The role of Chief Secretary needs strengthening as the Treasury’s second Cabinet Minister. Working for and under the general direction of the Chancellor the Chief Secretary needs to probe and challenge the bids for additional funds and the way in which existing budgets areĀ being spent. He or she should be the voice to greater efficiency and betterĀ value for money in everything government departments do.
The need to rein in public spending without damaging main services is obvious from the figures. The first target should be the huge welfare budget, where we need to replace more benefits with work incomes so people are better off and taxpayers save money. It is good to see peopleĀ now rejoining the workforce after covid. There is plenty more room to help people find appropriate work for their skill levels and health circumstances to reduce the welfareĀ bill.
The second target should be to ensure better value for all the extra money going into the NHS.Ā That requiresĀ the Health Secretary to work with the management to improve effective working and help employees deliver more with the right training, computer and automation back up where that can help. The phase out of special covid expenditures helps.
The third issue to examine is the capital cost of providing housing and public service provision for economic migrants. It might be better to reduceĀ numbers granted work visas and do more to develop our own workforce, as making provision for new arrivals is expensive given the amount of capital sunk to support everyone of us already settled here.
The fourth issue is to assist UK businesses to make and produce more at home. This will help generate more jobs and assist in delivering more tax revenue
August 1, 2022
Good morning.
I believe it to be the role of the PM (First Lord of the Treasury) to insure that all government departments are administered properly, and that the public purse is protected. It the role of the Chief Secretary needs strengthening, then so be it, but I also feel that various committees also strengthening to compliment and enhance such arrangements.
By ‘economic migrants’ you mean illegals, for that is what they are, then I am sorry but these people need to be discouraged as much as possible. I and others have suggested ways to do this but until you start to take a firm hand this will only get worse.
August 1, 2022
So long as they remain in the ECHJ and let the UK courts and lawyers to essentially invent new laws they are unable to have any real deterrents. Neither Truss not Sunak seem to have any workable solutions.
For housing you either need more houses or fewer people or a bit of – it is hardly rocket science.
Truss suggests rental payments should be considered in mortgage assessments. Well dear they already are as these are mainly paid from income which is clearly considered already so are you suggesting they count it twice? Some rents are paid from benefit claims but clearly these would not be received once you buy so it would be idiotic to give a mortgage on this income that would cease! She is starting to sound almost as daft as manifesto ratter and inflation causer tax to death, jam never Sunak.
August 1, 2022
ECHR rather with Bair’s UK 1998 HR Act. and his damaging legal reforms.
August 1, 2022
This government has had 12 years to repeal ECHR with the people referendum mandate for 6 years….nothing….and both leader have stated they’re going to remain members of the council of europe ECHRs
August 1, 2022
If we can’t stop ‘them’ coming over and staying, by which I mean fit young men aged 18-40, why not make it a benefit for the nation by a ‘work to earn your place’ concept. The Country needs some basic, cheap labour: fruit picking/farming, road repair and all the other jobs that no indigenous national wants to take. Couple this with language and social skills, for a 2 or3 year period. As noted, these are illegal immigrants, we don’t want to put them in gaol, but this would be a form of constructive provisional detention. I bet few would come!
Too ‘uncivilised’?
August 1, 2022
So Sunak now promises a 4p reduction in income tax in another jam tomorrow promise. This from the man who has just broken the last manifesto by increasing NI (another income tax by 1.25%X2). Is he really so daft that he thinks he can fool people in the way Osborne tried with his Ā£1m IHT promise way back (the rate is still 40% about Ā£325)?
Osborne did at least make Brown bottle his early election plans – about the only good thing he did as he might have won.
August 2, 2022
above Ā£325k!
August 1, 2022
Rather than being discouraged, illegal immigrants are actively encouraged. Lots of countries follow the same rules on refugees as ourselves, but no other country lays out the red carpet, as we do. I cannot think how illegal immigration could be made even more attractive! All the so-called deterrents are mere stunts to fool the public that the government is doing something to deter them.
Mass immigration and sale of everything UK to foreign interests means the UK is no longer the UK. It is just a hotchpotch of whoever wants a part of it and not necessarily beneficial to the country, or its people. Especially as it appears almost impossible to deport anyone, and even then only after long expensive legal battles. We should be deporting thousands, not handfuls, especially the criminals who are generally let off with suspended sentences and allowed to stay, because their home culture (no matter how barbaric) appears to be more important than UK law! How on earth can rape be part of a any culture and a reason for justice not being applied in the UK? Our soft justice is a magnet for the worlds criminals and people with evil intent.
August 1, 2022
Mark B
Agreed, why should the taxpayer fund an economic migrant who has gate crashed our Country without invitation.
Good grief we have enough people with problems (some not of their own making) who need our help and support, without adding to them from elsewhere in the World.
JR are you suggesting we examine the cost, because at the moment the Government does not have a clue how much is really spent, although the reported suggestion of over Ā£5 million per day just for temporary accommodation only, is suggested as the initial cost ( rising every day as more and more arrive )
The long term support cost, would I suggest be in the Ā£ Billions once you include provision for housing, NHS, Schooling, Benefits, etc.
August 2, 2022
Indeed government policy seems to be to pretend they are doing things to deter while actually just encouraging and enlarging the flow by the day.
August 1, 2022
It is not the function of the private sector taxpayer to finance your party’s refusal to dismantle and rebuild the now disturbingly authoritarian all-consuming, all-powerful Leviathan Socialist client State that expresses its undying loyalty to the Labour party and the regressive Left.
John knows full well what needs to be done but the political task of unpicking this complex web of Socialist parasitism of the taxpayer is simply too politically risky for his party. Far easier to accept the status quo and hop on for the ride and transfer the destructive cost of this Socialist barbarity to the general public
August 1, 2022
I wish I had your eloquence, Dom.
Very well said indeed. The country has never looked as Socialist as it does after 13 years of allegedly Tory rule.
August 1, 2022
+1
12 years in govt show JR is in cuckoo/dream land. Is this blog aspirational, looking at times gone past or an attempt to deceive? JR, What did you think would happen to foreign aid when set at a fixed sum? It would be wasted irrespective of the merits! Get real.
Same across the board for public sector spending, spend it or lose it has been the model throughout your party/govt.ās term in office for twelve years! Truss now openly speaking of policing streets instead of twitter! Met have more officers dedicated to this sham than small forces have officers ie Wilts, Gloucester, Dorset, West Mercia etc.
