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The Thursday afternoon open thread – politicalbetting.com

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  • Pungent PB Pundit Alert -

    Believe that Matt Gaetz did NOT nominate Trump for Speaker, but instead gave the Sage of Mar-a-Lardo his vote.

    BTW, think THAT dishonor should have gone by rights to George Santos.

    However, Gaetz IS a more successful con artist in the true Trumpite-Putinist mold.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 71,072
    edited January 2023

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    Yes, it's easy to find those figures, but more difficult to tell whether they are comparing like with like.
    But it's hard to deny that Switzerland's per capita spending is a lot more than ours.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,568

    Scott_xP said:

    GAETZ nominates TRUMP for speaker

    Would it constitutionally stop him running for President?
    No.
    Damn. Thought there was a cunning plan at work!

    But it being the Republicans....should have known better.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,568
    Chris said:

    Scott_xP said:

    GAETZ nominates TRUMP for speaker

    Just to match the inanity, the BBC reports that the nomination evoked "grasps [sic] and confusion".
    Would those be pussy grasps, Beeb?
  • SouthamObserverSouthamObserver Posts: 39,652
    edited January 2023
    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,664

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    I am sure Max will be along very soon to correct his earlier mistake.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,329
    Nigelb said:

    So - are we going to have a 36 hour ceasefire in Ukraine? Didn't seem to be much of one around New Year from the Russians, so I'm thinking the Ukrainians will tell Putin to spin
    - and carry on as usual.

    Given they were bombing civilians on Christmas day, it's a completely hollow offer.
    A proposal to retreat to the 2014 borders might be a different matter.
    Ukraine should double their fire and give them a good Christmas present
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,820
    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    Only a little bit more yet Swiss healthcare outcomes are lightyears ahead of ours, especially among lower income people who get subsidised insurance.
    Rather a lot more though, when you consider the GDP per capita is around half as much again as that of the UK.
    But wages in Switzerland are a lot higher too as well as other input costs for healthcare.
    Even on a PPP basis, Switzerland is considerably wealthier than the UK.
    Any proposal to reform our healthcare system need to be realistic.

    Achieving a Swiss system with Swiss outcomes would involve spending a great deal more than we do now.
    What we'd get is people at the top choosing to spend more and thereby subsidising the people in the middle who choose refundable packages and those at the bottom having subsidised packages. That's how it works there and our input costs are substantially lower, nurses can earn 80-100k CHF in Switzerland, doctors upwards of 200k CHF. What's important there are the regulations and competition in the insurance market which keeps prices down for punters and state subsidisation for low wage workers and the long term ill, but the state essentially allows both groups to buy their own insurance package and will then refund them a big chunk of it so the consumer is still king for those groups too.
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 51,648
    Baker - Minister of State for Food
    Freeman - Minister of State for Prisons, Parole and Probation
  • Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    Yes, it's easy to find those figures, but more difficult to tell whether they are comparing like with like.
    But it's hard to deny that Switzerland's per capita spending is a lot more than ours.
    And whilst there's definitely something not right with the UK health system, the conservative answer might be to be a bit cautious before changing it- Chesterton's Fence and all that. There's probably a fairly big space where you end up saying "knowing what we know now, we wouldn't have set the NHS up like this, but the damage of changing to a different basis is greater than the gains that are likely to accrue."

    In short, I'd like to be clear of the mechanism that leads to better outcomes per pound.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,664
    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    Yes, it's easy to find those figures, but more difficult to tell whether they are comparing like with like.
    But it's hard to deny that Switzerland's per capita spending is a lot more than ours.
    %GDP is the best comparitor we have. Sure if both Switzerland and the UK spent 11.3% of GDP the nominal Swiss spend per capita would be much higher than the UK's but their Labour costs are correspondingly higher too.

    Ignoring the distorting (and temporary) effects of Covid, spending 11%-12% of GDP on health is going to help deliver better outcomes than spending the <10% GDP that the UK historically has.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,592

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    I am sure Max will be along very soon to correct his earlier mistake.
    The following is interesting:
    https://www.health.org.uk/news-and-comment/charts-and-infographics/how-does-uk-health-spending-compare-across-europe-over-the-past-decade
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 49,863
    edited January 2023
    So another impasse, with McCarthy on 201, Jeffries 212, Donalds 18, Trump 1, and one present not voting.

    Donalds has lost Perry, who didn’t vote at all, plus the rogue Trump voter.

    Edit/ Perry turns up at the last minute and puts Donalds up to 19
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,820

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    I am sure Max will be along very soon to correct his earlier mistake.
    That's 2019, what does 2022 look like?
  • I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    Bloody hell. You don't reveal that about yourself, never mind your bro. I can understand him asking, but going to make the coronation awks

    They must be livid about the leak

  • LennonLennon Posts: 1,779
    IanB2 said:

    So another impasse, with McCarthy on 201, Jeffries 212, Donalds 18, Trump 1, and one present not voting.

    Donalds has lost Perry, who didn’t vote at all, plus the rogue Trump voter.

    Edit/ Perry turns up at the last minute and puts Donalds up to 19

    So that's entirely unchanged from yesterday, except Gaetz is being comedic and switching from Donalds to Trump as an FU to McCarthy I presume.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,103
    edited January 2023

    Leon said:

    Scott_xP said:
    Christ, he looks terrible. About 60 years old. Is he ill?

    Sincere question. I love his comic acting
    I remember having a similar reaction to Martin Freeman's party political broadcast for Labour in 2015 when he said, basically, if you were brought up properly you should vote Labour.
    That was a funny one. That might well be a verbatim comment. It was something like he was raised to be decent, and that's why he supports Labour.

