Ship of Fools: Jeremy Hunt

Thread: Jeremy Hunt Board: Hell / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :

Kindly go fuck yourself with an auger the size of your ego.

When you came to office, we had a good solid NHS, that worked. Not perfect, but very good, the envy of the world.

You have brought it to its knees, deliberately, and for profit. PEOPLE ARE DYING. And their blood is on your hands.

You are seeking to take the best health care in the world, a model that we should have been promoting to the world, something - one of the very few things left - that we can be proud of in the UK; and you are modelling it after the worst system in the world - the US model.

You are a morally bankrupt shit, and I hope you die a painful death.

Posted by The Phantom Flan Flinger (# 8891) on :

And he's been rewarded by being given specific responsibility for social care as well, so that will soon go to pigs & whistles.

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

He’s using the Philip Green model of management.

Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on :

To be fair to Mr Rhyming Slang, he's not managed to wreck the NHS on his own. He's been ably assisted by government policy that has ham-strung the economy to follow a dogmatic theory of reducing government debt by austerity, rather than investing in the country to stimulate economic growth (and, hence tax revenue that can be used to both cut debt and fund the NHS, education etc), and continues to consider cutting taxes for the rich to be more important than helping those in need. And, to fund vanity projects like Brexit at enormous cost.

Posted by mr cheesy (# 3330) on :

If anything, I think the reverse is actually true. The NHS has been in long-term decline, the Tories have accelerated this with a variety of policies (including various cost-cutting like the closure of walk-in centres and so on) and Mr Hunt has been left holding the baby.

The problem is that he can't really win. The whole Tory project is about cutting taxes, which inevitably means cutting the NHS - possibly to the kind of health system currently available in the Irish Republic. Which nobody wants.

Therefore the Tory grandees have handed Hunt the impossible task of selling a lie to the hard-pressed working classes who voted Brexit and who will elect-or-reject the next Tory government.

He's now forced to say that he's going to be putting money into the NHS, even though there is nothing in the coffers and even though even-if-there-was there would be pressure from the Brexit-loving-arseholes to put it into something more worthy - such as another cunning scheme to sift between the "worthy" and "unworthy" poor to determine whether they should be allowed to live or die.

The fact is that no money is going to become available and that no Tory would put it into the NHS even if it did. Because that would be rewarding failure - or something.

Meanwhile we have Theresa "Tough-nut" May mumbling on about a plastic ban in 25 years - as if that's at all relevant to anything today - and Michael "Govey" Gove going on national media to parade green-sounding policies which have zero chance of ever being enacted by a government which is propped up with corporate cash and support.

It's all bullshit.

Jeremy Hunt will be crushed like an ant when he fails at the task he's been given - he's obviously been given more responsibility so he can fail spectacularly at that as well.

Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on :

Bringing the NHS and Social Care together is long overdue; as long as both survive Jeremy "Makes you long for Landsley" Hunt's stint, that may pay dividends. Or may not, if it still ties people up shovelling money around internal markets. But it's not Hunt per se. It's the whole Tory machine, fapping away in the dark over thinking how first the financial crash enabled them to bring in a new philosophy of austerity which involved things Thatcher could only dream of after eating cheese.

Posted by Erroneous Monk (# 10858) on :

We urgently need to rebuild the NHS. We need to raise tax take to do this. If Labour were prepared to oppose Brexit, I think we might stand a chance of doing this.

I don't think we stand a chance.

[Frown]

Posted by Mark Wuntoo (# 5673) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Erroneous Monk:
We urgently need to rebuild the NHS. We need to raise tax take to do this. If Labour were prepared to oppose Brexit, I think we might stand a chance of doing this.

I don't think we stand a chance.

Agreed.
And, sadly, suspect you are right on the second point, although I still hold out hope. When a football crowd (admittedly bored with play) chants 'Oh Jeremy Corbyn' there is hope.

Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on :

Prescription: ring fence National Inurance - as originally intended. Have a debate and decide what percentage of GDP you wish to spend on health & social care. Include comparative data in that debate. We are, by the way, a long way off being the largest spenders on social care. Set National insurance rate.

Get private healthcare companies out of the NHS so we are not also paying for a profit margin. Get rid of ridiculously splintered internal bid / commission system and reinstate regional health authorities. We spend millions on the process of deciding which organisation does what every couple of years.

Stop putting social care / councils directly in charge of managing healthcare, because they are not good at it and do not understand how the different healthcare professions work, supervision requirements etc & because they are generally not CQC registered so the quality of the health service they deliver is not being adequately monitored.

