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Is this the thin edge of the wedge?
It has been announced today that a private company is now running an NHS hospital, the Braintree Community Hospital. The first act of this company was to appoint the private company Interhealth Canada as provider of elective surgery & outpatient care. After all Camerons pomises that the NHS is safe we now see through his lies the privatisation of the NHS has started. No longer will health care given according to need instead it’s health care by profit margin.
When I said a while ago that the Tory NHS reforms would lead to privatisation I was told I was being a typical left wing brainwashed zombie (or words like that) well it seems that I was right, others have said that we should give the Tories a chance, how many NHS hospitals have to be run for profit before we wake up to the fact that the Tories are out to destroy the NHS & hand it on a plate to private companies?
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Before we start on the blame game, regarding the NHS, this it would appear is a process that was started 9 years ago by the previous administration.
My view is that this administration is following on, and if it succeeds we may see an improvement in health care in this country, and lets be fair, it needs to improve urgently.
Braintree Community Hospital is the first one (as far as I am aware) the Tories have commissioned, since they came into power.
Below is a resume of Interhealths involvement in this country.
2002
NHS Franchise Scheme, United Kingdom, InterHealth Canada welcomes the announcement by Secretary of State for Health, Alan Milburn, on behalf of the United Kingdom Government, that the company has been included on the National Health Service Franchising Register of Experts. InterHealth Canada has been pre-qualified by the UK government to bid to take over senior management of “zero-star rating” hospitals
2003
InterHealth Canada pre-qualified by the UK government to participate in ISTC (DTC) bid process
2004
Awarded preferred bidder status for the Independent Sector Treatment Centre (ISTC) NHS in the United Kingdom
2005
InterHealth Canada was one of the first 3 private healthcare providers registered and accredited by the Healthcare Commission for the Independent Sector Treatment Centre programme in the UK
2005
InterHealth Canada begins clinical operations in its first ISTC Centre Kidderminster, United Kingdom
2005
InterHealth Canada opens the Orthopedic Hospital
2009
InterHealth Canada signs a 12 year concession with the Queen’s Square National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery to manage the Private Patient Unit and Gamma Knife Suite at this UK Centre of Excellence
Never say a humorous thing to a man who does not possess humour. He will always use it in evidence against you.
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The NHS in its present form has all the signs of a company on the verge of administration/liquidation which cannot be far away. Contrary to popular belief, the NHS is run largely for the benefit of the leading clinical staff and the so called "managers" that infest all organisations that are publicly funded. The real problem with the NHS from the organisational management aspect is that it is excessively over administered and significantly under managed. There is no real possibility of internal reform while it is micro managed from the Department of Health and is the testing bed for every latest management tool whim dreamed up by MBA-speak third raters who have never had to satisfy a customer or patient in their lives. If the bulk of the UK population knew how the present NHS was run with their money they would demand its abolition forthwith. Every day you can read in the UK press of incompetence in the system.
It is, of course, anathema to all those of socialist incline to even remotely consider that the private sector can be considerably more efficient than any public sector. That is the "jobs-for-life-paid-by -the-taxpayer-regardless -of -whether -I’m -competent or not" public sector.
This statement from Scouse is pure gold anti- Tory rhetoric though, because NO government, including Labour, has set about challenging the inefficiencies in the system, and when an attempt is made to do just that then it’s "those Tory bastards" all over again., without regard to the real problems to be sorted!
Sadly any criticism of the NHS, direct or implied, is treated by the Left as akin to racism and the perpetrators of such criticisms are invariably denounced as evil. The Left will also point to surveys supporting the contention that the public are ’satisfied’ with the NHS.
How do they know, when it’s never been tried, whether or not there are efficiencies to be gained from the private sector running a hospital? It works in other countries, so why do Labour say it won’t work within the NHS?