    Parties do make keen use of celebrity endorsements (easier for some than others to acquire them) so I assume they must see some value in them, even from a 'it gets people talking about us' perspective, but ones with actors in particular leave me cold, since their job is to convincingly pretend things. That doesn't make their comments insincere by any means, but the fact their job is to pretend means its always in the back of my mind that any emotion expressed could be fake and I'd have no idea.

    Less formal, more personal filmed messages might be more effective, they are more real, although even there I question the value of it - many celebrities are just charismatic, smooth talking idiots (perhaps they should be MPs), and their takes on politics are often basic and uninformed, the sort of thing you can find easily enough on twitter in 5 seconds, so why do they think they are some political sage?

    I think it also works best when there are endorsements of specific campaigns, like the Rashford one, since otherwise endorsements come down to interchangable guff about community and values - you could swap the text for the other side's messaging and not notice half the time, and if no one could possibly object to what is being said (like the 'Labour/Tories care about this country' style ones), then you know it is meaningless.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,820

    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    Yes, it's easy to find those figures, but more difficult to tell whether they are comparing like with like.
    But it's hard to deny that Switzerland's per capita spending is a lot more than ours.
    %GDP is the best comparitor we have. Sure if both Switzerland and the UK spent 11.3% of GDP the nominal Swiss spend per capita would be much higher than the UK's but their Labour costs are correspondingly higher too.

    Ignoring the distorting (and temporary) effects of Covid, spending 11%-12% of GDP on health is going to help deliver better outcomes than spending the 10% GDP that the UK historically has.
    It's not temporary though, the spending increases on healthcare over COVID haven't been cut back and there is no plan to cut them back. We are spending substantially the same as everywhere else in Europe and not getting anything like those healthcare outcomes.

    Anyway, surely you'd prefer an insurance based system, rich people pay more money for better insurance which feeds into capital investment and effective subsidisation of the healthcare by them.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,103
    Lennon said:

    IanB2 said:

    So another impasse, with McCarthy on 201, Jeffries 212, Donalds 18, Trump 1, and one present not voting.

    Donalds has lost Perry, who didn’t vote at all, plus the rogue Trump voter.

    Edit/ Perry turns up at the last minute and puts Donalds up to 19

    So that's entirely unchanged from yesterday, except Gaetz is being comedic and switching from Donalds to Trump as an FU to McCarthy I presume.
    Horrible little man by all accounts, but fair play on switching it up to add to the comedy.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,456

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    It's very sad.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,456
    Test
  • Lennon said:

    IanB2 said:

    So another impasse, with McCarthy on 201, Jeffries 212, Donalds 18, Trump 1, and one present not voting.

    Donalds has lost Perry, who didn’t vote at all, plus the rogue Trump voter.

    Edit/ Perry turns up at the last minute and puts Donalds up to 19

    So that's entirely unchanged from yesterday, except Gaetz is being comedic and switching from Donalds to Trump as an FU to McCarthy I presume.
    More of a mea culpa (sorta) to Trump. Who is on record urging (sorta) election of McCarthy as Speaker.

    Note that one of the beneficiaries of this flea-bitten circus, is Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

    AND that Gaetz "represents" the Redneck Riviera of . . . wait for it . . . Florida.
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,298
    My understanding is that while Britain now spends more,

    1. It spends money on staffing costs rather than capital infrastructure, where we are WELL below peers. Hence, no beds.

    2. We still don’t spend as much as peers

    3. While it’s true that Switzerland (for example) spends only a percent or two more, in real terms that amounts to a huge amount given Swiss wealth and not all of it goes on wages, see point (1) again.

    I personally am skeptical about the NHS system but given ageing, obesity and healthcare inflation, at the end of the day it is likely that meddling with structure to drive more efficiency is only going to have very limited results.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,456
    I don't thinking spending an extra 1.4% of GDP on the NHS would get us anywhere close to Swiss healthcare outcomes.
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,298
    Harry is a twat.
    His self-soiling is almost Trussian.
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,298
    MaxPB said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    I am sure Max will be along very soon to correct his earlier mistake.
    That's 2019, what does 2022 look like?
    Healthcare spending is distorted from 20 onwards, so 19 is likely our best metric until we get 23 or even 24 figures.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 49,863
    edited January 2023
    Lennon said:

    IanB2 said:

    So another impasse, with McCarthy on 201, Jeffries 212, Donalds 18, Trump 1, and one present not voting.

    Donalds has lost Perry, who didn’t vote at all, plus the rogue Trump voter.

    Edit/ Perry turns up at the last minute and puts Donalds up to 19

    So that's entirely unchanged from yesterday, except Gaetz is being comedic and switching from Donalds to Trump as an FU to McCarthy I presume.
    It seems so. The rebels are saying there’s no deal, while the core Reps stress the package of concessions already on the table.

    Rumours the Reps may go for an adjournment but the Dems will vote for their embarrassment to continue to an eighth vote.
  • MikeLMikeL Posts: 7,706
    PredictIt Speaker market (numbers are % chance)

    McCarthy 39
    Scalise 37
    Trump 6
    Jordan 6
    Stefanik 5
    Jeffries 4

    https://www.predictit.org/markets/detail/7326/Who-will-be-Speaker-of-the-House-of-Representatives-in-the-next-Congress
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,664
    MaxPB said:

    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    Yes, it's easy to find those figures, but more difficult to tell whether they are comparing like with like.
    But it's hard to deny that Switzerland's per capita spending is a lot more than ours.
    %GDP is the best comparitor we have. Sure if both Switzerland and the UK spent 11.3% of GDP the nominal Swiss spend per capita would be much higher than the UK's but their Labour costs are correspondingly higher too.

    Ignoring the distorting (and temporary) effects of Covid, spending 11%-12% of GDP on health is going to help deliver better outcomes than spending the 10% GDP that the UK historically has.
    It's not temporary though, the spending increases on healthcare over COVID haven't been cut back and there is no plan to cut them back. We are spending substantially the same as everywhere else in Europe and not getting anything like those healthcare outcomes.