Francis Maud was going to sort out civil service and quangos, a bonfire of them we were promised- they increased the number plus additional czars! Cummings was going to sort them out, then Rees-Mogg writing silly notes. I got an idea How about sacking those who fail to turn up for work?
August 1, 2022
+1 socialist, woke and vassal
August 1, 2022
Good morning Dom, it’s good to start the day with a fixated rant as ever, isn’t it?
Why ever no congratulations to the England women’s football side for their marvellous performance?
Is it because they’re women? And because of the great cheer, which went up from Wembley, as they expressed their solidarity with all those who fight for justice and equality for all people by their gesture?
August 1, 2022
How can you identify a woman when apparently the likes of Keir Starmer find it impossible? He thinks all you have to do is declare you’re one and your biology becomes irrelevant.
August 1, 2022
What’s football got to do with anything? I’m sure Dom has got his own thoughts on it but he doesn’t need you to tell him what he should think or say.
August 1, 2022
NLH. I’d come here to say exactly the same thing about the women’s football team (even though it is off topic.)
Though I am thrilled for them I’m not into football, neither men’s nor women’s and what this is going to mean now is double-football for all !!! Where is the equality in that ?
Now. If you want a real example of panem et circenses, brain washing and control of the masses then it is via the near compulsory national obsession with football and the worship of it.
As a male it is now far easier to be gay than it is to not be into football. In fact I’d say that being averse to football comes not far above being a paedophile. Either results in social exclusion.
Where’s my equality ???
August 2, 2022
Where are all the non league male commentators? They play at the same level as women. I find women football slow and boring. I can always pop along to watch village football games of equal equivalence.
Reply Sorry you didn’t enjoy a great game and win by England
August 1, 2022
Well then NLH, I suggest that you stop your daily rants.
August 1, 2022
Equality? Justice?
Gosh! I would have thought youād be worried about diversity!
All the lefties are gnashing their teeth!
Stillā¦they WON!
August 1, 2022
Its only football Lad, any common fool can kick a ball about, no skill needed
August 1, 2022
Have you noticed that all the ācelebratesā are falling over themselves to get their congratulation airedā¦.in fear of being singled out by the media for not saying something
August 1, 2022
Your usual rant about something trivial dredged up to try to make a point.
Do you ever start the day thinking everything is right with the world?
U2 – A beautiful day.
See the world in green and blue
See China right in front of you
See the canyons broken by a cloud
See the tuna fleets clearing the sea out
See the Bedouin fires at night
See the oil fields at first light
And, see the bird with a leaf in her mouth
After the flood all the colours came out
Itās a beautiful day /
Donāt let it get away
August 1, 2022
One thing the party could do is promise nice country working holidays on fruit farms to benefit claimants and see that it makes the benefit system flexible and TRANSPARENT!
Rather than have MSM try to scupper Truss by announcing that she wants to being in MORE fruit and veg pickers.
Surely these helicopter-confetti benefits must add to inflationā¦more money in systemā¦more competition for goods or some such?
August 1, 2022
Let students earn a living wage on farms so they can start paying their loans back.
August 1, 2022
I remember being told on a visit to the Channel Islands many years ago that benefit claimants there were required to do community service work for a few hours each week.
August 1, 2022
*being = BRING
August 1, 2022
cuibono, anyone fit in the summer under the age of 25 who can’t find work within six weeks should be on fruit picking placements or no benefits if that is a national need of this country. They’d soon find more preferred work. They have the accommodation with the job or foreign workers wouldn’t be able to come.
August 1, 2022
Brilliant post yet again Dom.
August 1, 2022
+1
August 1, 2022
Indeed the incentives to work over living on benefits need to be improved dramatically. Many are behaving entirely rationally in not working and/or choosing to work fewer hours and not to do any overtime. They are so little better off by doing so. This especially as commuting costs are getting higher and the vast tax and NI costs. If you do DIY you have no tax on your labour to paint your house or fix you car. If you employ a company to do the job you have 20% VAT, employers NI, employers NI (~24%) and income tax at up to 40%. Combined this can easily take over 50% tax in the loop so even if you are half as efficient as the professional it is still better to DIY for tax reasons. Sunakās appalling & manifesto ratting tax grabs have made this even worse.
August 1, 2022
We even still have 45% income tax for some which I had forgotten about.
August 1, 2022
Earning income is a good thing. Taxing what is good is a strange way of operating.
It would be better for people to receive the full pay they earn and pay tax on the ‘bad’ choices they make.
Tobacco, alcohol, sugar, fat, speeding and other harmful actions are more suited to penalty payment to encourage better behaviour.
August 1, 2022
me too – I’ve never had to pay it – ha ha.
August 2, 2022
Lifelogic, don’t forget there is an effective 60% tax when personal allowances are removed too.
August 1, 2022
Sorry, but you’re out of date.
Sunak now on 16% income tax. Slight problem is that that would happen well after he’s thrown out of office in a General Election.
His 25% Corporation tax now looks a bit high too. How about 12.5% which might provide us with some growth for his income tax cut?
It’s all fairy tale stuff from Sunak.
August 1, 2022
Certainly is fairly tale stuff, not jam tomorrow but jam never from the serial manifesto ratter Sunak.
We have not even had the Ā£1m each IHT threshold as promised by Osborne back in October 2007 still just Ā£325K then 40%! Why would anyone trust anything the Tories (or Labour) ever promise! In the US the threshold is more like $10 million and much lower rates and sensible countries have none!
August 2, 2022
and raise Stamp Duty threshold for property bought in England, but not Scotland or Wales.
August 2, 2022
Scotland and Wales should pay more tax than the English they are entitled to more benefits, university fees, study grants, free prescriptions, free hospital parking, awards and scholarships only they can apply for, competitions only they can enter, more social care benefits. They are getting away with asking the English to pay more to them to pay for it all.
August 1, 2022
SJR
Yes makes you wonder why he did not propose/suggest any of this stuff all the time he was Chancellor if he thinks it was all so good.
August 2, 2022
any more bids? Well Ms Truss will you lower Income Tax from 16 %? I’d rather you promised to raise Personal allowances by say Ā£1000 every year. Allow benefits claimers to work more than 16 hours, perhaps 20 to 25?
August 1, 2022
+1
You are literally punished for going to work. Tax upon already taxed income to pay to run a car to get to work. It is a ball breaker to see the VAT you are charged on a repair on the car you only have for the purpose of getting to work and the worry of running it… a liability that can drop a devastating bill on you at any time. Then there is the fuel tax rape at well over 100% of the refinery cost – watered down petrol with the government E10 scam.
