We are all in favour of getting NHS waiting lists down. Patients need timely appointments and prompt treatments. The government has announced a substantial unspecified portion of the Ā£36bn extra in one announcement over three years to tackle waiting lists, money toĀ be shared and transferred eventually to social care.Ā It has announced another Ā£8bn added to future budgets. I asked some questions about how this money is going to be spent.
When I asked how many extra medical staff will be recruited using the Ā£ 8bnĀ I was told “We are working closely with NHS England and NHS Improvement to develop a plan for how that funding willĀ be used including workforce requirements and additional medical posts that may beĀ needed”.
When I asked where was the plan to reduce waiting lists I was told they aim to publish “an elective recovery delivery plan ” in November.Ā They have explained that they added Ā£1bn to this year’s Ā£1bn Elective Recovery fund and aim to spend the Ā£8bn over the three years 2022/3 to 2024/5.Ā When I asked about the NI surcharge moneyĀ they said they are “working with NHS England andĀ NHS Improvement to develop a plan of how that funding willĀ be used”
When I asked how much the property costs wouldĀ be of setting up new NHS diagnostic centres they told me the small and precise figure of Ā£55m. That implies a plan with proper costings for that venture. I look forward to seeing how many centres that buys. The bigger cost will of course be staffing them. When I asked about theĀ value for money of the Test and Trace programme I was told there will be a value for money report on that in the late autumn this year.
I was somewhat surprised by these answers. Given the strength and depth of NHS management I thought they would have put together a plan to bid for funds from the Treasury for the waiting list work. I would have expected the workforce requirements toĀ be the main feature and cost in the plan. I would have expected the Treasury to require detail over how waiting lists were to beĀ brought downĀ before placing a firm sum into theĀ budget. I would also have expected the Treasury to have pushed back on the huge Test and Trace budget to see if some of this year’s allocation couldĀ beĀ transferred to waiting list work.Ā There are other elements in the large and fast growing health budget of the last two years that also need examining, as they should have been one off and set up costsĀ brought on by the pandemic. There is a general attempt in the Red Book to distinguish between one off and regular spending.
Presumably the costs of establishing then standing down the Nightingales was a one off . Presumably necessary work on better controls over airflows and air cleaning to curb infection spread has all been done by now, and those items should drop out ofĀ budgets. Presumably fewer of the workforce are now having to self isolate or be off sick as the Covid case rate in hospital declines and as serious infections wane thanks to widespread vaccination.Ā All that should help improve the ability of the hospitals to tackle backlogs and to get staff back to more normal duties and routines. I will watch out for the plan to get the lists down, and will ask further questions to see how they are getting on. They were not able to tell me how many Chief Executives the various parts of the English NHS now employs. I would have thought someone would keep a record of that, as they all get paid.
November 3, 2021
1. To temporarily reduce waiting lists, Trusts need to be instructed (not asked meekly) to use as much private care as is available in their local areas.
2. To permanently improve the whole management structure of the NHS, virtually all its Chief Executives need to be fired and replaced with experienced senior managers with successful records, from across the business sector, to be given serious powers .
Forget yet more reforms and White Papers and bleatings from Unions – from the current experiences of many of my UK friends, it appears Mr Arkwright from Open All Hours could do a better job of administering a Trust.
November 3, 2021
Well put
November 3, 2021
SM
SM Agree.
It is clear the NHS do not have a plan, other than to reduce the numbers of staff they already have by sacking those who do not want to be jabbed. So it will get even worse if this is completed.
The Government have offered more money, not originally requested, because it looks good, so it is no surprise the NHS do not yet have a plan to spend it.
Clearly the Private sector has some unused capacity, so the NHS should purchase that for some immediate benefit, as lack of money is not now an excuse.
John, has anyone actually sat down and said, if we were to start a National Health Service from scratch, how would/should it be set up, and how would/should it operate, and after agreement about the best solution, (taking note of how the rest of the World operates)
Then compare it with the present system, and look hard and fast at the differences.
November 4, 2021
+10
November 3, 2021
@SM – the only flaw are can see with that well reasoned suggestion is that the NHS is already administratively lead, so improvement to them means more administration, more administrative departments. After all they have grown themselves over the years with internal empire building. Appoint a ‘Diversity Manager’ you then get their assistants, their offices, their cleaners – one massive department that has nothing to do with clinical need
November 3, 2021
@SM; If the situation is so dire that NHS Trusts need to be instructed to buy-in private care to stop a public health care crisis then there is a very good argument for the State to simply take over the private providers (at least in the short term), just as was done during WW2.
As for your other comments, yes, put Matron (and others back) in charge, things were never this bad even when the trade unions (effectively) ran the NHS. Indeed the last thing we need are more White Papers and the private sector bleating about not having access to NHS patients etc, the more the private health industry gets their hands on the NHS the worse the NHS has/will become and the more people will seek to go private, the private sector love NHS waiting lists. Believing the private sector will/wants to sort out the NHS is akin to putting a fox in charge of the chicken coup!…
November 3, 2021
Could the NHS afford to buy global companies like BUPA
Are you suggesting the State should sequestrate private hospitals without paying for them?
When did trade unions run the NHS?
People will use the private sector when the State system tells them an operation is a year away and they are in pain.
November 4, 2021
@Peter2, Your knees are still jerking out un-thought out comments… Did the State “buy” all the hospitals at the outbreak of WW2, or did they just put them under the direct control of the Ministry of Health for the duration.
As for the trade union comment, perhaps you do not remember what was being said about the trade unions by the govt-in-waiting in 1978/9 and during the 1980s. Apologies if my irony was far to subtle for you Peter.
“People will use the private sector when the State system tells them an operation is a year away and they are in pain.”
Surely that is an argument for greater funding of the NHS?! Aalso have you ever stopped to wonder where many of the consultants etc the private health sector rely on actually come from, where they were trained, who subsidised that training.
November 4, 2021
So I take it from your response that you would support the sequestration without compensation of the private hospitals and clinics from their current legal owners.
Interesting Jerry.
November 5, 2021
@Peter2; Once again you you take my comment out of context, as trolls do, go read the comment by @SM that my original comment was in reply to. But glad to hear you think there is no public health emergency, so no need for the NHS to buy-in private care either!
As for your accusation of sequestration without compensation, companies who did war-work during WW2 were compensated, Rolls Royce, Supermarine, de Havaland, the Austin Standard, Rover and Morris motor companies etc, and their suppliers, all remained private companies and were paid for the work done, in fact some benefited greatly from the govts investment in shadow factories, many (still) private hospitals received new equipment, modernisation, even new buildings etc. in the period of war planning and during the war years. The govt merely directed what work needed to be done.
Stop trying to conflate the post war Labour govts actions with what took place during the ten years prior.
November 4, 2021
Jerry, you appear to be proposing that an inefficient unit (the NHS) should take over an efficient one (the private sector)? And matrons were re-introduced some years ago, but in my face-to-face experience do not have the power to improve matters significantly; also it is a huge myth that matron-run hospitals 50 years ago were notably more efficient, to put it politely.