    Anyway, surely you'd prefer an insurance based system, rich people pay more money for better insurance which feeds into capital investment and effective subsidisation of the healthcare by them.
    I'd personally have no objection to a universal system of compulsory insurance; I could not support a system that meant you get better cancer treatment, say, by paying higher premiums.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,103

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,820

    MaxPB said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    I am sure Max will be along very soon to correct his earlier mistake.
    That's 2019, what does 2022 look like?
    Healthcare spending is distorted from 20 onwards, so 19 is likely our best metric until we get 23 or even 24 figures.
    But the government isn't cutting spending, it's increasing it from COVID levels.
  • LennonLennon Posts: 1,779

    Lennon said:

    IanB2 said:

    So another impasse, with McCarthy on 201, Jeffries 212, Donalds 18, Trump 1, and one present not voting.

    Donalds has lost Perry, who didn’t vote at all, plus the rogue Trump voter.

    Edit/ Perry turns up at the last minute and puts Donalds up to 19

    So that's entirely unchanged from yesterday, except Gaetz is being comedic and switching from Donalds to Trump as an FU to McCarthy I presume.
    More of a mea culpa (sorta) to Trump. Who is on record urging (sorta) election of McCarthy as Speaker.

    Note that one of the beneficiaries of this flea-bitten circus, is Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

    AND that Gaetz "represents" the Redneck Riviera of . . . wait for it . . . Florida.
    Fair enough. I was reading it as a somewhat literal 'Anyone but McCarthy'. Is there any point at which the Dems show evidence of looking like they are trying to get movement by switching en-bloc from Jeffries to someone else (the House version of Joe Manchin presumably?)
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,103
    Minister for International Aid - Robert Goodwill.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,820

    MaxPB said:

    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    Yes, it's easy to find those figures, but more difficult to tell whether they are comparing like with like.
    But it's hard to deny that Switzerland's per capita spending is a lot more than ours.
    %GDP is the best comparitor we have. Sure if both Switzerland and the UK spent 11.3% of GDP the nominal Swiss spend per capita would be much higher than the UK's but their Labour costs are correspondingly higher too.

    Ignoring the distorting (and temporary) effects of Covid, spending 11%-12% of GDP on health is going to help deliver better outcomes than spending the 10% GDP that the UK historically has.
    It's not temporary though, the spending increases on healthcare over COVID haven't been cut back and there is no plan to cut them back. We are spending substantially the same as everywhere else in Europe and not getting anything like those healthcare outcomes.

    Anyway, surely you'd prefer an insurance based system, rich people pay more money for better insurance which feeds into capital investment and effective subsidisation of the healthcare by them.
    I'd personally have no objection to a universal system of compulsory insurance; I could not support a system that meant you get better cancer treatment, say, by paying higher premiums.
    That's why the swiss system works well, broadly everyone gets pretty good healthcare. My wife's insurance package required her to get a GP referral for any specialist treatment so it was a bit cheaper but the GP would always give the referral and the best possible course of action. Some insurance packages which are more expensive allow direct booking for specialists without the GP referral but it's maybe two days extra to get the GP referral and then it's the same specialists in the same hospitals as the person paying much more money.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,664
    MaxPB said:

    MaxPB said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    I am sure Max will be along very soon to correct his earlier mistake.
    That's 2019, what does 2022 look like?
    Healthcare spending is distorted from 20 onwards, so 19 is likely our best metric until we get 23 or even 24 figures.
    But the government isn't cutting spending, it's increasing it from COVID levels.
    Sure, to paper over the cracks of past underspend and mis-management. How much is being spent on agency staff because we don't pay enough to permanent staff or can't get the numbers due to lack of training places? How much spent managing old, inefficient buildings because we haven't invested in modern facilities?
  • Baker - Minister of State for Food
    Freeman - Minister of State for Prisons, Parole and Probation

    David Frost, TW3 c.1966:

    "The minister for agriculture lives in a house; the minister for housing lives on a farm."

    (Healy and Callaghan respectively)
  • Lennon said:

    Lennon said:

    IanB2 said:

    So another impasse, with McCarthy on 201, Jeffries 212, Donalds 18, Trump 1, and one present not voting.

    Donalds has lost Perry, who didn’t vote at all, plus the rogue Trump voter.

    Edit/ Perry turns up at the last minute and puts Donalds up to 19

    So that's entirely unchanged from yesterday, except Gaetz is being comedic and switching from Donalds to Trump as an FU to McCarthy I presume.
    More of a mea culpa (sorta) to Trump. Who is on record urging (sorta) election of McCarthy as Speaker.

    Note that one of the beneficiaries of this flea-bitten circus, is Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

    AND that Gaetz "represents" the Redneck Riviera of . . . wait for it . . . Florida.
    Fair enough. I was reading it as a somewhat literal 'Anyone but McCarthy'. Is there any point at which the Dems show evidence of looking like they are trying to get movement by switching en-bloc from Jeffries to someone else (the House version of Joe Manchin presumably?)
    Notion that Dems are gonna help elect a "moderate" Republican IMHO is total BS.

    Think Dems are floating this as part of psy ops against House GOPers.

    NOTE btw (also fyi) that US Senate - controlled by Democrats - is NOT scheduled to reconvene in Our Nation's Capital (and Capitol) until January 23.

    Leaving PLENTY of time for House Republicans to stew in their own juice.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,103

    Lennon said:

    Lennon said:

    IanB2 said:

    So another impasse, with McCarthy on 201, Jeffries 212, Donalds 18, Trump 1, and one present not voting.

    Donalds has lost Perry, who didn’t vote at all, plus the rogue Trump voter.