No. Boris. Most of us don’t care if our car goes “Va va vrooom !” but we worry interminably that it might go *pop*.
August 1, 2022
PS – increasing welfare while workers are on pay freezes only closes the gap further.
August 1, 2022
These alleged Tories now provide Mortgages on welfare! Why work, why pay taxes?
Johnson claims to have been Stitched up. Does he not have any sense of wrong doing? Were his apologies false?
August 1, 2022
I’ve recently returned from a 1200 mile round trip to sunny (yes sunny) Scotland for The Open. I’ve used only E10 for many months now – no issues. Our 12 year old car returned 46 mpg overall which is wonderful in this car. 70 mph where possible, and some at 60 and 50 where restricted.
August 1, 2022
How can you sleep at night not driving an EV…What would our glorious dear leader and his ife say
August 1, 2022
Correct the E10 is a scam
August 1, 2022
My husband has said this is becoming very much the case for a couple of women he works with who are single Mothers.
They are hard workers and defy the usual stereotyping of single Mothers and are not looking for an excuse to just live off benefits.
The reality is all their costs are rising but their pay isn’t.
Better paid jobs are thin on the ground in the area and if they could get one they would such is their work ethic and wanting to set a good example to their children.
I think far too many who have a lot of say and who assume much, don’t actually know what it is like in the real world.
August 1, 2022
No VAT on labour just materials. The honest small business finds itself at a competitive disadvantage against the sole trader who can keep below the VAT threshold.
Plus, you can always avoid VAT with people who will take cash, so changing the rules also reduces the scope for fraud.
August 1, 2022
Drop VAT altogether, its a burden to small business and a scam to big business….its an EU tax and we voted to leave the EU and all its institutions and to repeal their laws
I’ve just read that Liverpool City Council are going ahead with a 2nd phase of cycle lanes – with part European Regional Development Fund EU grant…..WHY
August 2, 2022
Because the buses haven’t been running for over two weeks and nothing is being done to find another bus provider perhaps?
August 1, 2022
You write “we need to replace more benefits with work incomes so people are better off and taxpayers save money”. Brilliant! Why has no one thought of that? Do you have even one concrete suggestion on how to achieve this? No. No, of course you don’t. You only have fantasies and platitudes. While your disastrous Brexit shrinks the economy on a daily basis
Reply Yes plenty of ideas as tge government is now attempting
August 1, 2022
Load of ways mainly to get the government out of the way of businesses, lower taxes and a bonfire of idiotic red tape so they can invest more, compete in the world and pay more.
August 1, 2022
UK exports to the EU are the highest since records began. Brexitās going great !
August 1, 2022
The trade in goods deficit, excluding precious metals, widened by Ā£9.5 billion to Ā£63.1 billion in the three months to May 2022 compared with the three months to February 2022, as imports of goods increased by Ā£20.2 billion (14.6%), and exports increased by Ā£10.7 billion (12.6%)
August 2, 2022
acorn, you talk about the outflow but not about the inflow, aren’t precious metals ‘goods’, didn’t we have to import a lot of energy? What caused the extra Ā£10.7 billion, who did we spend it with one or two countries, what were we ordering we couldn’t provide for ourselves I wonder?
August 2, 2022
Acorn, are our goods movements to Northern Ireland now counted as exports to the EU?
August 1, 2022
Shutting the economy and life in general down because of a flu has nothing to do with any economic problems I suppose???
No, of course not, it’s all BREXIT.
August 1, 2022
With plenty of vacancies in the job market, there should be no benefits for people fit to work.
August 1, 2022
Well said Dave.the socialist fling must end. work if you want to eat.
August 1, 2022
That’ll be Brexit shrinking the economy on a daily basis but with a negative rate of shrinkage:
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2022/07/17/why-we-need-growth-to-cut-the-deficit/#comment-1329824
āFigures published today by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) revealed gross domestic product (GDP) jumped 0.5 per cent in May, much higher than analystsā expectations of growth flatlining in the month.ā
āThe ONS also revised up its calculations for March from a 0.1 per cent contraction to 0.1 per cent expansion. Aprilās print was also adjusted upwards.ā
Just as thanks to Brexit our exports to Europe have collapsed, but collapsed upwards:
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2022/07/22/my-contribution-in-the-northern-ireland-protocol-committee-day-2-debate/#comment-1330678
āThe recent CityAM article āĀ£16.9bn boost for Brexit Britain as UK to EU exports hit highest level ever recordedā should have made it clear that none of those exports came from Leeds Central, because …”
August 1, 2022
I have a suggestion. Make people do community service like picking up litter, weeding pavements, and volunteer jobs. If the alternative to paid work was worse than staying at home on benefits people would soon choose a proper job. It’s not as if doing this puts a council worker out of a job as these tasks haven’t been carried out for years.
August 2, 2022
Christine, the local community could give a list of tasks that haven’t been done like this and that no council workers are currently doing:
Taking grass out of curb stones,
Brushing up gravel and stones from the new method of putting top coat onto road surfaces,
Strimming grass near roundabouts and junctions that obscure a drivers vision,
Pulling weeds on the metal fenced in utilities brick buildings
Re-painting underpasses and removing graffiti more regularly
cutting back overgrowing verges from paths and making them a two person walking width again.
Clearing public rights of way by trimming overhanging undergrowth and trees
Cleaning bus stops
Litter picking
Washing empty building windows inside and out (often council-owned)
Security cleared people could assist on a hospital ward, fetching and carrying drinks, helping people to reach objects they need, generally assisting nursing staff with a view to training nvq as ward orderlies or first level nurses as they are called now.
August 1, 2022
āThe fourth issue is to assist UK businesses to make and produce more at home.ā
The way to assist this is for government to get out of the way. Cheap on demand energy, no net zero, get fracking, move to easy hire and fire, deregulate, relax and speed up planning, stop blocking road and mugging motorist many trying to get or do work,
It is not so much for the Government to assist in this as to stop mugging, inconveniencing, distracting & handicapping UK industries at every turn. Also far too many people are going to university for three years to do worthless degrees and get Ā£50k of student debt + 7% interest. Release these people to get jobs, pay taxes and learn on the job. Do this by stopping the soft loans for most degrees other than in demand ones and for people without decent A levels. They can get a job and resit their A levels if they wish to.
August 1, 2022
Do that and the Establishment will scream merry hell.
I’m afraid you’re making the mistake of thinking they have a spine.