November 4, 2021
@SM; Well of course the private sector can appear more efficient when they cherry pick what they offer, when they offer it and who they offer it to…
As for your comments about Matron, I was aware that a position called “Matron” was re introduced, my point was much the same as yours appears to be, give them real control.
November 3, 2021
It is now fast approaching ten (TEN) people whom I have known die (two in hospices now) on NHS waiting lists – none from Covid-19… all had consultations delayed and cancelled.
We did NOT save the NHS.
November 3, 2021
The NHS has been saved- they are still here, sadly an enormous number of people who had a right to expect to be a patient were not and died before getting attention.
November 4, 2021
Get the money to the patients who are being failed (and then used to pay for the operations) not to the NHS who are failing them abysmally. The NHS or private providers only only get the money when and if they carry out the procedures required.
November 3, 2021
Seems to me, that they are trying to hide something, with those evasive answers, to questions that need to be asked.
November 3, 2021
Why don’t they use the private hospitals which the taxpayer has been funding throughout the pandemic.
Most have been lying empty because the socialist management of the NHS won’t countenance using the private sector.
November 3, 2021
@Ian Wragg; The govt funding you mention, did it actually pay for work undertaken for the NHS or was it similar to the help given to hospitality and retail, off-setting due to loss of foot-fall. Are you saying private health care is basically not available in the UK at the moment, that all such patients are being treated according to their medical needs, not their ability to pay (either themselves or via a health care plan), for example away from hospitals are all otherwise private practice dentists now also treating NHS patents who can not access their usual NHS options due to the backlog. Anyway a GP, dentist or consultant etc. can not be in two places at the same time…
In case you had not noticed, the -now- DHSC has been run by a Conservative Minister for the past 11 years (and a Conservative Minster for 29 out of the last 41 years), the failings are on the right, not those blasted socialist you always want to blame. Boris needs to get the NHS fixed, he might have won the last election due to Brexit but if the other parties (as they inevitably will) make the next election about the NHS the much celebrated Red Wall will be higher than ever -whilst the Blue Wall in the south is still been demolished due to the fallout caused by Brexit.
November 3, 2021
So the Republicans have won Virginia. Lots of Americans are suffering buyers remorse after votfor sleepy Joe.
The fightback begins.
November 4, 2021
@Ian Wragg; Yes, many in the USA now vote Republican again, but then that might have been because Trump(ism) wasn’t on the ticket….
November 3, 2021
Cheshire Girl,
Agreed. The information is there but they will not reveal it to anyone who might rock the boat.
The bureaucracy should be cut down to the bare minimum and GPs forced to return to the normal practice of face to face appointments with patients.
There may be a deliberate policy of allowing the system to get so bad, in order to facilitate the introduction of even more privatisation.
November 3, 2021
+1 Re: GP’s
I have finally been able to get an appointment with a GP. However, it is only a telephone appointment. Quite how they are going to be able to diagnose Rheumatoid Arthritis and agree that is what I have over the phone I don’t know, but suspect they will only offer pain killers, instead of the medication that actually stops it getting worse.
So I will have the NHS page which gives the names of the correct prescribed treatment open.
November 3, 2021
@Cheshire Girl , nearly with you on that. ‘Hiding’ the palace of ‘thick-o’s’ doesn’t have a real brain between them, so the only thing to hide is ‘no plan’. Keep taxing without an economy and it all dies and withers, to much hope from them(Government) that the productive side of the Country will sit around take it and not leave.
November 3, 2021
“Presumably the costs of establishing then standing down the Nightingales was a one off” – indeed and presumably it was a pointless political stunt and waste of money (as we know they never had staff for them and they were largely unused). Indeed most people who died from Covid (about 5 out of 6) received no intensive care at all. Many did not even make it to any hospital. Many went into hospital for other conditions, we infected in hospital, dumped into intensive care to infect others and given no treatment at all. As happened to a relative of mine.
The problem in giving more money to the state monopoly NHS is that they will largely waste it This is one thing they are very good at doing, this as they have little competition & so most patients have to take it or leave it. They are unfair competition but unfair competition from the state is it seems fine.
The money really needs to go to the patients on the waiting lists who are being failed so badly by the dire state monopoly, take it of leave it, rationed and delayed NHS. All the power is with the rationed and dire NHS and none is with the patients where it should be.
November 3, 2021
I am not sure it was a pointless political stunt. On the contrary it was a clever way to create a large number of free beds (even without the staff to look after those) allowing the Government and our nice Health Secretary at the time (Matt Hancock) to hold daily press briefings and tell us that the NHS had never been overwhelmed, whereas the situation in many hospitals had been so dire that the DNR sign originally applied only to very old patients with comorbidities (90+) was as time passed between April and May 2020 decreased to 85, 80, 75, 70 with additional triage to only provide mechanical ventilation to those thought to have a chance of recovering.
J.Calvert & G.Arbuthnott, āFailures of Stateā, 2021, chapters 10 to 13.
And in that respect, I cannot see how having had more private hospitals would have made a iota of difference, given that a large number of private hospital staff are the very same people that also work in the NHS.
November 3, 2021
How do these staff manage to work in both NHS and private hospitals at the same time hef?
Do they do 80 hour weeks
40 in each sector?
November 4, 2021
How ridiculous can you be? Not all doctors do a 40 (or 60) hour week in the NHS. I know of some working for both NHS and BUPA, the Spire or the Berkshire Independent Hospital. In April-May 2020, they were mainly working within the NHS, but most have now gone back to their shared schedules.
If you donāt know, why do you always think you are entitled to display your ignorance? Donāt you have any self-awareness?
November 4, 2021
I can be as ridiculous as you heffy.
As SM has explained very sucintitly below, your argument, as usual, is very poor.
Everytime you get all rude and personal I know, you know, I am right.
November 4, 2021
Never overwhelmed yet the vast majority who died of Covid about 5 out of 6 of them received no intensive care treatment at all!
November 4, 2021
Consultants are allowed, if they wish, to have part-time NHS contracts, Hefner, but many go full-time private if the opportunity exists, so your statement is misleading, to say the least.
November 5, 2021
Interesting comment, but it did not apply during the worst periods of the pandemic, when most of them were āon the NHS bridgeā.
In more normal circumstances, specially younger consultants do not all jump right to the deep end of the private sector, but keep a foot in the NHS.
See bma.org.uk BMA, 14/07/2021 āConsultants and private practiceā.
November 3, 2021
MoD wasting Ā£billions in incompetent procurement I read, I am so surprised! They were doing this about 40 years ago when I worked for a major MoD weapons and aircraft manufacturer. Nothing changes. How much was wasted on TSR2 before cancellation back in the 50s & 60s. How much on these sitting duck aircraft carriers without aircraft or support ships. āNot our money who cares?ā seems to be their response.
November 3, 2021
Philip Johnson today in the Telegraph.
Smart motorways are a symptom of the British stateās addiction to failure
From transport to defence procurement, mistakes are tolerated for too long and nobody is held accountable.
November 3, 2021
The NHS is a disaster and has been for a long time.
Probably since its nasty, politics of envy, communistic inception.
November 3, 2021
@Everhopeful +1
November 3, 2021
Nah, the Politics Of Envy is by the Right, towards those who studied hard at school and at university, and who deservedly got the good, interesting jobs, and whom they want to lose the appropriate contractual remuneration arrangements which went with those jobs requiring such expertise.