    Edit/ Perry turns up at the last minute and puts Donalds up to 19

    So that's entirely unchanged from yesterday, except Gaetz is being comedic and switching from Donalds to Trump as an FU to McCarthy I presume.
    More of a mea culpa (sorta) to Trump. Who is on record urging (sorta) election of McCarthy as Speaker.

    Note that one of the beneficiaries of this flea-bitten circus, is Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

    AND that Gaetz "represents" the Redneck Riviera of . . . wait for it . . . Florida.
    Fair enough. I was reading it as a somewhat literal 'Anyone but McCarthy'. Is there any point at which the Dems show evidence of looking like they are trying to get movement by switching en-bloc from Jeffries to someone else (the House version of Joe Manchin presumably?)
    Notion that Dems are gonna help elect a "moderate" Republican IMHO is total BS.

    Think Dems are floating this as part of psy ops against House GOPers.

    NOTE btw (also fyi) that US Senate - controlled by Democrats - is NOT scheduled to reconvene in Our Nation's Capital (and Capitol) until January 23.

    Leaving PLENTY of time for House Republicans to stew in their own juice.
    Wait, so on top of other benefits the Senators also get a longer Christmas break? Sweet gig.
  • kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    Or the Duke of Sussex is the sort of irritating brat who could provoke a saint into lashing out?
  • kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    The photo that keeps on giving.



    Either from a sense of self preservation or a deep love of the intstitution, I do get the impression Wills is turning into a staunch defender of the old old Firm.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 49,863
    edited January 2023
    Eighth vote now expected shortly

    …and off they go again
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,456
    MaxPB said:

    MaxPB said:

    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    Yes, it's easy to find those figures, but more difficult to tell whether they are comparing like with like.
    But it's hard to deny that Switzerland's per capita spending is a lot more than ours.
    %GDP is the best comparitor we have. Sure if both Switzerland and the UK spent 11.3% of GDP the nominal Swiss spend per capita would be much higher than the UK's but their Labour costs are correspondingly higher too.

    Ignoring the distorting (and temporary) effects of Covid, spending 11%-12% of GDP on health is going to help deliver better outcomes than spending the 10% GDP that the UK historically has.
    It's not temporary though, the spending increases on healthcare over COVID haven't been cut back and there is no plan to cut them back. We are spending substantially the same as everywhere else in Europe and not getting anything like those healthcare outcomes.

    Anyway, surely you'd prefer an insurance based system, rich people pay more money for better insurance which feeds into capital investment and effective subsidisation of the healthcare by them.
    I'd personally have no objection to a universal system of compulsory insurance; I could not support a system that meant you get better cancer treatment, say, by paying higher premiums.
    That's why the swiss system works well, broadly everyone gets pretty good healthcare. My wife's insurance package required her to get a GP referral for any specialist treatment so it was a bit cheaper but the GP would always give the referral and the best possible course of action. Some insurance packages which are more expensive allow direct booking for specialists without the GP referral but it's maybe two days extra to get the GP referral and then it's the same specialists in the same hospitals as the person paying much more money.
    The point is how efficiently you allocate risk.

    Rationing with a monolithic provider certainly can keep procurement costs down but it will carry its own bureaucracy and because it's carrying all the risk for everyone and has to take a one size fits all approach it doesn't really allow people to make their own decisions about where to invest on their own healthcare, or change behaviours, so it doesn't transform outcomes.
  • kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    It's fantastic. For years, people have been saying that William and Harry are the future, that we should bypass Charlie and how the young 'uns were going to drag the monarchy into the 21st century. Turns out they're just as fecked up as the rest of them!
  • Jim_MillerJim_Miller Posts: 2,999
    rcs1000 - You're welcome. I'm enjoying the contributions.

    First names can work, too. For example, those who want a Chancellor of the Exchequer who will control spending might want to see Penny Mordaunt in that position.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,103

    kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    The photo that keeps on giving.

    Either from a sense of self preservation or a deep love of the intstitution, I do get the impression Wills is turning into a staunch defender of the old old Firm.
    I think people may have underestimated when he was younger just how much it would be drilled into him, as the future heir, what was expected of him, and how much that will have stuck with him. As a result he's much more willing to accept the 'rules'.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,103

    kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    It's fantastic. For years, people have been saying that William and Harry are the future, that we should bypass Charlie and how the young 'uns were going to drag the monarchy into the 21st century. Turns out they're just as fecked up as the rest of them!
    The media must be thrilled to be reassured royal scandals will not, after all, disappear once the older generation pop their clogs.
  • bigjohnowlsbigjohnowls Posts: 22,662
    Dig Ding ROUND 8

    In other news SKS has managed to get out of the robot factory despite his robotic display.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 48,659
    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    A well regulated insurance based healthcare system which ensures that people with pre-existing serious conditions or inherited conditions aren't financially penalised would work just fine. No more strikes, no more staff shortages, no more agencies ripping off the taxpayer because insurers just wouldn't stand for it. We'd also finally get some kind of financial penalty for slovenliness which results in obesity and type 2 diabetes which is impossible under the NHS system and an incentive for people to keep fit as insurers in Switzerland offer different packages, many of which give refunds for low or no usage over the year.
    In the USA, where health insurance premiums and medical bill induced bankruptcies are a major financial stress for people, obesity and other unhealthy issues are rampant. Financial incentives don't really work on them.

  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,103

    rcs1000 - You're welcome. I'm enjoying the contributions.

    First names can work, too. For example, those who want a Chancellor of the Exchequer who will control spending might want to see Penny Mordaunt in that position.

    Rob Butler as a junior at the Treasury?
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 122,964

    kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    It's fantastic. For years, people have been saying that William and Harry are the future, that we should bypass Charlie and how the young 'uns were going to drag the monarchy into the 21st century. Turns out they're just as fecked up as the rest of them!
    The Queen was a rare exception in past monarchs in having a relatively colourless history.

