Year after year, decade after decade, the public that use the National Health Service (NHS) and the people that work in it, have witnessed a relentless decline in the provision of services and the general working conditions. The key questions are, why has this happened and why is it continuing to happen?
If all political parties support the NHS, as they claim, then its decline cannot be because of the effect of conflicting political ideologies. Instead, it appears to be due to wilful neglect. The powers that be seem to have conspired to reorganise the NHS in a way that is designed to demoralise the public and the medical profession, so that the only solution is the provision of healthcare by the private sector. The Health and Social Care Act 2012, is the method by which the NHS is being deliberately dismantled before our very eyes. If an organised crime cartel was running the country, instead of the Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition that pushed this legislation through, then you would have to wonder how they would have done it any differently. The details of the Act were never made available to the public during the 2010 election campaign and yet within two months of the coalition being formed, a white paper called Equity and Excellence: Liberating the NHS, was put before parliament, with the assistance of management consultancy firm McKinsey and Company. This eventually led to the bill that officially set the privatisation of the NHS in motion. Despite claiming that they wanted to stop top down reorganisations of the NHS, the coalition established an Act of parliament that removed the obligation of the Secretary of State for Health, to be responsible for the health of citizens. That’s like having a Secretary of State for Defence who is no longer responsible for protecting citizens from outside threats; or a Secretary of State for Education who is not accountable for the provision of teaching and student attainment. How are you supposed to run a public healthcare system, if the person in charge is not responsible for the outcomes? Well, if the idea is to remove the word ‘public’, so that the market runs healthcare, then the Secretary of State for Health need only be responsible for the structures that allow that market to function. To stop that from continuing to be the case, there needs to be a campaign to bring the responsibility for healthcare back to the Secretary of State for Health. Anything less, ultimately means surrendering the NHS to a cartel of private healthcare companies, where naked capitalism will thrive and where the vulnerable will suffer. Please watch the video below, which neatly explains what has really been going on and why it needs to be stopped.
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AuthorA citizen journalist. Archives
October 2018
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