Reinstate nursing bursaries so we have a fighting chance of getting nursing staff.

Pay social workers properly so we stop hemorraghing money for locums. Also stop treating them as public whipping boys, for the same reason. This largely why children's social care departments can't recruit & retain staff.

Introduce a citizens bond, consisting of the minimum guaranteed income rate - pay it to everyone, tax folk on their overall income. Care packages & modifications & equipment for folk with disabilities to be provided on prescription - and prescriptions to be free. Then get rid of the benefits system with its attendant massive waste and ridiculous enforcement costs. Transfer most staff to hmrc, and turn job centres into career advice centres.

Then you should also be able to cut student loans, state pensions, large amount of arts grants, bits of business funding etc - with their attendant expensive bureaucracy - because they're designed to provide enough to live off whilst you do something not yet profitable (like study or start a business) and the citizens bond will do this.

Change council tax so it incentivises people to take lodgers, and build more, a lot more, social housing. Consider rent control.

Set a minimum wage such that your tax allowance = citizens bond + minimum wage. Adjust corporate taxation such that companies over a certain size that pay more than 10% of their workforce at a prorata minimum wage rate pay an additional tax (e.g. Walmart can currently pay its employees full time wages & they need food stamps, the state in this situation is not subsidising the individual they are subsidising the business model).

How will afford this I hear you ask, because it will be cheaper I reply. We spend millions and millions on the operation of the benefits system and the internal competition systems. Private landlords and large companies are being subsidised by the state via housing benefit & in work benefits - this needs to stop.

[ 11. January 2018, 11:29: Message edited by: Doublethink. ]

Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :

It is not just Hunt. It is the entire Tory lan to destroy the country and take as much money to protect themselves as possible.

But Hunt is one of the most obnoxious supporters and implementers of this. And yes, it is sensible to combine Health and Social Care. But not under the rhyming asset stripping shit.

Posted by RdrEmCofE (# 17511) on :

quote:
How will afford this I hear you ask, because it will be cheaper I reply. We spend millions and millions on the operation of the benefits system and the internal competition systems. Private landlords and large companies are being subsidised by the state via housing benefit & in work benefits - this needs to stop.

Have you considered offering your prescription to the policy department of a national political party?

If so which one?

Posted by RdrEmCofE (# 17511) on :

quote:
When a football crowd (admittedly bored with play) chants 'Oh Jeremy Corbyn' there is hope.

Judging by his pathetically fence sitting, non interventionist behaviour recently over bWreckzit, you still think 'Hope' is an appropriate word?

Wouldn't 'Despair' be a better fit? Even the monotonous, tuneless, wearysome, dirge this idiotic mantra is intoned to is mindnumbingly depressing. No wonder football fans resort to it to express their dissatisfaction when the match they have paid a fortune to see, is devoid of skill, interest or excitement.

A bit like the Labour Party's antics are at the moment.

Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on :

Labour, but the citizens bond is a Green Party policy. However, it was being discussed by the Treasury back in the 1970s and there have been limited trials in other countries.

The problem is not the economics of it, you capture back in tax from those who don't need it, it's getting people to swallow the idea that you will indeed pay a small number of people to do fuck all. However, that will be cheaper than building a massive punitive system in attempt to prevent that. And it means business needs to treat people decently because otherwise they will walk.

But it also relies on the understanding that people generally do not wish to be idle, they wish to do something meaningful to them. It means people with fluctuating capacity to work will be more able to do so as and when they can, that inventors creatives and entrepreneurs may have the opportunity to try and fail and try again - the way only the wealthy can manage now - potentially tapping a reservoir of talent and innovation. it means valuing the work of family carers who would have an income allowing them to make that choice.

It could be socially transformative, and it would give everybody a stake in the system, rather than divide and rule.

Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on :

quote:
Originally posted by RdrEmCofE:

quote:
When a football crowd (admittedly bored with play) chants 'Oh Jeremy Corbyn' there is hope.
Judging by his pathetically fence sitting, non interventionist behaviour recently over bWreckzit, you still think 'Hope' is an appropriate word?

Wouldn't 'Despair' be a better fit? Even the monotonous, tuneless, wearysome, dirge this idiotic mantra is intoned to is mindnumbingly depressing. No wonder football fans resort to it to express their dissatisfaction when the match they have paid a fortune to see, is devoid of skill, interest or excitement.

A bit like the Labour Party's antics are at the moment.