    The future however as Charles and William is fine, Harry will gradually fade into the background now with his wife like the Duke and Duchess of Windsor
  • kle4 said:

    kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    The photo that keeps on giving.

    Either from a sense of self preservation or a deep love of the intstitution, I do get the impression Wills is turning into a staunch defender of the old old Firm.
    I think people may have underestimated when he was younger just how much it would be drilled into him, as the future heir, what was expected of him, and how much that will have stuck with him. As a result he's much more willing to accept the 'rules'.
    Also, Wills has a purpose- it's going to take a while, but eventually he will be King. Harry's last residue of original purpose vanished with the birth of baby George.

    We haven't worked out what to do with spare heirs once they become redundant. Accepting that Harry isn't doing this right, he's hardly doing worse than his uncle Andrew.
  • kle4 said:

    Lennon said:

    Lennon said:

    IanB2 said:

    So another impasse, with McCarthy on 201, Jeffries 212, Donalds 18, Trump 1, and one present not voting.

    Donalds has lost Perry, who didn’t vote at all, plus the rogue Trump voter.

    Edit/ Perry turns up at the last minute and puts Donalds up to 19

    So that's entirely unchanged from yesterday, except Gaetz is being comedic and switching from Donalds to Trump as an FU to McCarthy I presume.
    More of a mea culpa (sorta) to Trump. Who is on record urging (sorta) election of McCarthy as Speaker.

    Note that one of the beneficiaries of this flea-bitten circus, is Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

    AND that Gaetz "represents" the Redneck Riviera of . . . wait for it . . . Florida.
    Fair enough. I was reading it as a somewhat literal 'Anyone but McCarthy'. Is there any point at which the Dems show evidence of looking like they are trying to get movement by switching en-bloc from Jeffries to someone else (the House version of Joe Manchin presumably?)
    Notion that Dems are gonna help elect a "moderate" Republican IMHO is total BS.

    Think Dems are floating this as part of psy ops against House GOPers.

    NOTE btw (also fyi) that US Senate - controlled by Democrats - is NOT scheduled to reconvene in Our Nation's Capital (and Capitol) until January 23.

    Leaving PLENTY of time for House Republicans to stew in their own juice.
    Wait, so on top of other benefits the Senators also get a longer Christmas break? Sweet gig.
    House of Reps not normally a beehive of activity most Januaries. Or rather, engaged in preliminary stuff. Like arranging furniture, fixtures and (dare I say?) wallpaper in new offices. Important public business.
  • kle4 said:

    rcs1000 - You're welcome. I'm enjoying the contributions.

    First names can work, too. For example, those who want a Chancellor of the Exchequer who will control spending might want to see Penny Mordaunt in that position.

    Rob Butler as a junior at the Treasury?
    Are we accusing the Butler of stealing and selling the family silver?
  • kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    It's fantastic. For years, people have been saying that William and Harry are the future, that we should bypass Charlie and how the young 'uns were going to drag the monarchy into the 21st century. Turns out they're just as fecked up as the rest of them!
    Addams family all the way through. At least Hazza is trying to entertain us.
  • twistedfirestopper3twistedfirestopper3 Posts: 2,421
    edited January 2023
    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.
  • Good grief, why the feck is McCarthy putting up the clowns he's putting up to put him into endless re-nomination?
  • TimSTimS Posts: 12,994
    IDS Home Secretary when they introduce ID cards.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,459

    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Who cares?
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,839
    edited January 2023

    Good grief, why the feck is McCarthy putting up the clowns he's putting up to put him into endless re-nomination?

    Because he has clowns to the left of him, jokers to the right. And he is stuck in the middle.

    Actually, the more you listen the more appropriate the words become:
    https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=clowns+to+the+left+of+me+jokers+to+the+right&amp;qpvt=clowns+to+the+left+of+me+jokers+to+the+right&amp;view=detail&amp;mid=1284744C7FBE5CF024841284744C7FBE5CF02484&amp;&amp;FORM=VRDGAR&amp;ru=/videos/search?q=clowns+to+the+left+of+me+jokers+to+the+right&qpvt=clowns+to+the+left+of+me+jokers+to+the+right&FORM=VDRE
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,103

    kle4 said:

    kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    The photo that keeps on giving.

    Either from a sense of self preservation or a deep love of the intstitution, I do get the impression Wills is turning into a staunch defender of the old old Firm.
    I think people may have underestimated when he was younger just how much it would be drilled into him, as the future heir, what was expected of him, and how much that will have stuck with him. As a result he's much more willing to accept the 'rules'.
    Also, Wills has a purpose- it's going to take a while, but eventually he will be King. Harry's last residue of original purpose vanished with the birth of baby George.

    We haven't worked out what to do with spare heirs once they become redundant. Accepting that Harry isn't doing this right, he's hardly doing worse than his uncle Andrew.
    I don't think royals have ever really had much idea what to do with side members. They could be powerful allies or horrible obstructive and difficult.

    I was reading a short bio of Edward VII the other day, and it said it was the first time in many generations that the monarch had not publicly struggled against their heir.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,456
    Harry strikes me as the sort of person who, if he can't get exactly what he wants when he wants it, will try and destroy and bring down everyone else around him.

    I am not sure he used to be like this.
  • kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    The photo that keeps on giving.



    Either from a sense of self preservation or a deep love of the intstitution, I do get the impression Wills is turning into a staunch defender of the old old Firm.
    Self preservation, and a wife who wants the throne so bad she can taste it.

    It's way beyond dad's mistress, it's dad's mistress on the night before his wedding to mum. I can see how he would want to destroy her.
  • twistedfirestopper3twistedfirestopper3 Posts: 2,421
    edited January 2023
    HYUFD said:

    kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    It's fantastic. For years, people have been saying that William and Harry are the future, that we should bypass Charlie and how the young 'uns were going to drag the monarchy into the 21st century. Turns out they're just as fecked up as the rest of them!
    The Queen was a rare exception in past monarchs in having a relatively colourless history.