August 1, 2022
Producing more at home is greener too.
It takes out transport miles and it brings back control of emissions to the UK. Exporting our filthy work to China has done nothing for the environment and we have only gone on to subsidise a whole class of people NOT to work in manufacturing in the UK by taxing those lucky enough to have proper jobs. Better to have kept our people busy. The chances are that we would not have had to put up with an economy wrecking virus either.
August 1, 2022
Youāre taking about medium and long term solutions while our government works from headline to headline satisfying its overlords globalist policies
August 1, 2022
So a highly competent person is required to fill the Chief Secretary job then!
No doubt spending departments are charged with control too, but are the incentives appropriately aligned to give sufficient encouragement to them to act in harmony with the Chief Secretary? What happened to David Cameron’s call so common in industry upon departments to do more with less?
August 1, 2022
Liz Truss can show the differences she intends with better job titles.
Youngsters might wonder what āChief Secretary to the Treasuryā means; perhaps envisioning Ben Gunn guarding an open chest of jewels with a blunderbuss. Old men might have an image of a shapely shorthand typist with expensive taste counting on her bossā lap.
āAuditorā might be more relevant, or are 7 syllables too precious to cut?
August 1, 2022
As to the dire NHS we should have fair competition between the NHS and private healthcare not a dire take it or leave it rationed NHS communist monopoly. The NHS should charge all who can afford to pay with tax reductions to balance this. Under Thatcher we had income tax relief for medical insurance and company policies and no 12% insurance tax either. People on waiting list should be given say 50% of the money to go privately for certain procedures. This cuts the waiting list for others, saves the NHS half the cost and get more money and provision overall into health care.
August 1, 2022
Still waiting for “Lose weight. Save the NHS.” We still have an obesity crisis and – if we’re to be honest – this is why the UK and US were so severely impacted by the Covid crisis too.
I blame the NHS for our obesity crisis. It operates Reverse Darwinism. It pays particular care to obese people and doles out pills that make this lifestyle choice viable. It even adapts hospital doorways and ambulances in service to the self inflicted obese. In my experience it neglects people of healthy weight and panders to the greedy and indisciplined.
All except one of the 17 people I know to have died since the start of the Covid pandemic (none from Covid) were a healthy weight. I suspect that each of them went under Doctor’s radar but all had terminal conditions that went unspotted or ignored.
August 1, 2022
17? Do you know a lot of people and mainly fairly old people then?
August 1, 2022
We pay sickness benefits for obesity. The Government tried to stop this but was overruled by the EU. Now we are out this policy should be reversed. It’s perverse that the Government charges all of us a sugar tax to cut down our weight but gives extra money to the obese so they can buy more food.
August 1, 2022
and we allow obesity in our school children….no extra PT or referral to NHS for diet advise
August 1, 2022
How about “no motorbikes – save the NHS”? “no high injury sports – save the NHS”?
Smoking taxation I read, pays for its NHS cost and as the smoker often dies earlier also saves pension and old age NHS costs and other benefits.
August 1, 2022
Obesity is definitely not the fault of the NHS. This is the result of individual choices – too much motor car and not enough bicycle, too much chocolate cake and not enough salad.
Then there’s the attitude “I’ve paid my taxes so expect to get treated when I make myself ill.”
August 1, 2022
The problem of the ever expanding and unproductive civil service cannot be solved until itās possible to sack civil servants as easily as the private sector.
August 1, 2022
Indeed almost never are they fired or made redundant. Just the same with bad teacher who go on āteachingā children badly for years and years until they are finally encouraged to retire.
August 1, 2022
Promoted to get them out of ones way!
August 1, 2022
We’re losing a nuclear generator today of about 1gw.
11,000 windmills are currently providing less than half this at 0.42gw.BP are set to increase capacity to 30gw which will remain stationary for lo g periods. Can we stop the subsidy and cfd payments for all new wind and solar.
August 1, 2022
Don’t be silly Ian. That’s far too sensible.
August 1, 2022
A great speech by Neil Oliver on GBNews last week about how bad for the environment wind and solar power are. Unfortunately net-zero isn’t about saving the planet it’s just a money-making scam. All part of Agenda 2030. We need a proper debate about this issue but the MSM has shut down any opposing views. Politicians are too frightened to listen to experts who speak out against the net-zero policies.
August 1, 2022
+1 I’ve got a lot of time for Neil Oliver a good presenter
August 1, 2022
IW : āCan we stop the subsidy and cfd payments for all new wind and solar.ā
Not only should subsidies for renewables be ended but that they should also be paying the costs for their intermittency as advised by Sir Dieter Helm, Professor of Energy Policy at Oxford University, in his 2017 Cost of Energy Review for the Government.
Or providing the necessary backup for their claimed capacity.
At the moment gas, and sometimes coal, generators are in effect subsidising the wind farms by providing this backup.
In effect, because renewables are intermittent, consumers are currently paying for two energy systems, renewables and fossil fuel, and the Net Zero Strategy plan is to remove the fossil fuel system by 2035 to leave us with simply intermittent renewable electricity generation and with volatile pricing and demand management (euphemism for rolling blackouts) to keep the grid balanced and not crashing completely.
August 1, 2022
Yes Ian, Lionesses permitting, the long-planned closure of HinkleyB is the most important news item of today. It means that switching from Hydrocarbons to electricity will be fairly pointless until beyond 2030 because the extra electric power will generally mean burning more gas. Even the benefit of air or ground-source pumps will be limited. Efforts to reduce CO2 should focus on energy efficiency until we have a surplus of nuclear + output from renewables on most days.
August 1, 2022
+1 subsidy was never a policy in the old days….whatever happened to market forces
August 1, 2022
Exactly Javelin, and sacking them in the private sector is far too difficult.
August 1, 2022
So Mr Sunak wants the NHS to charge me Ā£10 if I fail to turn up for any appointment. That might be acceptable provide the NHS pay me Ā£10 per hour for any appointment where I am kept waiting for an hour or more, or if an ambulance takes more than an hour to arrive.
August 1, 2022
Plus Ā£10 for every time your appointment is cancelled.
Another Ā£10 for every time you see a Doctor or nurse who really can’t be bothered to even look at you properly.
Another Ā£10 for every subsequent appointment you have to have because of the above.
August 7, 2022
Some of you on this blog are rather silly with their Ā£10 comments:
For rather bad hip problems, I decided to go private at the beginning of March 2022.
