Barely a week goes by without someone telling me about another imminent threat from the Tories to privatise the NHS, and introduce American style healthcare. As you might have spotted after 30 years of these stories I am pretty sceptical. The NHS is still as it ever was. I do understand people’s anxieties. Hospitals that… Read More Who owns American Hospitals? | And are they coming over here?
Dominic Cummings has been giving evidence to the Commons Science and Technology select committee. He remains unshakable in his belief in his own genius, even though it is obvious to everyone that the Government has performed loads better since he left. The Government won’t hold an inquiry into Covid until next year at the soonest,… Read More Dominic Cummings and the NHS | Do we believe him? | Does it matter?
The Greensill scandal isn’t going away with further revelations about lobbying and inquiries. There are still some big questions that stick in my mind; What was Greensill’s actual business? How did they plan to make money? Warning: Contains full frontal accountancy Greensill liked to describe themselves as a fin-tech company, but their business model was… Read More Greensill P2 | Credit Crunch economics
Yet another blog about hapless hospital botherer and haunted dishcloth Matt Hancock This week the Government announced an inquiry into the relationship between Greensill Capital, David Cameron and Boris Johnson’s Government. Most of the questions the press are asking are about the relationship between Cameron, Rishi Sunak and Greensill over Covid loans. But there is… Read More The real threat to the NHS | Greensill, Topwood and Matt Hancock
Matt Hancock was found this week to have broken the law by failing to publish the details of contracts awarded without competition for goods and services such as personal protective equipment (PPE) needed during the covid-19 pandemic. This is the first of a series of Judicial Reviews by an eccentric group of lawyers called The… Read More How Matt Hancock broke the law | And why it matters
The Government has announced it’s new plans for NHS reform, the draft of which was leaked a week or 2 ago. Fuck is a strong word for a headline, but I am afraid that’s what is about to happen. The Lansley reforms of the NHS will be reversed, along with almost all of the internal… Read More How the Government will mess up the NHS | Centralisation not privatisation is the problem
The Government has made a massive mess of it’s response to Coronavirus. An unmitigated disaster. Boris Johnson and his team prioritised managing the news cycle over managing the virus; too many eye catching announcements without any actual thought about whether they would work. With so many gaffes it’s hard to pick a low point, but… Read More Fragile Working | Why the public sector coped with Covid better than the private sector
Over the last week there has been on line anger over a vote in the House of Commons to stop the NHS being part of a future UK/US trade deal. The vote itself was pretty much meaningless political posturing. The response on social media was full of plucky memes fighting NHS privatisation, complete with made… Read More Another NHS Re-organisation | More plucky memes!
A few months ago I wrote about the impossible task that Trump had set himself getting rid of Obamacare: Trump’s basic problem is that the US has been drifting closer and closer to a socialised healthcare system for decades as Federal and State spending on healthcare has over-taken insurers and private individuals. All Obama did… Read More Aneurin Biden | How the US gets it’s own NHS
In yesterdays blog I suggested that the new centralised system to provide PPE to care homes was run by a company called Clipper. The actual system that the Department of Health and Social Care has set up is run by Ebay. Clipper are the logistics partner who are distributing the equipment to all non-acute health… Read More NHS PPEbay | An update