    The future however as Charles and William is fine, Harry will gradually fade into the background now with his wife like the Duke and Duchess of Windsor
    I wouldn't be so sure. Social media wasn't around then.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 122,964
    edited January 2023

    HYUFD said:

    kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    It's fantastic. For years, people have been saying that William and Harry are the future, that we should bypass Charlie and how the young 'uns were going to drag the monarchy into the 21st century. Turns out they're just as fecked up as the rest of them!
    The Queen was a rare exception in past monarchs in having a relatively colourless history.

    The future however as Charles and William is fine, Harry will gradually fade into the background now with his wife like the Duke and Duchess of Windsor
    I wouldn't be so sure. Social media want around then.
    The press certainly was and the Windsors were a big draw in the late 1930s, 1940s and 1950s in the US, Bahamas and Paris where they based themselves but gradually faded away and Harry was never even King like the Duke of Windsor was
  • Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 49,863

    Good grief, why the feck is McCarthy putting up the clowns he's putting up to put him into endless re-nomination?

    His rebels won’t let him win and his opponents won’t let him go home
  • Lennon said:

    Lennon said:

    IanB2 said:

    So another impasse, with McCarthy on 201, Jeffries 212, Donalds 18, Trump 1, and one present not voting.

    Donalds has lost Perry, who didn’t vote at all, plus the rogue Trump voter.

    Edit/ Perry turns up at the last minute and puts Donalds up to 19

    So that's entirely unchanged from yesterday, except Gaetz is being comedic and switching from Donalds to Trump as an FU to McCarthy I presume.
    More of a mea culpa (sorta) to Trump. Who is on record urging (sorta) election of McCarthy as Speaker.

    Note that one of the beneficiaries of this flea-bitten circus, is Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

    AND that Gaetz "represents" the Redneck Riviera of . . . wait for it . . . Florida.
    Fair enough. I was reading it as a somewhat literal 'Anyone but McCarthy'. Is there any point at which the Dems show evidence of looking like they are trying to get movement by switching en-bloc from Jeffries to someone else (the House version of Joe Manchin presumably?)
    Notion that Dems are gonna help elect a "moderate" Republican IMHO is total BS.

    Think Dems are floating this as part of psy ops against House GOPers.

    NOTE btw (also fyi) that US Senate - controlled by Democrats - is NOT scheduled to reconvene in Our Nation's Capital (and Capitol) until January 23.

    Leaving PLENTY of time for House Republicans to stew in their own juice.
    I entirely agree. There's no pressure at all on Democrats to help out - they aren't the majority, and have no interest in a GOP House getting to start setting the agenda, whether with McCarthy or anyone else holding the gavel. They can just grab the popcorn and continue voting 212 for Jeffries indefinitely.

    As you say, the rest is just mischief. If your opponent is in a hole, chuck down a shovel rather than a ladder.
  • IanB2 said:

    Good grief, why the feck is McCarthy putting up the clowns he's putting up to put him into endless re-nomination?

    His rebels won’t let him win and his opponents won’t let him go home
    What I mean is, the members speaking on his behalf are terrible speakers (small s).

    The anti-Kevinites are better at that, anyway.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 12,994

    MaxPB said:

    MaxPB said:

    Nigelb said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    Yes, it's easy to find those figures, but more difficult to tell whether they are comparing like with like.
    But it's hard to deny that Switzerland's per capita spending is a lot more than ours.
    %GDP is the best comparitor we have. Sure if both Switzerland and the UK spent 11.3% of GDP the nominal Swiss spend per capita would be much higher than the UK's but their Labour costs are correspondingly higher too.

    Ignoring the distorting (and temporary) effects of Covid, spending 11%-12% of GDP on health is going to help deliver better outcomes than spending the 10% GDP that the UK historically has.
    It's not temporary though, the spending increases on healthcare over COVID haven't been cut back and there is no plan to cut them back. We are spending substantially the same as everywhere else in Europe and not getting anything like those healthcare outcomes.

    Anyway, surely you'd prefer an insurance based system, rich people pay more money for better insurance which feeds into capital investment and effective subsidisation of the healthcare by them.
    I'd personally have no objection to a universal system of compulsory insurance; I could not support a system that meant you get better cancer treatment, say, by paying higher premiums.
    That's why the swiss system works well, broadly everyone gets pretty good healthcare. My wife's insurance package required her to get a GP referral for any specialist treatment so it was a bit cheaper but the GP would always give the referral and the best possible course of action. Some insurance packages which are more expensive allow direct booking for specialists without the GP referral but it's maybe two days extra to get the GP referral and then it's the same specialists in the same hospitals as the person paying much more money.
    The point is how efficiently you allocate risk.

    Rationing with a monolithic provider certainly can keep procurement costs down but it will carry its own bureaucracy and because it's carrying all the risk for everyone and has to take a one size fits all approach it doesn't really allow people to make their own decisions about where to invest on their own healthcare, or change behaviours, so it doesn't transform outcomes.
    The vast majority of European systems have compulsory insurance and pretty much equality of outcomes so I don’t think you’re going to get anyone going down the US route, not least because it’s hideously expensive.

    NHS outcomes were reasonable as recently as 2010. We were still a bit behind European peers on cancer survival rates among other things, but it was a value for money health service with high rates of satisfaction.

    I don’t see how the funding mechanism is the biggest issue here. The gap with social care is an obvious problem, the dynamic between GPs and hospital care clearly needs fixing and the whole system needs more staff and beds. I don’t see how moving to an insurance based set up changes that, not to mention the doubtless vast cost of change.
  • Really enjoying the lame efforts of Republicans to blame Democrats for their own freaking Freak Show.
  • numbertwelvenumbertwelve Posts: 6,813

    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    “I mounted her quickly”.