Isn’t it?
November 3, 2021
No.
November 3, 2021
Everhopeful, +1, short, pithy and precise
November 3, 2021
Hereās a new concept, why not get the doctors to increase there face to face contact with patients, itās kind of funny but mad really that some doctors are not doing face to face but given the extra money incentive to give the COVID jabs they will do one to one, money grabbing leaches
November 3, 2021
Mick
Dentists now see patents face to face and give close proximity treatment,
Perhaps the clue is they are perhaps on a much reduced income if they don’t.
Private Physio’s the same.
November 3, 2021
dentists don’t have the wonderfully rewarding (to the GPs) contract.
November 3, 2021
@Mick – a big problem with that Mick, face to face causes early diagnostics, early treatment, therefore less demand. Then what would this Government throw your money at, it is consumed with spending your money – how else would they get to say ‘The Government’ will GIVE you this.
November 3, 2021
Can you ask Javid why the NHS only has about 1/200 of the ECMO machines they have in Japan for example – far, far fewer than most developed countries? Are UK citizens just not worth saving when these are needed? Not only are the NHS failing patients but they treat many of their medical staff very poorly indeed and so many leave to get less stressful and better paid jobs elsewhere (medical or often non medical). They thus waste and squander this expensively trained resource. Only about 50% of UK trained doctors remain working for the NHS, so unattractive are the NHS as an employer. They get away with this as they are a virtual monopoly too unless people leave the profession or the country.
Junior doctors after five or six years training are paid about Ā£25-30K and they often can have student debts of up to Ā£200K with interest on this going up at circa Ā£12K PA. Meanwhile had these people read law in three years (with student debt of perhaps just Ā£60K ) the best ones would be starting on up to Ā£100K. One person I know qualified as a medical consultant only to convert to law and now litigates mainly against the NHS. One cannot help feeling the rewards system is totally absurd. Do we want more good doctors, surgeons and medical treatments or would be prefer endless litigation and lawyers?
November 3, 2021
@lifelogic + 1 UK Citizens are just the fodder of in particular this Government – the taxes to make this evangelical cult look good on the World stage. Its not science its religion
November 3, 2021
Boris certainly worships the NHS. How wonderful it was coping during the pandemic!
November 3, 2021
Americans tell you they go to church and pray for guidance.
Johnson tells you Green and NHS are his religions, all 3 concepts are fatally flawed.
November 3, 2021
LL, a nurse after three years of University training, basic salary ‘The current starting salary for a Band 5 Nurse is Ā£25,655. With 2-4 yearsā experience, a Band 5 Nurse will earn Ā£27,780, and the very top of this banding pays Ā£31,534.’
What is your source that Doctors only start on a band 5 nurses wage after 6 years in University, this just can’t be true, it is nowhere near what they should expect after six years and I just can’t believe it.
Everyone with a degree has a student loan it is a graduate tax of 9% and was changed in 2012 so that it can never be paid off because of the excessive interest now charged.
November 3, 2021
Everyone with a degree from England.
November 4, 2021
Doctors train in 3 stages the NHS Careers says – a 4 years masters at University/medical school.
2 years foundation training paid after 4 years basic training – as a doctor in training youāll earn a basic salary, plus pay for any hours over 40 per week, a 37 per cent enhancement for working nights, a weekend allowance for any work at the weekend, an availability allowance if you are required to be available on-call, and other potential pay premia.
In Foundation training, you will earn a basic salary of Ā£28,808 to Ā£33,345 (from 1 April 2021).
https://www.healthcareers.nhs.uk/explore-roles/doctors/pay-doctors/pay-doctors
3-4 years more specialist training.
If youāre a doctor starting your specialist training in 2021 your basic salary will be Ā£39,467 to Ā£53,077.
Speciality doctors
If youāre working as a specialty doctor youāll earn a basic salary of Ā£45,124 to Ā£77,519.
November 3, 2021
It is a shocking amount of debt coupled with low pay in the early years and top rate tax when reaching a mortgageable wage.
It stuck in the craw having to buy my lad’s scrubs knowing friends of friends who’d made a Ā£4m killing from the NHS during the pandemic and bought a coastal mansion in a top area with cash.
The sums do not add up. If you are a girl don’t go to med school. You’ll be far FAR better off and established earlier in your own home if you have a child by a male anon and raise them badly, getting High Rate dependency for ADHD (fast passes at theme parks, the lot.)
A guy ? Do an apprenticeship instead. Work cash-in-hand as much as possible.
November 3, 2021
Presumably because the many NHS chief executives know that many cancer patients have been unable to get a GP appointment with cowering GPs, diagnosis or treatment for the past 18 months, they are spending on TV advertising telling us that,if we have a cough, we should phone the GP and all will be well. providing we don’t delay.
The public relations side seems to be in good shape.
November 3, 2021
Exactly. They do not seem to care if they NHS works but they do want endless expensive adverts to pretend/claim it is working well. And if it is not then it is probably the patients fault not the NHS’s. About 5/6 of Covid patients who died apparently did so without any intensive care treatment at all it seems. Many without any real medical treatment at all & many of these we even infect by the NHS.
They presumably were not considered to be ill enough (or important) enough for any treatment.
November 3, 2021
@Stred +1 ā¦ Yup as with everything its not the actual deed its the PR, the ‘headline’
November 3, 2021
You can hear them now in No. 11 and the Treasury – āthat Redwood is asking awkward questions again – he knows as well as we do that we will just throw money at the NHS and hopeā.
Meanwhile, at NHS central, they are rubbing their hands at all the new money. āNew IT system? Anyone got any ideas? Weāve got to spend it on something ā¦ doctorsā pensions?ā
November 3, 2021
More diversity officers on Ā£80K+ and a vast rebranding of the Trusts. New huge signs on all the hospitals and building, more lawyers to defend negligence actions, more senior admin staff, a better restaurant, more adverts and PR, more way to massage the waiting list figures and pretend they are not actually waiting…
November 3, 2021
More expensive net zero lunacy for hospitals and net zero green officers on Ā£80k+ salaries.
November 3, 2021
@Lifelogic
Yep.
My local CCG has leased a substantial amount of space from my Local Authority (as many LA staff are now involved in “flexible working”). I am led to believe that the CCG then spent much money on refurbishment and “rebranding”. Waiting lists must be a low priority.
November 3, 2021
@Mike Wilson ā¦. Ah, but its Government money!
November 3, 2021
Unnecessary Diversity and Inclusivity managers with one aim and only aim and that is to find or invent racism where there is none and develop ridiculous courses which become mandatory. Any critics are further evidence you need more diversity managers
November 3, 2021
MIKE W – – – Weāve got to spend it on something – – Thousands of non contributing, non English speaking, translator, cost and time consuming expensive new arrivals??? – – loads STILL coming. PP on a bonus???
November 3, 2021
Throwing money at it doesn’t succeed. As Sir John alludes, THERE IS NO PLAN! Costed plans are essential. Its like a black hole.
