundamentally, people resent the idea that someone is making a profit from someone else's illness.
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05-06-2015 #56
Re: UK General ELection 7 May 2015
The NHS is something dear to the hearts of most Brits - like the BBC, the Post Office and the railways. Maybe that's why politicians want to change them all beyond recognition. We can't afford the perfect health service though we spend less than most developed countries. Health expenditure in the UK was 9.27 per cent of GDP in 2012. This compares to 16.90 per cent in the USA, 11.77 per cent in the Netherlands, 11.61 per cent in France, 11.27 per cent in Germany, 10.98 per cent in Denmark, and 10.93 per cent in Canada. The NHS net surplus for the 2013/14 financial year was £722 million.
Politicians of all parties have, as they do for education, messed around with the NHS. The Public Private Initiative (PPI) was a big mistake. To get health investment off the books, NHS Trusts bought new facilities on a mortgage. Saddling them with 20-30 year debts. This is the root cause of many of the NHS's problems.
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05-06-2015 #57
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Re: UK General ELection 7 May 2015
Very well put Martin, an important perspective too.
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05-06-2015 #58
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05-06-2015 #59
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05-06-2015 #60
Re: UK General ELection 7 May 2015
Reasons why I don't trust the Tories
When Nye Bevan established the NHS for free treatment and healthcare for all following the war, the Tories voted against the National Health Act in Parliament on three occasions in an attempt to prevent the NHS as we know it today.
In 2009 the Tory health secretary Jeremy Hunt co-authored a book calling for the NHS to be dismantled calling it 'no longer relevant'
The 2010 Tory manifesto (P47) said 'we will stop forced closures of A&E' (What went wrong?), Tories also said 'no more top down re-organisation' (They have actually turned the NHS on its head never mind reorganised it)
The Tory led coalition have made cuts of over £20-billion to the NHS dressing them up as efficiency savings'
Under the coalition waiting times have risen to their worst levels for many years, the NHS has been forced to axe over 4,000 senior nurses since 2010;
62 Tory MP's and 63 Tory Lords have links to taking on NHS private health care contracts
Worst of all the Tories introduced the 2012 Health And Social Care Act removing the government duty to provide healthcare, meaning the Health Secretary now only has to promote healthcare and is no longer lawfully obliged to provide it.
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