    Well that’s put me off my dinner.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,103

    Harry strikes me as the sort of person who, if he can't get exactly what he wants when he wants it, will try and destroy and bring down everyone else around him.

    I am not sure he used to be like this.

    If his family are as horrible as he claims, I'd advise him to stop being regretful and just be glad to have cut ties. I know, we shouldn't give up on family casually, but sometimes its for the best.

    Not entirely sure how spilling the beans in a book and various documentaries and leaks to biographers is better than private briefings to the press attacking him and his wife, which is a main allegation, but whatever, he seems committed and sure of his path now, so despite the angst may well be better for him.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 48,659
    edited January 2023

    MaxPB said:

    MaxPB said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    I am sure Max will be along very soon to correct his earlier mistake.
    That's 2019, what does 2022 look like?
    Healthcare spending is distorted from 20 onwards, so 19 is likely our best metric until we get 23 or even 24 figures.
    But the government isn't cutting spending, it's increasing it from COVID levels.
    Sure, to paper over the cracks of past underspend and mis-management. How much is being spent on agency staff because we don't pay enough to permanent staff or can't get the numbers due to lack of training places? How much spent managing old, inefficient buildings because we haven't invested in modern facilities?
    Yes lack of investment drives higher running costs. My city has 3 hospitals, each with acute services, so each needing on call teams across a variety of specialities. For about 30 years there have been plans to rebuild and consolidate on two sites. There have been a number of proposals, all reaching the design stage and then falling at the funding stage, so gets abandoned.

    A couple of years later new proposals are raised, though increasingly hard to get clinician engagement, as bitter experience is that these too will be abandoned. The current SMT has a more evolutionary approach, refurbishing obsolete estate, and gradually shifting departments. We plod on on a building site, hampered by unsuitable buildings. There will still be 3 hospitals here when I retire.

    The estate is a major drag on productivity, and hinders recruitment, as working conditions are often cited as a reason not to come.
  • Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    Absolutely scandalous from Harry and I, for one, am shocked beyond measure at his treachery.

    Can't believe he used the word "ass" rather than "arse".

    I took it the ass was in a threesome.

  • So the GOP circus continues. Starting to look increasingly likely that McCarthy will have to step aside

    But presumably McCarthy has enough allies to prevent anyone else getting 218 votes.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,103

    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    If real, then respect for being frank I guess, though feels like that level of detail might take away from the core message (I'm guessing that to be that the media are awful, and William a tool).

    Internet sleuths can probably start making educated guesses about the pub and year, and start hunting for witnesses.
  • FairlieredFairliered Posts: 4,931

    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    Shagged by Camilla?
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 50,269
    Foxy said:

    MaxPB said:

    MaxPB said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    I am sure Max will be along very soon to correct his earlier mistake.
    That's 2019, what does 2022 look like?
    Healthcare spending is distorted from 20 onwards, so 19 is likely our best metric until we get 23 or even 24 figures.
    But the government isn't cutting spending, it's increasing it from COVID levels.
    Sure, to paper over the cracks of past underspend and mis-management. How much is being spent on agency staff because we don't pay enough to permanent staff or can't get the numbers due to lack of training places? How much spent managing old, inefficient buildings because we haven't invested in modern facilities?
    Yes lack of investment drives higher running costs. My city has 3 hospitals, each with acute services, so each needing on call teams across a variety of specialities. For about 30 years there have been plans to rebuild and consolidate on two sites. There have been a number of proposals, all reaching the design stage and then falling at the funding stage, so gets abandoned.

    A couple of years later new proposals are raised, though increasingly hard to get clinician engagement, as bitter experience is that these too will be abandoned. The current SMT has a more evolutionary approach, refurbishing obsolete estate, and gradually shifting departments. We plod on on a building site, hampered by unsuitable buildings. There will still be 3 hospitals here when I retire.

    In part because politicians, local and national, would step in "to save our hospital"

    Incidentally, what is your opinion of the sprawling mess that some hospital sites are? I've walked miles in some to get to from the entrance to the ward.

    Wouldn't hi-rise with a pile of big lifts be better?
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 48,659

    kle4 said:

    I have not been paying much attention to the Harry and Meghan saga, but I just saw he has revealed that he and William both asked Charles not to marry Camilla. I reckon that is by far the worst revelation he has made (that I am aware of anyway). It crosses a line. That kind of stuff really should be kept private.

    The great (or terrible) thing about this saga is you don't have to pay attention, as the juicy stuff will get reported widely enough to pick up anyway.

    I'd be interested in the context of that remark, as I'm not sure why he would include that sort of detail, as while there are plenty of people who do not like Camilla, it doesn't seem to add to his own heroic/martyr narrative to spill the beans about telling his dad not to marry the love of his life, even if it would be understandable for someone to not be a fan of the mistress of their dad.

    All rather bad for the institution of course. Either Wills is, rather surprisingly for someone so boring, the kind of bastard who would physically assault his own brother, or Harry is someone who would lie about such a thing - either way, definitely a sign of decades of acrimony to come.
    The photo that keeps on giving.



    Either from a sense of self preservation or a deep love of the intstitution, I do get the impression Wills is turning into a staunch defender of the old old Firm.
    Self preservation, and a wife who wants the throne so bad she can taste it.

    It's way beyond dad's mistress, it's dad's mistress on the night before his wedding to mum. I can see how he would want to destroy her.
    Yes, it is hardly a surprise that neither Prince liked Camilla or thought her a suitable Consort.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 49,863

    Lennon said:

    Lennon said:

    IanB2 said:

    So another impasse, with McCarthy on 201, Jeffries 212, Donalds 18, Trump 1, and one present not voting.

    Donalds has lost Perry, who didn’t vote at all, plus the rogue Trump voter.