Same applies to Nut Nuts husband. NO PLAN. Importing our energy is a no brainer. Importing manufactured goods and not including them in our CO2 use is a no brainer. It just exports our jobs and CO2 footprint abroad. Importing coal and gas when we have our own is a special kind of stupid to appease Nut Nuts and her kind. When are we getting our referendum for Net Zero? CO2 is not driving the climate and no voices opposing this rubbish allowed on MSM. Absolute farce and we all know it. Must stop writing as its cold in November. Its always been throughout my 60 plus years and I need to put my gas boiler on!
November 3, 2021
Behind closed doors they will be saying ‘it always works’ and fist-pumping.
November 3, 2021
You would have expected some numbers and a plan to accomany these awards but here we are dealing with the NHS for which accountancy is an unknown concept.
Just fling money at it and watch the overpaid Jobsworths on the Boards and in ‘management’ waste it
November 3, 2021
Not just accountancy, but accounability!
November 3, 2021
Jeremy Hunt (PPE again) was Health Secretary for circa 4 years. He is surely largely responsible for the dire state the failing NHS was in and has been in for years. Why did he retain the state monopoly communist model that can never work efficiently?
Yet despite this he gets to joint chair Joint a parliamentary inquiry into how it dealt with Covid with Rt Hon Greg Clark MP.
Greg Clark in my view should not be in the Conservative party for obvious reasons given his appalling behaviour over Brexit.
November 3, 2021
Before any of the usuals say it, let me, a former Tory Party officer, do it:
the Conservatives have been in Government for years, and not one Health Secretary has had the cojones to tackle the NHS head on (hmmm … is that physically possible?).
Cameron let Andrew Lansley make everything yet more complicated, Johnson has worshipped at the altar, and meanwhile the medical cabals continue their empire-building and squabbles and management apparently live in a different time continuum to the UK public.
November 3, 2021
J Hunt and G Clark? A right pair, if you ask me.
November 4, 2021
+1
November 3, 2021
The money will go on management consultants not medical consultants.
Itās a very lucrative business for the large management consultants.
November 3, 2021
+1
November 3, 2021
Javelin,
+1
Firms that used to stick to auditing and accounting now market themselves as medical experts.
November 3, 2021
From the standard of replies to your questioning it is becoming blatantly obvious that the NHS in total including the Department of health has morphed into a totally uncontrollable, unaccountable, unflexible and at times very accident prone organisation.
Working with a consultant try to bring real change to his department to improve patient response times and for his staff to be more proactive in the way things were done he said in a workshop with a cross section of his department that, “everytime there is change within the whole Trust all it does is create a bigger warren for people to hide and dilute the control and effectiveness of the medical departments”. Therein lies the problem. Too many people in the supply and management structure not accountable to those on the front line.
When people fondly talk about matrons running a hospital it was because what she/he was managing was a small compact organisation who actually spent their time walking the talk, listening to surgeons and staff and getting things sorted. Patients and relatives had a one stop complaint, concern person who they recognised and trusted.
November 4, 2021
+1
November 3, 2021
Forget waiting lists.
The NHS is dead. It died in 1997. The patient is an inconvenience. Diversity and inclusivity help the unions and Labour allies to strengthen their grip over this organisation. It’s the same across all taxpayer dependent State organisations. The BBC is another.
The deity that is the NHS ceased to be a provider of medical services way back and is now a political organisation. Unionised and self-serving. Concerned with strengthening its political control over elected government while becoming an indispensable cog in the monitoring system now under construction under both parties
The Tory party encouraged clapping for a Socialist political organisation. That is how low the Tory party has fallen. A party so desperate to appease Labour’s public sector that it panders to it at every turn.
A handful of lobbyists from Labour aligned groups can force a Tory PM and a Tory Minister take decisions they secretly disagree with.
How many Tory MPS dare question the NHS? Not one, they are terrified and they have brought it upon themselves by pandering to NHS power
All is politics and all is political
November 3, 2021
Stop ātestingā.
Stop ātestingā.
Then there will be so many fewer āsickā staff.
If a high enough amplification is applied to PCR ANYTHING can be found.
What on earth has this government been playing at if the NHS isnāt fully up and running?
Theyāve scarcely seen a patient for two years. I suppose all that dancing may have exhausted them?
Or is the NHS out of government control?
And now the NHS staff for whom some clapped (!!) are to be fired if they donāt submit to experimental medication? And with such a backlog?
November 3, 2021
I got my two AZ vaccines in February and May, and recently my Pfizer/BioNtech booster one, with no particular problems except sore arms for a couple of days.
If it is āexperimentalā, this experiment has now been running for ten months with a bit more than 100,000,000 doses injected, only in the UK. Have there been 100 m deaths here?
Having travelled a couple if times to France recently, I have submitted to PCRs before and after getting over borders, and to LFTs in between. Not that pleasant, I agree, but worth having to get back to a more normal life.
If I had to go to the hospital or even to the surgery, I would expect the people working there to be vaccinated too.
Reading regularly your comments, I was wondering: Have you ever thought of getting vaccinated against paranoid delusion?
November 3, 2021
Totally inadequate answers to your questions. We live under an elective dictatorship with a rogue government unworthy of support.
November 3, 2021
+1
November 3, 2021
Steve Baker MP said the same in the Telegraph yesterday. We need a right of centre party to rid us of the Green Tory Consocialists.
November 3, 2021
He’s not wrong
November 3, 2021
There are too many agencies funded by The NHS.
Who runs what?
Why are GPās no longer seeing patients?
What is the population of the U.K?
Who is in charge of The NHS?
Why have we so many staff working in The NHS who have not been trained in The U.K.?
November 3, 2021
BOB DIXON – – population of the U.K? – Border Force changes it every hour or so when their free boat/ferry service returns with more.
November 3, 2021
This confirms what one feared all along: that the money was just a figure plucked out of the sky and no work had been done to establish what was really needed. We need a plan for the reform of the Health service, and not just the NHS but it’s interaction with the Private Sector as well, before we can possibly know what it is going to cost, but it is very clear that this Government has no plan for anything, except wasting our money.
November 3, 2021
This is written in a very naive manner, as though you haven’t given up hope with this organisation. We all know that the NHS is a religion. No amount of money or praise is enough. Lack of performance only proves that even more money and people are needed. It is really no use trying to prop this lot up. It will kill us with working to pay for it before it ever saves us. It is a financial and organisational disaster area. Avoid.
November 3, 2021
We have a major problem when Tory MPs like John Redwood refuses to expose what is happening across our public sector. He knows the NHS has become a political player but he continues to perpetuate the myth that the NHS is still a primary provider of medical service to the public.
John NEVER calls for reform of Labour’s unionised power base that is now the public sector that has become all powerful, entitled, unnacountable and privileged.
The Tories don’t want a war with the all powerful Socialist power bloc so the public and the taxpayer are forced to shoulder the cost of Tory party appeasement. That is FACT
November 3, 2021
You speak for Mr Redwood who I believe tries to achieve realistic change using his political experience and influencing skills. The task gets ever harder though, what with FTSE 100 companies about to have to report their ‘green plans’ on pain of fines. More like Corbyn and McDonnell than a Tory government with an 80 seat majority. I fear my prediction will come true, sooner than expected, that a Tory Chancellor (or PM on their behalf) will announce that economic growth is no longer a particular government priority. Conservatism is dying.