I saw a hip surgeon, Ā£260, he required X-rays and MRIs Ā£860, then second appointment to discuss the pictures Ā£230, recommended I see first a spine doctor as the MRIs were showing three damaged lumbar disks pinching nerves that had better be fixed before considering a hip operation.
First appointment with the spine surgeon Ā£260, agrees with the hip surgeonās diagnostic, he proposes an injection in a nerve to see whether I really need a spine operation. I get the injection Ā£335. After three weeks of relief, pain comes back as bad as before. Spine surgeon decides I need decompression surgery on these three lumbar disks, Ā£1005 for surgeon, Ā£535 for anaesthetist, Ā£440 for two days in private hospital.
By first week of August I have now spent Ā£3925 since mid-March. Fortunately I do not appear to require much reeducation after this spine operation as I am reasonably fit and was more or less able to walk (with crutches) out of the hospital.
Assuming the spine stuff is now āfixedā, Iāll return to the realm of the hip surgeon in five weeks time where I can expect an expense of Ā£5-9k for the hip replacement depending how much reeducation Iāll require after the operation (a daily one-hour physio session over two weeks is about Ā£3k).
The good thing of going private is the speed at which care can be obtained in the Thames Valley area. I had been on a NHS waiting list since midā21 and the only tangible thing I had actually got in Decā21 was a 30 mn phone conversation with a hip physio who sent me later a booklet with ten exercises to be done daily to improve my ādaily lifeā with a potential operation by mid- to end-2023.
(And apologies to all for concentrating on poor old me).
August 1, 2022
It can take over an hour of your time on the phone just to book a GP appointment! So will we get Ā£120 for that wasted time. Sunak wants to charge Ā£10 for 5 mins of the doctors time. Time that is not wasted anyway as the Doctor can see the other patients for a bit longer (many need more than 5 mins) or make other telephone appointments or do other admin like getting staff to answer the phone after a minute or two & not 60 minutes. Or letting people leave a message and call them back when free!
August 1, 2022
Agreed…
A missed appointment doesn’t cost the NHS a penny, it’s an opportunity for reportedly overworked GPs to get their appointments and work back on track….
August 1, 2022
I’d rather detailed statistics be done on the people that don’t show for appointments, what age were they? Did they forget because appointments are now too far in advance? Were they too sick to attend? Did they try to get through to cancel the appointment and couldn’t (phone record proof)? Why didn’t they cancel the appointment? What time of day were the missed appointments? It is very odd, face to face appointments are difficult to get so why would someone just not turn up, is it the same small number of regulars or not?
August 2, 2022
The NHS has cancelled lots of appointments on me, often at the last minute when I have already taken time off work. The NHS has openly failed to provide life saving treatment that was essential to staying alive, and I had to go private under protest. When the NHS provides a cheque for these then I will listen to rishi’s idea. We really need lots more power in patients hands and far less in NHS administration hands.
August 1, 2022
Gap between government revenue and spending 2019/20 Ā£60bn 2020/21 Ā£394bn rather like a world war. Good historical graphs on Twitter from the excellent Dr Clare Craig.
The figures now suggest that nothing positive was even achieved by this vast Covid expenditure and pointless extended lockdown. It seems to have done far more harm than good. The net zero agenda is also doing huge damage to the UK and is, and clearly will never do, anything positive at all.
August 1, 2022
+1
Is there any way of quantifying the casualties of lockdown and the ensuing economic crisis ? I know seventeen to have died not-of-covid including my own brother from suicide.
Where are Professor Whitty’s charts and doom forecasts on this ???
Keep safe !
August 1, 2022
IMO all we can really do on that question, NLA, is compare ourselves with a country that did not lock down, Sweden being the closest in terms of population concentration in urban areas, standard of living and type of economy. If you look at officially reported EUROMOMO statistics you will see that the UK has suffered considerable excess mortality over the 2020-22 period, Sweden very little:
https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps
Even without Covid deaths (however defined) excess mortality in Britain has been running in tens of thousands since the middle of 2021. Lockdowns and denial of health care are likely to be mainly responsible for this, and the next Health Secretary needs to ensure lessons have been learned at Cabinet level from our dire experience.
August 1, 2022
The charts and vocal delivery should be stored for the nation. We don’t believe you! in spades.
August 1, 2022
On reigning in public spending, I wonder what would happen if Ministers’ pay packages had lucrative bonus packages, contingent upon achieving enduring spending cuts?
August 1, 2022
As apposed to very lucrative bonuses from acting as paid “consultants” to lobbying companies trying to push through laws that often assist vested interest at the expense of the public. This is an affront and subversion of democracy. You elect politicians but they they get bought up by vested interests plus you have the party donation racket for government contracts. Just look at the many insane laws they pass and some contracts they award for proof of this. Look at energy, net zero, heat pumps, motorist mugging, housing regulations, EPCs, electrical and gas checks, deposit protection, the hydrogen lunacy, education, transport, HS2, test and trace, vaccines, NHS procurement, military procurement… it cannot all be incompetence.
August 1, 2022
Re your heading, I don’t think that anyone ever claimed that it did, Sir John.
August 1, 2022
Re your penultimate paragraph, the many talented people who used to come to this then part of the European Union from others were no more “economic migrants” than were Scots who came to London, or Cornishwomen who moved to Glasgow, for whatever family, professional, educational, romantic, or whatever other reason.
They have been replaced by people from elsewhere who generally very much are, however, thanks to your brexit, Sir John.
Reply What a nasty comment about non EU people we welcome here. It is not my Brexit, it is the people’s Brexit decided in our biggest ever democratic vote.
August 1, 2022
āPeople from elsewhereā. Using a euphemism doesnāt disguise the sort of person *you* are.
August 1, 2022
I would far rather share my country with those of compatible cultures who are willing to integrate fully than with those who are not.
How about you?
August 2, 2022
so which compatible cultures do we see fully integrated with us?
August 2, 2022
Mickey
Scandinavian, Irish, Dutch and many others
August 1, 2022
The ERG have been granted almost everything that they demanded re brexit. The 26% of the people who voted Leave did so on the understanding – propagated by the likes of Hannan – that “no one was talking about” threatening the UK’s position in the Single Market on the other hand.
August 1, 2022
Has anyone else heard a whining noise since 2016?
August 2, 2022
It should be tracked down – it seems every time I open Sir John’s diary the same whine starts up.