Labour are trying not to get in the way of the governments mistakes, they can't meaningfully oppose Brexit until / unless the majority view of the country changes. which may happen if the government continues to cock it up spectacularly enough.

I strongly recommend this article.

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
The problem is not the economics of it, you capture back in tax from those who don't need it

Above what level of income would you say people no longer need it?

quote:
But it also relies on the understanding that people generally do not wish to be idle, they wish to do something meaningful to them.

The trouble is, "meaningful to them" isn't the same as "valuable to society as a whole".

Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:

quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
The problem is not the economics of it, you capture back in tax from those who don't need it
Above what level of income would you say people no longer need it?

Open to debate I think, the key saving from such a policy is in the massive reduction of bureaucratic costs, and no doubt different governments would draw the line in different places, in a stepped fashion via income tax.

quote:
But it also relies on the understanding that people generally do not wish to be idle, they wish to do something meaningful to them.

Posted by TomM (# 4618) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:

quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
The problem is not the economics of it, you capture back in tax from those who don't need it
Above what level of income would you say people no longer need it?

Surely you don't need to make that decision if the tax system is equitable? (Unlike the current system which is generally more punitive - as percentage of income - on the poorest).

[ 11. January 2018, 20:01: Message edited by: TomM ]

Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:

quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:

quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
The problem is not the economics of it, you capture back in tax from those who don't need it
Above what level of income would you say people no longer need it?

quote:
But it also relies on the understanding that people generally do not wish to be idle, they wish to do something meaningful to them.

The trouble is, "meaningful to them" isn't the same as "valuable to society as a whole". [/QB][/QUOTE]

I would argue that much of the time it is, and we know centrally planned economies don't really work anyway - one of the big economic arguments against communism.

This system would mean work always paid, so that basic incentive doesn't disappear.

(If you were mildly insane you could structure it so you are either paying out exactly the same amount of money as you are now, or net monies to exactly the same people but it would be a wasted opportunity)

Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on :

Sorry my attempts to reedit correctly went phut bang.

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
the key saving from such a policy is in the massive reduction of bureaucratic costs

I don't have the time or inclination to run the exact numbers right now, but the total welfare budget (about 114,400,000,000) divided by the total adult population (about 53,000,000) only gives about 2,000 per person. Not very much, and that's without making any savings out of the budget.

Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on :

Yeah but, if I give, for example, Richard Branson the bond - his income will equal his income beforehand + bond. And the tax take will equal what he paid before plus the cost of the bond.

So no loss or gain to him or the treasury.

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:

quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
the key saving from such a policy is in the massive reduction of bureaucratic costs
I don't have the time or inclination to run the exact numbers right now, but the total welfare budget (about 114,400,000,000) divided by the total adult population (about 53,000,000) only gives about 2,000 per person. Not very much, and that's without making any savings out of the budget.

£217bn.

That brings it up to £4000 per adult per annum. Suddenly something decent (say, £6k pa) looks within reach. (For reference the UK state pension is £8k).

Posted by Dark Knight (# 9415) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:

quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:

quote:
But it also relies on the understanding that people generally do not wish to be idle, they wish to do something meaningful to them.
The trouble is, "meaningful to them" isn't the same as "valuable to society as a whole".

No, the trouble is you have conflated "society" and "economy" in the last part of that sentence. They are not the same thing, and thinking they are is what got us into this mess.

[ 11. January 2018, 23:06: Message edited by: Dark Knight ]

Posted by simontoad (# 18096) on :

My knowledge of British Politics is limited to British satirical comedy, primarily Radio 4 podcasts. On that basis, I understand that the most newsworthy politicians are:

1. David Davis, the Brexit Bulldog;

3. Govie Govie Govester;

3. Dianne ABBOTT (who I have learned something about and I think she's pretty bloody cool); and

4. Arlene thingy, your Prime Minister.

I have heard Jeremy Hunt's name quite a bit too, and yes, always with the rhyming slang.

The person I miss from a comedy perspective is "I'm Nigel Farage. No no no, let me speak." I do that quite a bit at work.

Posted by BroJames (# 9636) on :

I think Farage is missing it too, hence his recent about turn in the issue of another EU referendum.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by BroJames:
I think Farage is missing it too, hence his recent about turn in the issue of another EU referendum.

Farage was taken aback by the referendum result and is now at a loose end. He has nothing to do now, apart from pick up his MEP salary and considerable expenses. One of the few benefits of Brexit will be that Farage will be out of work and to be honest I don't see even the most fervent Brexiteer giving him a job.