November 3, 2021
Today’s Diary entry IS explicitly exposing what is (not) happening in the NHS; the fact that Sir John does not ‘do’ hysteria in your particular style, DOM, is a blessing as far as I’m concerned.
November 3, 2021
Indeed. The NHS is the industrial wing of the Labour movement and the BBC.
November 3, 2021
“Presumably necessary work on better controls over airflows and air cleaning to curb infection spread has all been done by now”
Ha ha. Good one.
November 3, 2021
There must be thousands of bureaucrats in the NHS who could be fired without affecting the level of actual healthcare provision. A good place to start would be the people who drafted those pathetic obfuscatory answers.
November 3, 2021
@ Richard1 … thousands of bureaucrats in the NHS who could be fired without affecting the level of actual healthcare…” – no doubt too often true but also recall that the bureaucracy was created to provide information previously inadequate or unavailable and upon which decisions about allocations and effectiveness then could be made.
November 3, 2021
A tactic used by a certain high-tech company at a forefront was to tell staff a percentage of employees would be identified by management and ‘let-go’ each year.
The percentage does not matter -the principle motivated workers to perform, or else.
Could the NHS begin the strategy, it does not prevent hiring but excludes previous firings.
November 3, 2021
“One person I know qualified as a medical consultant only to convert to law and now litigates mainly against the NHS.” I get that. If you’ve trained for 7-10 years then get pushed round by a politics graduate NHS administrator from Bristol Poly or whatever being paid 3 times as much, you’d be a tad cheesed off.
November 3, 2021
+1
November 3, 2021
All demonstrates the complete lack of planning skills in both the NHS and HMG. How can you allocate money if there is no costed plan.
Totally useless all of them.
November 3, 2021
The NHS sounds like an out of control, sprawling blob when it come to cash management. The replies you received reveal that the recent announcements are not based on thought out, costed business plans but on political expediency. The country is being beggared by the irresponsible spending by a financially illiterate Prime Minister. Having exhausted the public purse he is now intent on exhausting everyones private purse in the vain pursuit of ill-conceived schemes which, we are assured, will ‘save the planet’. The devious technique to be adopted by Sunak is regulatory and legislative pressure on FTSE companies to demonstrate their net zero credentials. Quite why the Conservative party tolerates this nonsense is a mystery to me.
November 3, 2021
Did Sunak get his idea from the pronouncement of a Wall Street investment manager which said they would use their voting power on behalf of investors (who wont be consulted) to force (British) companies to go green or face board level interference? A proper conservative response would be to invite the whole lot to board the next plane for NY.
November 3, 2021
Dear Mr. Redwood,
You paint a picture of financial incompetence where government allocates huge sums of money to the NHS without first producing detailed plans on how that money will be spent. One wonders if this practice extends to other areas?
How fortunate indeed for the Conservative Party that the alternatives to it are completely unelectable.
November 3, 2021
Perhaps Owen Paterson could be persuaded to start up a proper Conservative Party to free us from the globalists who are swiftly imposing a totalitarian style government over us. It is extremely frightening indeed. Maybe, just maybe, people are finally now waking up to what is going on in this country, but they need a leader.
November 3, 2021
alan
Perhaps another example is Foreign Aid.
For decades we have thrown Ā£Billions abroad, and it would appear no one bothers to find out how it is spent, if it has actually made any improvement for the people at all, or just enlarged some despots bank account.
November 4, 2021
Alan, you know the answer to that, don’t you.
November 3, 2021
As you suggest, it is normal to develop an operating plan with timetables, staffing etc. to deliver the required outcome, in this case reducing the waiting lists, and for this to be fully costed and then funding, or budget, sought. Checks and balances are then introduced to check and maintain progress.
The way of spending madness is to throw money at the problem and then say – come back and tell me how you will spend it and what it will achieve.
Why does Government run the economy this way?
November 3, 2021
Our hosts second paragraph is most revealing, so basically all this useless govt has done so far, in effect, is to ask the opinions of yet another quango, why not just ask NHS front-line staff, ask the health care trade unions what needs to be done (yes of course we all know what they will likely say but this time they might just be correct), or are Tory ministers still to scared that been seen having (virtual) beer and sandwiches with trade union barons will be seen oh so 1970s, yet some ministers, even ex ministers, all appear very ready to trip over the heels of (ex) private industry barons, to the point of putting them in charge of multi-billion contracts…
This “NHS Improvement”, how big a slice out of the DHSC budget, how much is it costing, does this quango take, has our host asked, has anyone on the govt benches? Oh and what a surprise, just look who the Chairman (sorry, Lady) is, the same person originally asked to run NHS T&T…
This govt is increasingly looking like the senior officers of the RMS Titanic, first not slowing down despite the warning, not seeing the iceberg until to late, and after is seen rearranging the deckchairs as the ship sinks.
November 3, 2021
The NHS could save money by not employing people in pretend jobs like the following, featured on the Guido Fawkes website in March: “New job listings on the NHS website reveals the Service is now on the look-out for eight ādiversity, equality and inclusion managersā across the country, with salaries ranging from Ā£38,000 to as much as a whopping Ā£62,000.”
November 3, 2021
Pud : āNew job listings on the NHS website reveals the Service is now on the look-out for eight ādiversity, equality and inclusion managersā across the country, with salaries ranging from Ā£38,000 to as much as a whopping Ā£62,000.ā
The NHS is not in need of further diversity as it is far more diverse than the UK population.
Our Marxist fifth column are trying to replace meritocracy, a big advantage for the democratic West, with diversity. Thus making our businesses feebler and institutions untrustworthy.
Who wants to have an operation performed by a surgeon who has been selected by diversity rather than by competence?
November 3, 2021
The NHS isn’t used to being required to account for the vast sums thrown at it. It beggars belief that the Government did not require a plan from the NHS to bring down waiting lists, BEFORE raising NI and bunging it another Ā£6 billion. This bung will disappear into the black hole, just like the last one did. And the NHS will never give up this money. It will not go to improve Social Care in 3 years time, as we were told it would.
I very much doubt that this money will go towards patient care. It will be swallowed up by NHS Management increasing bureaucracy; dodgy IT system and the recruitment of diversity officers.
Throwing money at the NHS is an example of the definition of insanity put into practice.
November 3, 2021
“I asked some questions about how this money is going to be spent.”
Asked and answered Sir John – as with all the money flow organised by this Government, take it from the taxpayer and just give it to whom ever gives you the best ‘headline’
There is no plan, juts spend, spend, spend and everything will be alright.
This is a literal tax and spend Government simply because they cannot be held to account – they have changed the rules
November 3, 2021
I did wonder whether the plan was New-Labouresque – flood the NHS with money whilst quietly making clear that blame for failure to deliver would then be hard to pin on the Government, rather would rest upon NHS operatives.
November 3, 2021
If the govt. REALLY wants to improve the NHS it should de-centralise it.
More smaller hospitals and more GP surgeries.
And of course more GPS.
Restore the high status of doctors and incentivise them to do the job.
Cut all red tape and all political correctness.
Control the numbers coming in to use the NHS.