August 1, 2022
NLH – selective memory – the leave campaign we were told below made it CLEAR…David Cameron the PM made it clear…
12 Jun 2016 – David Cameron confirmed Sunday that “he will pull Britain out of the single market if there is a vote to leave the European Union at the upcoming referendum. The prime minister told the BBCās Andrew Marr show that it would be impossible to copy the Norwegian model by remaining inside the trading bloc despite being outside the EU because that would mean accepting freedom of movement and trade rules made in Brussels. He said the Brexit campaign had made it clear to voters that voting to leave also meant pulling out of the single market. The prime minister said he would accept the result as an āinstructionā despite warning that leaving would be like planting a ābombā under the British economy.”
What exactly did the ERG demand do you have a list, what has been granted?
However, the Leave campaign has made it clear that in order to restrict immigration and strike trade deals with countries outside the EU, Britain would have to leave the single market. The prime minister said: āWhat the British public will be voting for is to leave the EU and leave the single market.ā
August 1, 2022
What a stupid statistic from you again NHL
26%
Quite ridiculous.
PS
Another myth from you.
Access to the SM was what Lord Hannon was talking about.
Just like all the other non EU nations enjoy.
August 1, 2022
Many coming in under EU freedom of movement were coming for economic reasons. It is not the same as people moving around within their own borders as you suggest.
It is very often the cry of those from the middle classes whose jobs were not being given away to those from Eastern Europe for cheaper labour, that this wasn’t happening. It wasn’t happening to them, so it didn’t matter. I suspect they are going to see things differently soon given the amount of visas being handed out.
I believe EU rules allowed for a country to return those from elsewhere who after a given period were still reliant on the host country benefits system.
Of course we didn’t do that, and many from certain parts of EU have never had it so good.
I disagree entirely with Sir John, your comment regarding non-EU is not ‘nasty’.
That’s a childish accusation and one thrown about too often now when someone raises an issue that we are not supposed to raise.
August 2, 2022
Isn’t the difference benefits Michelle, the UK doesn’t have to provide benefits to none EU workers and their families abroad, small changes were requested by Cameron the EU said no, if they wanted to keep the EU together this change, which people in the EU argued was an insignificant amount of money would have been granted. However, they knew it was a massive financial obligation on our taxes.
Paying taxes to the EU on prostitution and drugs a made up figure to increase our contributions, the many have to pay for the few.
I have no problem with the migration of workers who don’t claim any benefits, no problem at all. They must pay a contribution to our health service to obtain healthcare and if they are treated here without paying that contribution then our health service should look at itself before it wants more and more money off the general public.
August 1, 2022
Talented people from the EU are still able and welcome to come here.
Vaccine mandates had a lot more to do with changes than Brexit. Thank the Communists for that one, NLH.
August 1, 2022
NLH – if anyone (including Scots, Welsh, EU citizens) come to England to find work, then they are very much ‘economic migrants’. How else would you describe them? Maybe you imply they do not come to work, but to rely on benefits?
August 1, 2022
Martin – so you are claiming all these young relatively wealthy men with the latest smartphones, but no documents, are war refugees? Either your argument is pathetic or you are wet behind the ears – which is it?
August 1, 2022
You are delusional. People came here from eastern Europe because economic differences meant that a low salary in Britain was worth a lot more when spent in their own country, not because they were searching for romance!
August 2, 2022
exactly.
August 2, 2022
I was talking with a guy in the EU a week ago who achieved great things working just a few years in the UK, his wife and children stayed in their home country and claimed all the benefits allowing her not to work, he did two jobs is a fish market and as an uber driver coining it in living many to a house to keep his UK costs down, he build a brand new house and its paid for, if he wants an extension he’ll be back for a spell to pay for it as he obtained his UK rights before he left during covid (still got furlough from his primary job all the time he was home with no intention to return).
August 1, 2022
You talk about enhancing NHS staff performance with more computer technology, Sir John, but how is that going to work if we keep luring into this country people from the third world with no doubt a lot of goodwill and caring capacity, but little previous technical background? Wouldn’t we do better to make NHS front line jobs more financially attractive to local people who thanks to our education system do have more of an IT background?
August 1, 2022
Philip, it already is financially attractive with a great benefits package, full sick pay, excellent pension, and overtime. The training places aren’t opened up to British people. The Brits wanting to train are turned away and they made it University training often unnecessarily so that grade 5 pay would be graduate pay immediately from the majority of applicants at the age of 21.
August 1, 2022
The only way to improve efficiency is to force departments to work with ālessā money.as a successful businessman you know this but keep quiet because politically that wouldnāt be acceptable.
Actually it would if your government had the guts and confidence to take the electorate with you.
As for producing more at home, we read that you are more interested in rewilding so paying to take productive land and putting āwild flowersā on it. National Trust buying out tenant farmers.
Unfortunately both candidates have done nothing but talk about give aways and spending so continuing inefficiency/bureaucracy etc holding this country back and wasting my/our money.
What an indictment of our political class.
August 1, 2022
I find it very sad that Sir John has to give the incoming Prime Minister a lesson in Economics for Dummies and the desirability of stewarding taxpayers’ money carefully.
Both candidates have worked as Chief Sec to the Treasury and, we are told, are highly experienced and qualified for the role of First Lord of the Treasury. You’d really think they would have grasped these basic facts a long time ago.
Unfortunately, all it demonstrates is what a pigs’ ear the Not-a-Conservative-Party has made of the past 12 years of supposedly Conservative Government – and the reason that has happened is the calibre of the Prime Ministers/Ministers it has supplied and their unfitness for the important roles they have occupied.
I’m afraid both these candidates demonstrate that fitness for office isn’t likely to improve any time soon.
I’d like to know what Sir John thinks the Party should do about THAT?
August 1, 2022
@ Donna – could it be the audience Sir John is truly writing for is other than an incoming prime minister? š
August 1, 2022
There’s an obvious need to reduce the Welfare budget when so many vacancies are going begging. The government hasn’t grasped that nettle.
August 1, 2022
The last two paragraphs make the points many people in the general public have been saying for donkey’s years.
The usual suspects hurl all sorts of insults at them, not least that they are retards and it’s impossible to do such things, which they would know if they were as clever with a degree in the importance of diversity of pencils in the work place.
Then there are those in positions of power and influence who want to dismiss the workforce because they’ve branded them as lazy, which gives them the excuse to hand out lots of visas to other people.
August 1, 2022
Brilliant Michelle! I wish I’d written that…
August 1, 2022
Off topic, but highly relevant when it comes to the ludicrous money-wasting schemes the Establishment have foisted on us:
This morning, the highly subsidised, mega-expensive windmills are providing 0.7 GW of electricity to our grid.