Posted by The Phantom Flan Flinger (# 8891) on :

But how will a second referendum help him?

Either it will be another leave vote, in which case he's in the same position, or it will be a remain vote, in which case what can he do? Call for best of 3?

Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on :

Farage is a distraction. I think he's secretly paid by the Tories, get him to say something stupid whenever they want us to stop talking about the way the government is killing people.

It's worked again here. He mentions a second referendum on leaving the EU, and the governments record on the NHS is forgotten.

Posted by Jay-Emm (# 11411) on :

quote:
Originally posted by simontoad:

4. Arlene thingy, your Prime Minister.

Technically our prime minister is Teresa maybe.

Arlene is the leader of the DUP (the Political wing of the pro-english freedom fighters in Northern Ireland). Having a narrow interest at stake she's got much more control and made less compromises over any deals than the previous coalition.

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

The NHS was a wonderful concept in its day.
Gradually it has turned into an administrative elephant, a bottomless pit into which government's of any colour can pour money to little or no avail.

In the absence of a cross party agreement on how to address this situation we will continue to see a health service taken for granted by the public, and a political football knocked forward and back by Tory/Labour Governments vying for Power.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
The NHS was a wonderful concept in its day.
Gradually it has turned into an administrative elephant, a bottomless pit into which government's of any colour can pour money to little or no avail.

The NHS has always been a bureaucratic nightmare. The various boards, regional health authorities not to mention expanded hospital administrations were created, at least in part, to provide post-war jobs.

quote:

In the absence of a cross party agreement on how to address this situation we will continue to see a health service taken for granted by the public, and a political football knocked forward and back by Tory/Labour Governments vying for Power.

I think Nye Bevan, political founder of the NHS regretted that "We wanted a National Health Service but we got a National Sickness Service".

Posted by simontoad (# 18096) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jay-Emm:

quote:
Originally posted by simontoad:

4. Arlene thingy, your Prime Minister.
Technically our prime minister is Teresa maybe.

Arlene is the leader of the DUP (the Political wing of the pro-english freedom fighters in Northern Ireland). Having a narrow interest at stake she's got much more control and made less compromises over any deals than the previous coalition.

I just love the impression of Arlene they do on Dead Ringers, where she is portrayed as the effective PM [Smile]

Back to the NHS, the Jewel in the British Crown.

Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on :

Every attempt to reduce the bureaucracy creates more. I seem to recall Sir Humphrey patiently explaining to Jim Hacker why setting up his Bureaucratic Watchdog meant taking on another thousand civil servants.

From my experience working in the NHS, contrary to popular opinion, one of the problems is a lack of management. The problem is that people think everyone who's not clinical is "management". They're not. They're mostly doing paperwork, generally on even lower pay grades than the clinical staff.

Posted by Baptist Trainfan (# 15128) on :

quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
In the absence of a cross party agreement on how to address this situation ...

I suspect that there are members of all political parties who are cross about the NHS - although not in agreement as to how its ills may be remedied.

Posted by The Midge (# 2398) on :

quote:
Originally posted by simontoad:

Back to the NHS, the Jewel in the British Crown.

Yes, Quite. Which leads me to ask "Why hasn't the NHS tried healing crystals?"

Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on :

quote:
Originally posted by The Midge:

quote:
Originally posted by simontoad:

Back to the NHS, the Jewel in the British Crown.
Yes, Quite. Which leads me to ask "Why hasn't the NHS tried healing crystals?"

Because crystals don't get ill and in need of healing?

Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on :

quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
The NHS was a wonderful concept in its day.
Gradually it has turned into an administrative elephant, a bottomless pit into which government's of any colour can pour money to little or no avail.

In the absence of a cross party agreement on how to address this situation we will continue to see a health service taken for granted by the public, and a political football knocked forward and back by Tory/Labour Governments vying for Power.

I invite you to look at the links I provided on how much we spend on healthcare relative to other countries, it's a myth that the way our healthcare system is structured leads to vastly more expenditure. There are ways of making it more efficient certainly, but we spend vastly less % GDP on healthcare with far better results than the US - for example. And it is knowing this, that makes it all the more worrying that the government seems to want to push us in that direction.

Posted by alienfromzog (# 5327) on :

http://www.tinyurl.com/jeremyhunt
one of my better ones, me thinks...

AFZ

Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :

That the thing, the NHS is not perfect by any means. But it does provide health care comparatively cheaply.