And get a decent police force to improve ALL public behaviour.
And teach receptionists and nurses a degree of respect towards patients and doctors.
And cut the cr*p about smaller places not being able to afford various diagnostic things.
If an institution an afford diversity and fairnessā¦it can afford ANYTHING!
November 3, 2021
So Comrade Carney has now pronounced gas “a bad asset”! This globalist revolution is gathering speed at a frightening pace and running out of control. China is the smaller elephant in the room, but have any of the revolutionaries mentioned the really huge one, overpopulation?
November 3, 2021
ROSE- – overpopulation? – – the 5+ YR OLDS, in an already vastly overcrowded country, that is importing THOUSANDS MORE, ( who WILL be bringing their wives and kids to breed even MORE )- – are going to be jabbed – – what with???? This is an island NOT the TARDIS.
November 3, 2021
rose-
Overpopulation is the one issue that will need to be tackled sooner or later but human nature being what it is there will be disputes over remaining resources.
At the current rate of increase the population could double by 2100.
Lifestyle changes will become necessary eventually.
November 4, 2021
Oh they are ‘dealing’ with the overpopulation issue!!!!
“Go get your jabs, like obedient little sheep!
Then your 3rd shot ‘booster’, then your 4th, 5th, nth every 6 months to keep your vax passport valid, maintain your credit score and avoid having your UBI cut and be placed in solitary confinement in your home”.
Q?: What’s the difference between ‘conspiracy theory’ and ‘proven fact’?
A: ………about 6 months.
November 3, 2021
When health care is free at the point of delivery it is impossible that queues will go down . It is also impossible that the NHS will ever not be in a crisis. It was discovered in the Soviet Union that when funds are allocated to need each department will show that monies provided to them are the most urgent and justified . Hence perma -crisis.
One of the problem s with populism is that conflict of any sort is always avoided and without taking on the Public sector Unions we can expect nothing but the sort of babble John Redwood has been fobbed off with.
My suggestion is that Pensions should from now be purchased from private providers with the contributions added to salary . Jobs can then be advertised at the increased wages and the whole pension black hole be taken away form the public feeing up funds for health care .
I am not a fan of the NHS I do not think they have performed well in this period and as I am not a politician I am not obliged to pretend I admire what is at best a mediocre service.
November 3, 2021
Some very good questions there, Sir John, but for the answers I fear you’ll still be saying ‘Presumably… presumably…’ in a couple of months’ time. It would appear that planning isn’t something the NHS is interested in. You even seem to have discovered they don’t know how many chief executives they’ve got on the books, which is pretty extraordinary. Even when it has the information, the NHS may refuse to publish it – they are keeping quiet about how much was paid to the private sector to treat Covid patients, when as you say almost no Covid patients were treated in private hospitals. Questions about accountability also remain for some of the other unsatisfactory outsourcing decisions, such as the Covid testing ‘megalabs’. Why can’t some of the NHS people responsible for this shambles be hauled in front of a Commons committee?
November 3, 2021
āThe Stateās addiction to failureā Quite.
November 3, 2021
I am not surprised that there is no plan to spend the vast amounts of extra money allocated to the NHS. The idea of throwing money at it and hoping for the best started under Tony Blair, when he foolishly delegated spending plans to Gordon Brown. Huge sums were spent, and there was little to show for it.
The hugely mistaken reverence in which the NHS is held, clouds every issue related to the service.
That’s what it is, just another public service which should be accountable for every pound thrown its way.
This week a long standing friend and client of mine died after a minor heart procedure. A postmortem is being requested because it is believed that a vital organ or artery had been nicked during the operation but that this went unnoticed with fatal results.
On the positive side, it is exactly six months to the day since I had my second jab. At 08:15 I went online and managed to book an appointment for the third jab at a local pharmacy this Friday afternoon. That is very efficient.
November 3, 2021
The NHS is long overdue a visit from a real trouble-shooter and team who if paid by results would be worth a small fortune. It wastes so much because it is set up along outdated lines, designed by supply-led and not demand-led as in modern systems.
Throwing new cash at digitised old framework is a recipe for disaster.
November 3, 2021
A lot of medical staff are very highly trained. Where on Earth do you expect to suddenly get extra medical staff from? I guess many may be arriving on dinghies but they are being sent away.
The problems in the health service are simple. None of you pay enough for it for the service you expect. All of the medicines you need, all of the treatment, all of your drugs, all of your doctors appointments – it all costs money. And you donāt pay enough tax to cover it. But itās not just you – the billionaires who fund the Tory Party donāt pay enough tax either. So granny ends up on a trolley in a car park.
I have private healthcare. Enjoy your trollies.
November 3, 2021
The occupants of dinghies are well, having ‘all found’ in hotels.
Perhaps you would like them to be assigned to hospitals, and have one make life and death decisions about one of your family?
November 3, 2021
Are they being sent away when arriving in dingies young andy?
It seems they are helped ashore and allowed to stay.
November 3, 2021
Andy. Those arriving in dinghies are being sent away? You make more stupid statements every day. Of the 20000 that have arrived uninvited none have been deported so what the hell are you talking about?
November 4, 2021
Since you frequently allege [boast] that you have private health care, you have no personal knowledge of how the NHS ‘works’, do you Andy?
November 4, 2021
Andy
Private hospitals have no consultants. They use NHS consultants to you are paying to jump a queue whilst demanding open borders.
You also use private education thus insulating your kids while demanding open borders.
(Thankfully my kids did not need private education and passed exams to get into a school which selects on ability, not payment.)
No doctors are being turned away. Brexit never demanded closed borders, only selective admission to this country.
November 3, 2021
The NHS is the largest single employer in Europe – it used to be the Army of the USSR. Too big to fail?
November 3, 2021
This doesn’t sound like a well organised government.
If they don’t know how many people need to be recruited HOW ON EARTH CAN THEY DEMAND AN EXTRA Ā£8B WHEN NOTHING HAS BEEN COSTED! They have no business sense, and they had no business case.
This is a pathetic state of affairs and smacks ever more of a socialist way of doing things, which is very far from professional.
Most of us are sick of the way extra taxes are imposed on us for very glib reasons – Saving the NHS doesn’t seem to have any plan behind it other than soundbites, self justification by the government and a desire to rob us ever more of our money, for something that should have been resolved with improved management professionalism.
November 3, 2021
@Bryan Harris +1
November 3, 2021
Bring Back Better
Bring Back Trump
November 3, 2021
IT’s all over for NHS. No money required.
November 3, 2021
10 seconds to the save the NHS. This is the type of emotive, lying crap pumped out by the parasitic NHS and Labour’s public sector that we have to tolerate simply to extract ever greater levels of private taxpayer funding to keep the public sector gravy train ticking over. The more they get, the more powerful they become
At what point will access to the POLITICISED NHS be used as a weapon to impose social compliance, target those who don’t conform to the new oppressive orthodoxy or as part of the punishment in a social credit system ?
I can smell the direction of travel and it ain’t towards reform and liberalisation. All points to an all-powerful, all-knowing and all-seeing Neo-Marxist state using digitalisation to impose total control
I am not interested in the fortunes of the bullshitting Labour and Tory parties who benefit from the status quo. I am only interested in protecting our civil world, our civil freedoms from the now sinister British State and its leviathan-esque public sector
November 3, 2021
No more “diversity inspectors” or “inclusion monitors” on Ā£270,000 pa, thank you.