Solar – 0.1 GW.
Gas, which they refuse to frack for – 16.9 GW.
Anyone would think they WANT massively inflated energy and power cuts this winter.
https://energynumbers.info/gbgrid
August 1, 2022
At the moment government departments bid for more money making vague commitments to do doing things differently. Once the money is decided, they then work out how to spend it.
A better way to control public spending is to base it on outputs. Departments would break down what they achieved the previous year and how much each part cost. They would outline their plans for the next year, comparing costs on existing services. Then cost their plans for new services, showing those dropped and improvements.
This would establish a clear picture of value for the taxpayer and a more robust basis for making decisions.
August 1, 2022
I am glad to see Mrs Truss appears to be winning. Sunak has resorted to a pathetic bribe, going against all his stated beliefs.
In my humble opinion, there are so many things wrong in this country, the NHS, Net Zero, Gender and Racial Identity problems that it is essential that you do not do “a Gordon Brown” and give the reins of power to someone chosen by the Conservative Party.
You have had a pretty dismal record since you broke through. It is time to show to everybody that the PEOPLE want YOU!
Call a General Election and let the people choose who they want to lead them out of this mess.
August 2, 2022
John, all the new incomer needs to do is stick to the manifesto pledges, no more but no less, they have this manifesto promise granted with a very large majority and every conservative that stood on this ticket now needs to honour it. They have two years to put it right.
August 1, 2022
A great speech by Neil Oliver on GBNews last week about how bad for the environment wind and solar power are. Unfortunately net-zero isn’t about saving the planet it’s just a money-making scam. All part of Agenda 2030. We need a proper debate about this issue but the MSM has shut down any opposing views. Politicians are too frightened to listen to experts who speak out against the net-zero policies.
August 1, 2022
The Health Secretary should not be talking to the Arts graduates running the NHS but the full time senior doctors who work in it. They would have a much better idea about how the service can be improved in ways which might not be beneficial to the unqualified jobsworths in charge at both national and local level.
There are far too many part time women in GP surgeries; patients often have no other recourse than to go to A&E after consistently failing to obtain a timely appointment. Is there a connection here?
Should Medical training be available to no more than a minority who are not prepared to work full time in the NHS after qualification? The NHS will never reach the standard of continental ones whilst it is dependent on foreign trained medics and yet students who have qualified for training through their A level results are still failing to obtain places.
How do substantially improve the woeful calibre of candidates that the liblabcon selects without which things will continue to get much worse?
August 2, 2022
forhurst, is Sunak promising us Ā£10 for every appointment we can’t get that we then have to go to A&E at our expense and wait to get seen?
August 1, 2022
Well done to the England women’s football team for standing up for both women and this country hopefully leading the charge for change in outlook attitude and determination , well overdue in politics and government too to get things done.
You could have a whole TV channel devoted to public scrutiny of the vast resources that are wasted and just signed off as normal expenditure by the Civil service. They have never heard of Zero Budgeting practiced regularly in the Private Sector which they poo poo. Easier to burn up to your budget max in March and add 10% which is shaved to 8% or similar at every spending review and off to twiddle or worse WFH.
August 1, 2022
This piece sounds like a job application to me !
August 1, 2022
I’m seeing fewer babies in the shops.
August 2, 2022
who wants to buy babies?
August 1, 2022
Off topic, I read here:
https://conservativehome.com/2022/08/01/david-gauke-the-pluses-minuses-and-risks-of-trussonomics-and-the-looming-shadow-of-lord-frost/
“A failure by the UK to comply with our obligations under the Trade and Cooperation Agreement may result in severe retaliation from the EU which could involve the loss of tariff-free, quota-free access to EU markets.”
But I also read here:
https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/explainers/disputes-trade-cooperation-agreement
“.., the complainant can retaliate by suspending its own obligations under the agreement … Any retaliation cannot exceed the amount of harm caused by the initial breach.”
So suppose that the UK government agrees with the recommendation of the Lords sub-committee that the grace periods should be made permanent:
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2022/07/26/memo-to-an-incoming-prime-minister-take-control-of-our-borders/#comment-1331709
and legislates to that end, clearly contrary to the provisions of the treaty, what material harm would that cause to the EU? How could the EU convincingly quantify that material harm so that its retaliation was proportionate rather than excessively “severe”? Especially if the UK introduces a system of export controls to provide an alternative means to protect the integrity of the EU Single Market. In any case how could the total economic damage of EU retaliation reasonably exceed the EU’s own estimate of the total economic value to the UK of the trade treaty, which is 0.75% of GDP? Would David Gauke consider that “severe”?
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2022/07/22/my-interventions-in-the-north-ireland-protocol-committee-day-2-debate/#comment-1330696
“On the EUās model, for what it is worth, leaving on basic WTO terms without a special FTA would have cost the UK 3.00% of GDP in the long term, but the FTA will retrieve one quarter of that, 0.75% of GDP, equivalent to Ā£16 billion a year.
That is the low value that the staunch unionist Boris Johnson put on the UKās sovereignty over the Irish part of its territory, and all of these excruciating problems with the protocol spring from that.
And that is also what we stand to lose if the EU cancels the trade deal, less than GDP growth in Q1 2022.”
August 2, 2022
Denis
We have lost much more in economic growth by leaving already, so your figures are irrelevant already
Reply Not what the figures show
August 2, 2022
Got any facts and figures to back up your claim bill?
Looking forward to your incisive and lengthy reply.
August 3, 2022
Whatever happened in the past, on the EU’s own model loss of the TCA would cost us only 0.75% of GDP.
August 1, 2022
Joe public doesnāt understand or compute any reduction in public spending in the UK while weāre rich enough to spend billions on foreign aid, billions to the EU, billions on immigration, billions to the UN and at home billions on HS2 and billions to repair parliamentā¦..the squeeze only appears to be on Joe public
August 1, 2022
…and billions on Track n’ Trace Ā£37+ billion
August 1, 2022
My God. So much is out of control.
Bring on the revolution
August 1, 2022
Simon Clarke was appointed Chief Secretary to the Treasury on 15 September 2021.
Simon Clarke was previously appointed Minister of State at the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government on 13 February 2020.
He was previously Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury from 27 July 2019 to 13 February 2020.
Never heard of him, never seen him interviewed? Yet he is responsible for an awful lot that people here think is going wrong – https://www.gov.uk/government/people/simon-clarke
August 7, 2022
It is certainly true that it is easier to be familiar with someone like Nadine Dorries.