And Virgin HealthCare are reported to have amde a £15M profit. That means that they charged 15M too much for the services they provided, surely? Given that they don;t have any other income sources for that part of the business.

Posted by Arethosemyfeet (# 17047) on :

quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
The NHS was a wonderful concept in its day.
Gradually it has turned into an administrative elephant, a bottomless pit into which government's of any colour can pour money to little or no avail.

Ah, the usual spew of bullshit from the right. The NHS is one of the most efficient healthcare systems on the planet. How about we try pouring in at least the European average and see how things stand? Or US levels of healthcare spending. There is a law of diminishing returns with health spending but the last 6 years have shown that when you cut NHS spending you cause real harm. The administrative burden is lower than any insurance-based system so beloved of the right wing privatisers. No, the thing the far right and their ignorant fellow travellers have against the NHS is that it is a hugely successful example of socialism on the national scale.

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

One tends to spew out a theme which is being constantly spoon fed by news outlets. Presumably the public was being buttered up for a major shake out of the NHS following the Tory landslide... errr, which never happened.

Then the fact that woes of the NHS are still often deemed the top story to give morning tea sipping radio listeners, makes me think that it is either a national obsession or, as is more likely the case, used to divert public gaze from other stuff.
Blessed are the news makers.

Posted by alienfromzog (# 5327) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:

quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
The NHS was a wonderful concept in its day.
Gradually it has turned into an administrative elephant, a bottomless pit into which government's of any colour can pour money to little or no avail.
Ah, the usual spew of bullshit from the right. The NHS is one of the most efficient healthcare systems on the planet. How about we try pouring in at least the European average and see how things stand? Or US levels of healthcare spending. There is a law of diminishing returns with health spending but the last 6 years have shown that when you cut NHS spending you cause real harm. The administrative burden is lower than any insurance-based system so beloved of the right wing privatisers. No, the thing the far right and their ignorant fellow travellers have against the NHS is that it is a hugely successful example of socialism on the national scale.

This.

The brilliant, persistent myth that the NHS is somehow uniquely a bottomless pit for money. This does not stand up to any kind of analysis.

Healthcare is a potentially bottomless pit because (unsurprisingly) people want to be well and you have a phenomenon termed 'supplier-induced demand' whereby a diagnosis and treatment create new demand. However this is true of all healthcare systems.

That resources put into healthcare don't achieve anything. If you look at the NHS 2001-2010 compared to 2010-18 it's very easy to see what a ridiculous lie this one is.

Ultimately, every developed nation, pretty much, is facing the same demographic (and ultimately humanitarian) challenge. To have the most efficient system and to then decide that to meet that challenge you want to rip-up that system and start again is just insane. But that's ideology before evidence...

And the big issue with Hunt is how he continues to lie about what is going on.... continually.

AFZ

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :

So here's my considered take on the situation.

"We need a strong economy in order to have a strong NHS."

That's just bollocks. Errant bollocks. It's a matter of funding priorities. Money isn't in short supply. We spunked nearly a £1trn against the wall when it looked like the banks were going down, we're wanking ourselves senseless over getting to London from Birmingham a few minutes quicker, we've just had a massive orgasm over an aircraft carrier with no aircraft, and in the future we can look forward to the Chinese selling us outrageously priced electricity we've already paid for five times over. Presumably so that Tory MPs can carry on searching for grot over the internet without interruption.

No. We need a strong NHS to provide us with a strong economy. Sick people with preventable or treatable conditions and diseases aren't at work. Healthy people caring for those sick people aren't at work either. The faster you can heal sick people, the quicker they can get back to earning money and paying taxes. If you look at places which don't have decent healthcare, where workers are one accident away from being unemployable, it's the places with low productivity and an underclass of chronically sick unproductive adults.

(the same argument goes for roads, buses, rail, the internet - invest in them to get productivity up)

So a pox - hopefully an incurable one that really itches - on the Minister for Rhyming Slang.

Posted by BroJames (# 9636) on :

I posted this on the Influenza thread in Purgatory, but it seems equally relevant - if not more so - here

quote:
In 2015, the UK was spending less per capita on healthcare than: Luxembourg, Germany, Netherlands, Sweden, Ireland Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Switzerland, Norway and Iceland. It spends a smaller percentage of GDP than all those countries except Ireland, Luxembourg and Iceland. [source]

In 2014, the UK public expenditure on health care was a lower percentage of GDP than the USA, and between 1/3 and 1/2 of the amount of public expenditure per capita in the USA [source].