Abolish the requirement for nurses to have degrees; a condition only introduced for socialist union leaders to pay themselves more for doing less real work.
November 3, 2021
Agree 100%
November 3, 2021
“Presumably fewer of the workforce are now having to self isolate or be off sick as the Covid case rate in hospital declines and as serious infections wane thanks to widespread vaccination.”
Sorry, I don’t agree there will be a decline, IMO they are deliberately prevaricating on detail in an attempt to hide reality. Last year flu was reassigned as covid. This year adverse reactions to the jab will probably be reassigned as flu. And I think the ‘flu and respiratory’ season this year will be bad.
The statistics from other countries are clearly showing there is a higher percentage of those who have been jabbed, who are getting ill. Whereas here in the UK, they have decided to try and disguise this by claiming those who have been recently vaccinated are classed as unvaccinated, but they know they can’t hide this indefinitely and even with their gerrymandering, the statistics show that is happening here.
I also suspect that is why they are now using the age-old societal divide principle between the jabbed against the unjabbed, coup;ed with draconian threats, because how else are they going to be able to explain the huge increase in ‘flu’ etc, when the greater percentage of those who are ill, are the jabbed?
November 3, 2021
Think about the army, a single vision, a single management and command structure, a single pay and HR structure, a single infrastructure and a single budget working in one direction for the whole nation
Now think about the NHS, split nationally, regionally and locally, split as private companies, split contracts of employment, split vision, split direction working for their own goals
We need a government with the bottle to completely revamp the serviceā¦. tinkering around the edge achieves nothing
November 3, 2021
I think I read that the Government had given the NHS additional funding specifically to enable them to purchase private care to bring down waiting list times but that the money hadnāt been spent. Or at least not on private elective operations.
If this is true, and if the Government intends to use private care to reduce waiting lists again why not give the patients the money directly in the form of a voucher?
November 3, 2021
Personally, I don’t care a jot about waiting lists. Waiting lists are the wrong thing to measure,. If I’m waiting for treatment, what I care about is waiting times.
If I need treatment, it doesn’t matter to me whether I’m first on the list, tenth, hundredth or whatever, I care about whether I get seen next week, next month or next year.
November 3, 2021
Well measure it in time then Peter.
Most people are told it will be X months before you get your operation.
November 3, 2021
Have you read the title of the article?
November 4, 2021
Yes I have.
The words waiting list are in my experience with the NHS given to patients in a measurement of time.
I am agreeing with you.
November 3, 2021
So it appears money has been taken from taxpayers and given to people who don’t know how much they need and how it will be spent.
That is no way to run things especially when I think of all the inefficiencies I have personally experienced at the NHS.
Surely we should be clearing out the people who are mismanaging things before we hand over yet more money.
November 3, 2021
As soon as we get a government with the cojones to adopt the French health system the better; but, I won’t hold my breath waiting. The DHSC’ four national NHS divisions, suffer from the classic British fault of trying to run everything from central government. In the last NHS England annual report, there is a section called “How we operate”, count the number of acronyms. https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/nhs-england-annual-report-2019-20-full.pdf
BTW. Now Mr J Hunt is chair of the Health Select Committee, perhaps he will force publication of his Exercise Cygnus; never published. A 2016 report of a government simulation of a flu outbreak, carried out to war-game the UKās pandemic readiness. āThe UKās preparedness and response, in terms of its plans, policies and capability, is currently not sufficient to cope with the extreme demands of a severe pandemic that will have a nationwide impact across all sectorsā, particularly social care beds capacity it added.
November 4, 2021
Re your comment on Cygnus – you are absolutely correct, acorn. Has Mr Hunt ever apologised, in any way whatsoever, has anyone on the Health Select Committee brought it up?
November 3, 2021
Billions Sir John, have become the new Millions since you were a government Minister and one important reason is that the state sector has become far too big, and a political giant that controls Parliament. Money allocated to this sector is now always referred to as ‘Government’ money. State sector believes this to be so with not a thought as to where it really comes from, the tax payer!
November 3, 2021
Are your government trying to introduce a charge per GP appointment, this was floated in 2019 with headlines like 15 million GP appointments are wasted each year in England alone. Each appointment was estimated to cost Ā£30 at the time. Screening checks GPs were paid Ā£24. GPs are paid around Ā£155 per patient registered with them. GP practices are private practices are this government trying to send them down the route of the dentists when Labour virtually privatised that service?
November 3, 2021
Off topic:
Sunak’s speech to Cop26. Having watched it I really have despaired of the present Leadership. I doubt a Labour Administration would shower quite so much borrowed money about. When all the wishful thinking about Green Energy being cheap has dissipated, we will have left our children a poorer World.
Johnson’s comments about James Watt and the Industrial Revolution are bizarre. He, Johnson, would probably not be here in the alternative reality he pines for. If you were able to go back to alter the past then many things that exist now would promptly disappear – cause and effect in action.
November 4, 2021
Atlas, our children a poorer world ?
We’re all going to get significantly poorer under this administration. Boris’s magic is in telling us it’s for our own good.
They hypocrisy displayed at COP 26 has pissed many millions of people off. Leonardo DiCaprio jetted in !!! There is NO global problem that an actor can’t sort out (to quote another.)
November 3, 2021
PMQs The green government being asked questions from a green opposition to green MPsā¦.and thereās actually only one Green Party MP ā thatās democracy
November 3, 2021
Given that every role in the NHS has a grade and that each function of the NHS has a cost centre beit clinical or administrative it should not be beyond the wit of each Trust’s CFO to produce a top level income and expenditure statement which can then be drilled down into to discover where money is being spent. These Trust statements could even be consolidated to give overall NHS expenditure breakdowns in quite some detail with a breakdown of clinical, clinical procedures, and administrative.
The same process can be used for advance budgeting so we can see where the money is planned to be spent. Exception reporting on a monthly basis will ensure that money is being spent as it is planned to be spent.
Apart from the consolidation of all Trusts, I am sure this is happening (the NHS has too many accountants and finance mandarins within it for it not to be). Therefore the information is there so why can’t they give it to you Sir John? Is the Ministry and Treasury not asking for it?
November 3, 2021
Those cost centres would also highlight Management consultancy and temporary nursing costs. Why does the NHS not run its own Temping agency with a pool or workers and not employ from outside that pool?
November 3, 2021
Years ago a proposal to erect a new replacement hospital in our town was made. When the NHS bosses were asked at a public meeting whether the new hospital would have a maternity unit the following quite astonishing answer was proffered: “we don’t know which services exactly will be available in the new hospital”.
It’s akin to saying to somebody”I need your help to take something to France”
They say, “certainly, what do you need me to take? Will I need a motorcycle or a 38 ton truck?”
Before the answer comes, he goes and hires a minibus.
Organisation? What organisation!
November 3, 2021
Mr Redwood will you be continuing with this blog once your government implements it’s online harm bill. It seems a little pointless since no disagreement with government agendas will be tolerated and even sharing a post can get you 2 years inside. Who will bother reading anything online when it will simply consist of unchallenged propaganda?