August 1, 2022
The memo to the PM and all the cabinet is to remove the pro UN/EU communist fifth column in our Civil Service, quangos, judiciary, educational establishment and all our public services and institutions who are destroying our social harmony through uncontrolled and illegal immigration and our economy through deliberately wasteful spending and crazy ideas like the climate change/Net Zero Strategy which is science denying nonsense.
August 1, 2022
Spot On
August 1, 2022
The most important ministerial job in the Treasury is currently the lowest ranked; the Exchequer Secretary. The UK needs the equivalent of the US Treasury “Bureau of the Fiscal Service” they are responsible for the “Daily Treasury Statement”. This shows the daily cash transaction down to fine detail. Here is an example;
https://fsapps.fiscal.treasury.gov/dts/files/22072800.pdf
The UK Treasury was, and still is, based on 18th and 19th Century legislation. Even the magic money tree department wasn’t separated out till 1968 (National Loans Fund). But there is a team in the Treasury who actually handle the cash daily, the Exchequer Funds and Accounts (EFA). They should be the outfit to publish a UK version of Daily Treasury Cash Statement. Then we could all see who was spending what and asking why.
The one thing the currency issuing government sector has in common with the currency using non-government sector is, if you want to know how both are actually doing; follow the cash flow.
August 1, 2022
Watched a game of football last night and none of the players spat!
August 1, 2022
Wrong I saw one do it.
August 1, 2022
The NHS has doubled the number of managers while enthusiastically adopting net zero and diversity. I suggest sacking the new chief and axing every one of the new in these categories.
Another huge drain is the booster vaccination campaign. My friends who are over 65 and some who are more vulnerable are now on their 3rd booster by month 7. GPs were paid Ā£30 per jab originally and a typical panel of older patients could easily .number 2000. At 5 jabs pa, that’s Ā£300,0Iplus the cost of the mRNA shots at Ā£20+ = half a million pa. Maybe it’s been halved to 350,000.
The shots are only effective for a month and don’t prevent infection or illness. Yet the NHS follows WHO guidance to only use cheap effective and safe treatments in trials. It’s almost as if the NHS is acting as the sales agent for Pharma.
August 1, 2022
300,000
August 2, 2022
If you’re making that sort of money as a GP, no wonder you don’t want to see patients any more. And usually you’re getting paid just for being present at the centre, because it’s normally nurses who administer the injections, I thought.
August 1, 2022
‘to assist UK businesses to make and produce more at home’
Yes Sir John but aren’t you avoiding the huge elephant in the room?
We CAN NOT make and produce more at home while running the U.K. on sun and wind!
Get rid of all the ridiculous CARBON NEUTRAL legislation.
Particularly for example, to stop producing I.C. vehicles.
Get cracking on producing MORE nuclear energy.
Make sure we are getting the best from North Sea oil.
And get a move on with investigating pros and cons of fracking – one of the few things the U.S. can teach us.
August 1, 2022
+ million
August 1, 2022
“It might be better to reduce numbers granted work visas and do more to develop our own workforce”
And to motivate it, by removing benefits and restoring some dignity and value to employment, without HMRC constantly hunting down the tiniest workplace advantage and trying to tax or outlaw it.
It is ridiculous that, for example, it is easier to have a comfortable and valuable home when in receipt of benefits than when working for a living.
August 1, 2022
What an excellent post, Sir John. Better late than never. Let’s go through your list.
Replacing benefits with work incomes. A bit of carrot and stick is needed. We need to get the structure of income tax – particularly the thresholds – to reward work. The lower income tax and NI threshold should be Ā£18,000, approximately the minimum wage annualised. Below this, income tax and personal NI should be zero. Hand in hand would be a reduction of the universal credit cap from Ā£20,000 pa (Ā£23,000 in London) to Ā£18,000 pa (Ā£21,000 in London). The upper income tax threshold should be raised to at least Ā£60,000, roughly the value adjusted for inflation that applied in the Lawson/Lamont era. The Conservative Party has increased taxation of the upper middle classes substantially. The standard rate of income tax should be between 20% and 25% and the upper rate between 40% and 45% – the Chancellor to do the maths.
Simultaneously, we should get the regulators off taxpayers’ backs. Abolish OFGEN, OFCOM and the Race Relations Commission, which serve no useful purpose.
Getting better value from the NHS will involve several components: (1) Obtaining non-taxation revenue and introducing demand management via modest charges – e.g. Ā£20 per GP appointment, Ā£30 per non-emergency use of A&E, and Ā£150 pa for any use of hospital in-patient facilities. (2) Getting big Pharma under control. Currently 8.3 million people in England alone are receiving anti-depressant drugs and opioids to control pain are known to be addictive killers. (3) Putting a sensible law of medical negligence on the statute book. An error of judgement is not negligence. Over prescription can be just as dangerous as under prescription. (4) Reduce the workload of doctors by delegating some decisions to nurses and pharmacists. (5) Cap the rate per day that the State will pay for lawyers representing litigants. (6) Let drug patents lapse after 5 years. (6) Get something like the Nightingale hospitals up and running and make clear to people who refuse to get vaccinated that that is where they will go.
Hospitals should invest in rehab facilities and staff in order to end bed blocking.
There should be no free housing or hotels or legal services for any immigrants, particularly those who enter the UK illegally. The State should not own any housing stock. All council houses should be sold off to tenants or private landlords. Housing benefit should be paid to people and should cease when the need ceases, for example when the children grow up.
Assisting UK businesses to produce more at home? That’s protectionism, only justified for military reasons. We do have a currency that floats on international markets.
August 2, 2022
Public spending would control itself if everyone spending money had incentives for spending wisely and heavy penalties for wasting.
August 2, 2022
And the Public Sector costs followed the Private Sector fortunes when belts are tightened – rather than infinitely and permanently ratcheted up skywards and forgotten about and “onto the next topic” after lessons will be learned – but never are.
August 2, 2022
The only way to get value for money from the NHS is to hand real buying power over to individual patients on a grand scale.
Turn the thing into a state backed insurance scheme, but get the state out of owning and running health care providers. Some modest manipulation to ensure coverage in rural areas etc.
Stop hyping the thing as a quasi religion, the service most of us get is really really bad, the way it treats it’s own staff is really really bad.
It needs the normal virtuous cycle of constant customer feedback enabled by end individual customers with buying power they can take elsewhere easily.