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Quoting: Colin Hall The NHS in its present form has all the signs of a company on the verge of administration/liquidation which cannot be far away. Contrary to popular belief, the NHS is run largely for the benefit of the leading clinical staff and the so called "managers" that infest all organisations that are publicly funded. The real problem with the NHS from the organisational management aspect is that it is excessively over administered and significantly under managed. There is no real possibility of internal reform while it is micro managed from the Department of Health and is the testing bed for every latest management tool whim dreamed up by MBA-speak third raters who have never had to satisfy a customer or patient in their lives. If the bulk of the UK population knew how the present NHS was run with their money they would demand its abolition forthwith. Every day you can read in the UK press of incompetence in the system.
It is, of course, anathema to all those of socialist incline to even remotely consider that the private sector can be considerably more efficient than any public sector. That is the "jobs-for-life-paid-by -the-taxpayer-regardless -of -whether -I’m -competent or not" public sector.
This statement from Scouse is pure gold anti- Tory rhetoric though, because NO government, including Labour, has set about challenging the inefficiencies in the system, and when an attempt is made to do just that then it’s "those Tory bastards" all over again., without regard to the real problems to be sorted!
Sadly any criticism of the NHS, direct or implied, is treated by the Left as akin to racism and the perpetrators of such criticisms are invariably denounced as evil. The Left will also point to surveys supporting the contention that the public are ’satisfied’ with the NHS.
How do they know, when it’s never been tried, whether or not there are efficiencies to be gained from the private sector running a hospital? It works in other countries, so why do Labour say it won’t work within the NHS?
Last edited by Colin Hall
Alright Colin, I expected the defence of the indefencable to start with you.
The Labour administration did indeed allow private hospitals to be created & did licence private heath care providers. They even allowed NHS cases to be treated in Private hospital if the queue for treament by the NHS was too long. The one thing they didn’t do was to give contol of a whole NHS hospital to a company who’s total aim is profit. I don’t want an operation to be with held due to the costs cutting into the shareholders profit, nor do I want the Yankie system were the first question asked isn’t were does it hurt it’s are you insured.
To simplify the debate should NHS hospitals be run for profit or should they be run to cure the sick.
Now you’ve got the Tory rhetoric out of the way could you answer the question.
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Quoting: John (scouse) Hirons
Alright Colin, I expected the defence of the indefencable to start with you.
The Labour administration did indeed allow private hospitals to be created & did licence private heath care providers. They even allowed NHS cases to be treated in Private hospital if the queue for treament by the NHS was too long. The one thing they didn’t do was to give contol of a whole NHS hospital to a company who’s total aim is profit. I don’t want an operation to be with held due to the costs cutting into the shareholders profit, nor do I want the Yankie system were the first question asked isn’t were does it hurt it’s are you insured.
To simplify the debate should NHS hospitals be run for profit or should they be run to cure the sick.
Now you’ve got the Tory rhetoric out of the way could you answer the question.
Indefensible? Sez who? Labour?
Scouse, you’ve never answered a question in your life There is evidence to suggest that that NHS hospitals are already running on a cost basis, with health being secondary, so why do the Left think different? There is no evidence by the way that privatising an NHS hospital will cause it to be run any differently to what it is now, [and to suggest otherwise is simply Ed Nauseum] scaremongering and by getting rid of a layer of pen-pushers might just work!
It has merely been the unquestioned dogma of successive generations of politicians that this responsibility must be discharged by means of a nationalised health service, run by the State according to a giant masterplan. Other countries - and I don’t just mean the USA, try France, for example - manage to get by with a much more flexible and imaginative interpretation of how healthcare should be delivered. And generally get better results.
There is evidence to suggest that that NHS hospitals are already running on a cost basis, with health being secondary, so why do the Left think different? There is no evidence by the way that privatising an NHS hospital will cause it to be run any differently to what it is now, [and to suggest otherwise is simply Ed Nauseum] scaremongering and by getting rid of a layer of pen-pushers might just work! 