November 3, 2021
All good questions, maybe I am old fashioned but unless they can say how much will be spent and what we will get for it in some detail they shouldn’t be given the money. Thats how business cases work in the real world.
Reply Agreed. I am asking Ministers to require plans and budgets first.
November 3, 2021
Sir John, you need to get with the Project. Why would Ministers have Plans and Budgets?
They need focus groups, diversity accounts, statisticians with lots of incomplete data in lots of incomplete spreadsheets. Teams of interns reading and analysing social media, uptodate info from influencers. Press and news coverage, visits to Downing St, looking like important heroes and be ready to switch ministries when the PM has to deflect trouble ahead.
Take a deep breath, close eyes, exhale slowly – thats much better isn’t it?
November 3, 2021
Hmmmm. Ā£36 billion over three years? Ā£12 billion per year.
Let’s put that into perspective shall we?
1) I recently saw an interview with the head of an aid agency who said that world hunger could be solved with an input of around Ā£6.6 billion.
2) Dishy Rishi has just announced at COP26 that globally, we must but Ā£130 TRILLION into the pot to (effectively) limit global temperature rise to under 1.5degC.
There are around 200 countries on the planet, and many of those would not be able to afford (or be inclined) to contribute resources that are better spent elsewhere, so let’s say … 130 countries could contribute?
Ā£1 trillion each? Let’s also make that number more visible – Ā£1,000,000,000,000.
A million millions.
So that’s OK then?
Our national debt has recently crept past Ā£2 trillion with our spending on Covid combatative measures (not counting the further consequential losses to businesses through lockdowns and non-recovered trade).
And you want to increase our national debt by another 50% Rishi?
Thanks for that old bean.
These tw@ts have completely and utterly lost the ***insert preferred expletive here*** plot !
November 3, 2021
@G.Wheatley +1 Yes and rather than create an create an effective efficient sustainable economy to fund all these projects – they just go for tax, hence kill the very thing they are there to do
November 3, 2021
This is the same method of profligate spending that characterises the distribution of the aid budget. It doesn’t matter how it’s spent, what the outcomes are or who is to be held fiscally responsible for actions taken. Just that it’s big enough to keep critics at bay.
NHS England and NHS Improvement (an oxymoron if ever there was one) should demonstrate improvement or at least have a realistic plan to achieve that goal before they receive another pound of taxpayers’ cash.
November 3, 2021
Itās interesting to me that we are all chatting about normal things, when you consider the background.
In aurumn 2019, Mr Johnson asked us to lend him our votes, to get all the things done that we wanted, and assured us we wouldnāt regret it. Autumn 2022 and he is saying he is coming for our civil liberties, cars, heating, fuel and food, and insisting we all get more jabs or he will lock us down again.
November 3, 2021
@Barbara +1. Yes all talk and ego with no respect of those in theory he is supposed to serve. Dictatorship not democracy comes to mind
November 3, 2021
Correct Barbara
We donāt have a capitalist government we have a command government
November 3, 2021
There appears to be appalling mismanagement in the NHS, much of which you have highlighted John.
What a rip-off the NHS is. Why does it remind me of the BBC?
November 3, 2021
How will any blog/comments section be able to persist once the Tory online censorship Bill is rushed through?
Two years in prison for criticising the government.
And apparently they are making House of Commons staff work from home in a sort of lockdown.
Never heard the like!
Oh actually thoughā¦..
November 3, 2021
In order to assist the stressed out and overworked GPs I think the NHS should begin running walk-in GP clinics located at every hospital. They should be made part of an expanded A&E department.
One advantage would be that if a patient comes in with what appears to be a serious condition they can be sent to the correct department immediately for treatment or further investigation without the time wasting need for GP referral letters etc..
The patients can also be given their first prescription, again saving time.
November 3, 2021
The shape and structure of the NHS will never work and it will go on soaking up tax payers money and lurching from crisis to crisis. If a commercial company came to the market with a similar model it would not raise a cent!
This was clearly illustrated at the beginning of the pandemic when we had NHS this, that and the other, all tripping over each other protecting their own vested interests. So now we have got NHS England and NHS Improvements and heaven knows what this division contributes.
We have about 5 large health care companies in the UK, like Nuffield and Spire to name two, and they have a straight forward management structure doing a similar job to the NHS but all making a profit.
Why the government can’t adopt the same model defies logic.
November 3, 2021
So when can we expect ‘them’ to start the ”build back better” strategy? Any time soon? Or do they have to destroy everything first?
November 3, 2021
Do you really trust your government? All part of the globalist plan.
November 3, 2021
The government could get waiting lists down by taking some load off the NHS. Here are 3 ways it could be done.
1. Make self-funded or employer-funded treatments tax deductable.
2. Reduce the benefit-in-kind tax on employer provided medical insurance, so that more companies offer them and more employees take it up
3. Stop insurance companies giving cashbacks to push their customers back to the NHS.
If the above are polically too unpaletable, they could at least be emergency measures to get waiting lists down.
November 3, 2021
Dare anyone suggest that one reason for our high death rate from CoVid is the NHS.
November 3, 2021
Despite newspaper comments I don’t think the plebs give a toss about Mps being paid by companies.
More and more people are becoming a little concerned about vaccine safety, covid passports, no jab/no job etc.
Nobody ” In power” left or right appears to be able to talk in a convincing manner to the public.
November 3, 2021
And in other news our government wishes to take even more of our freedoms
If you buy a new car you canāt alter, improve or tamper with it, even change the alloy wheelsā¦.you brought it, surely if its safe within the rule of annual MOT what it got to do with this government what I do with my own property
āā Future of transport regulatory review: modernising vehicle standardsāā
https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/future-of-transport-regulatory-review-modernising-vehicle-standards/future-of-transport-regulatory-review-modernising-vehicle-standards?fbclid=IwAR3PNsYDmmRXCECousUTmWhIniUgtjcG6PPRswErIhqsAhvFZT3nBy8iSs8#tackling-tampering
November 3, 2021
Sir John, reading todays responses, the NHS as with all things requiring and others who just receive taxpayer funding are not accountable in the real sense. Simply put those that ‘award’ entities with taxpayers money should first and foremost be the ones accountable with, not a fudge, but their jobs. – that would create parity with others in the Country that live that way everyday.
November 3, 2021
It [The Government] has announced another Ā£8bn added to future [NHS] budgets. I asked some questions about how this money is going to be spent.
I would not be surprised to learn of a Government announcement during COP 26 that the NHSās top priority is now its path to net zero (CO2 emissions that is, not waiting list size).
November 4, 2021
All of this reinforces the impression that the NHS is a monster over which the Chancellor has no effective control. Just to take one example, why has no-one in parliament asked what the proposed new health and social care Czars, 42 of them at Ā£200,000+ a year each, will actually DO? Methinks they will be glorified PR pillocks who will explain, at inordinate length, how they tried to protect the social care budget but funds were insufficient. Hint to NHS: the less you spend on resource allocators, the more resources you can spend. Like most government organisations and large corporations, the NHS has too many chiefs and not enough (workers Ed)