There almost certainly are inefficiencies in the NHS, but they are not leading to some ridiculous over-expenditure compared to other countries. If structural changes need to be made in the NHS, then the government needs to invest in making those changes, otherwise the resource cost of bringing about the change can only be met by reducing the resource amount available for the existing system of patient care.

The arguments made on health care seem to me to be similarly one-sided to those made on austerity. I heard some government person on the radio the other week saying that if we want to reduce the government's debt levels, then there is no alternative to austerity. He didn't make any case one way or another about increasing the government's revenue by increasing taxes - he simply ignored it as a possibility at all.

Furthermore, austerity seems to be focussed principally on health, social care, and welfare benefits. If that is where the focus is, then it is the poorest and the most vulnerable who are being asked to carry the load of reducing the government's indebtedness.

I am well-aware of the argument about not killing (with heavy taxation) the (wealthy individual and corporate) goose that is expected to lay the golden egg (of tax revenue). But I feel increasingly sceptical that some members of the government and MPs have any other golden egg in mind than their possible employment when out of office.

Posted by Erroneous Monk (# 10858) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
So here's my considered take on the situation.

"We need a strong economy in order to have a strong NHS."

...

No. We need a strong NHS to provide us with a strong economy. Sick people with preventable or treatable conditions and diseases aren't at work. Healthy people caring for those sick people aren't at work either. The faster you can heal sick people, the quicker they can get back to earning money and paying taxes. If you look at places which don't have decent healthcare, where workers are one accident away from being unemployable, it's the places with low productivity and an underclass of chronically sick unproductive adults.

(the same argument goes for roads, buses, rail, the internet - invest in them to get productivity up)

This is consistent with my view that people of goodwill on the right and on the left want the same things - they just disagree about which order they can be achieved in.

In this case, I'm on the left side, in that all my life experience has shown me that people who feel mentally and physically well regularly go above and beyond what is expected of them in terms of productivity in the work place. So let's prioritise health and get everybody feeling as close to A1 as possible. Then our productivity will get back on track.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by BroJames:
I posted this on the Influenza thread in Purgatory, but it seems equally relevant - if not more so - here
quote:
In 2015, the UK was spending less per capita on healthcare than: Luxembourg, Germany, Netherlands, Sweden, Ireland Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Switzerland, Norway and Iceland. It spends a smaller percentage of GDP than all those countries except Ireland, Luxembourg and Iceland. [source]

In 2014, the UK public expenditure on health care was a lower percentage of GDP than the USA, and between 1/3 and 1/2 of the amount of public expenditure per capita in the USA [source].

There almost certainly are inefficiencies in the NHS, but they are not leading to some ridiculous over-expenditure compared to other countries. If structural changes need to be made in the NHS, then the government needs to invest in making those changes, otherwise the resource cost of bringing about the change can only be met by reducing the resource amount available for the existing system of patient care.
The arguments made on health care seem to me to be similarly one-sided to those made on austerity. I heard some government person on the radio the other week saying that if we want to reduce the government's debt levels, then there is no alternative to austerity. He didn't make any case one way or another about increasing the government's revenue by increasing taxes - he simply ignored it as a possibility at all.

Furthermore, austerity seems to be focussed principally on health, social care, and welfare benefits. If that is where the focus is, then it is the poorest and the most vulnerable who are being asked to carry the load of reducing the government's indebtedness.

I am well-aware of the argument about not killing (with heavy taxation) the (wealthy individual and corporate) goose that is expected to lay the golden egg (of tax revenue). But I feel increasingly sceptical that some members of the government and MPs have any other golden egg in mind than their possible employment when out of office.

A bit of a tangent but you can't look at the NHS in isolation.

Nothing reduces tax revenue like people who aren't in work and are therefore on benefits which as ane fule kno increases the demands for taxes and makes deficit reduction and lower taxes very difficult!

Therefore, if some proper schemes were put into place to employ some of those currently on JSA so that they earn a wage, pay taxes and are able to buy goods and services they can't do while on benefits it will be a win-win-win for the exchequer and the economy. As a consequence the fat cats will be able to pay less tax.

That all seems obvious to me so I must have made a stupid mistake somewhere otherwise it would be in place. If there is an economist in the house do tell me.

Posted by Arethosemyfeet (# 17047) on :

That's just basic Keyenes, SS. In other words: yep, you're right.

Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
I must have made a stupid mistake somewhere

Your mistake is in underestimating the incompetence of government.

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