    Edit/ Perry turns up at the last minute and puts Donalds up to 19

    So that's entirely unchanged from yesterday, except Gaetz is being comedic and switching from Donalds to Trump as an FU to McCarthy I presume.
    More of a mea culpa (sorta) to Trump. Who is on record urging (sorta) election of McCarthy as Speaker.

    Note that one of the beneficiaries of this flea-bitten circus, is Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

    AND that Gaetz "represents" the Redneck Riviera of . . . wait for it . . . Florida.
    Fair enough. I was reading it as a somewhat literal 'Anyone but McCarthy'. Is there any point at which the Dems show evidence of looking like they are trying to get movement by switching en-bloc from Jeffries to someone else (the House version of Joe Manchin presumably?)
    Notion that Dems are gonna help elect a "moderate" Republican IMHO is total BS.

    Think Dems are floating this as part of psy ops against House GOPers.

    NOTE btw (also fyi) that US Senate - controlled by Democrats - is NOT scheduled to reconvene in Our Nation's Capital (and Capitol) until January 23.

    Leaving PLENTY of time for House Republicans to stew in their own juice.
    I entirely agree. There's no pressure at all on Democrats to help out - they aren't the majority, and have no interest in a GOP House getting to start setting the agenda, whether with McCarthy or anyone else holding the gavel. They can just grab the popcorn and continue voting 212 for Jeffries indefinitely.

    As you say, the rest is just mischief. If your opponent is in a hole, chuck down a shovel rather than a ladder.
    The Reps wouldn’t allow the Dems to effectively choose their speaker, anyhow. Whoever emerges would have no internal credibility.
  • numbertwelvenumbertwelve Posts: 6,813
    kle4 said:

    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    If real, then respect for being frank I guess, though feels like that level of detail might take away from the core message (I'm guessing that to be that the media are awful, and William a tool).

    Internet sleuths can probably start making educated guesses about the pub and year, and start hunting for witnesses.
    I hope it wasn’t in Woking. That place has had enough of royal scandal.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,839

    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    He's polishing his geezer credentials. He's shagged older birds behind the pub, killed 25 taliban and told his old man not to marry his knock off. Then gets beat up by his older brother. Sounds like an Eastenders episode.
    Or the first five minutes of Soap.

    But what the hell does he do for season 2?
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 17,405

    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    Hmm, older lady, likes the horses? Sounds like we know why he didn’t want his dad to marry Camilla. #horseystepmom
  • Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    Shagged by Camilla?
    Well that just might be the utterly awful innuendo of the passage.

    It all sounds made up by people who don't know how English life works, like, say, Meg and the ghostwriter. 97.5% of women at that level of society love horses very much so you don't have to specify, arse is not spelled like that, English pubs are not California bars - if it is dark enough to shag outside it's winter, and they are not a credible venue for this episode. It's house party stuff.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,437
    ...

    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    Absolutely scandalous from Harry and I, for one, am shocked beyond measure at his treachery.

    Can't believe he used the word "ass" rather than "arse". He's only been in the United States for five minutes, FFS.

    Being an equine fan, perhaps she really did spank his ass.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,592

    Harry strikes me as the sort of person who, if he can't get exactly what he wants when he wants it, will try and destroy and bring down everyone else around him.

    I am not sure he used to be like this.

    I think they both (and all his family) have been dealt a difficult but gilded (*) lifestyle. I reckon the gilding would mostly make up for the difficulties. But William and Harry lost their mother in a massively public way, and still have to deal with that, and what they see as the cause - the press.

    I feel great sympathy for the position Harry finds himself in, and the title of his book neatly encapsulates the problem. But I think he's dealing with it really poorly.

    The whole things just tragic. Though I must admit that the story about the horsey lady is hilarious.

    (*) Not 'gelded'; though I expect some of his family would quite like to do that to him now...
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,103
    edited January 2023
    DavidL said:

    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    He's polishing his geezer credentials. He's shagged older birds behind the pub, killed 25 taliban and told his old man not to marry his knock off. Then gets beat up by his older brother. Sounds like an Eastenders episode.
    Or the first five minutes of Soap.

    But what the hell does he do for season 2?
    Well, it might get stale without fresh revelations, but it'll get more bitter in tone, the royals might start swinging back, and there will always be plenty of press interest even to rehash the same old stuff when it comes to royals.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 12,994

    Foxy said:

    MaxPB said:

    MaxPB said:

    Nigelb said:

    MaxPB said:

    Driver said:

    MaxPB said:

    Keir needs to reform the NHS into a Swiss system. Today he has given himself the room to do that.

    Lol, as if. The Swiss healthcare system is fully privatised and insurance based with subsidies offered by the state to low wage workers and unemployed people. Otherwise there is nothing like the NHS in Switzerland, all healthcare providers are privately owned and run for profit and insurers are owned and run privately for profit. There is no scenario where any party will ever propose to switch the UK to Swiss style healthcare, it would mean dismantling the NHS completely, privatising all hospitals and trusts, mandating insurance. It's a non-starter.
    That's ultimately what we need Max. NHS is not fit for purpose.
    This is true, but significant reform is politically completely impossible, because the vested interests will always accuse you of wanting to Americanise the NHS.
    Somebody is going to have to say to Britain:

    "The unpalatable truth is that NHS needs fundamental reform. It is broken.

    The current political consensus by stasis simply condemns patients to an ever worse system of outcomes. We are witnessing this winter after winter.

    All other healthcare systems around the world need to be considered, to discover what they do better than us. We must be able to find elements that will work for us in our system. We need a task force as we had for Covid jabs. The finest minds - think the unthinkable to give us a hugely improved system."

    Labour will scream. The healthcare unions will scream. The trusts will scream. But fuck them. They gave got us where we are, whilst refusing to take any responsibility. If somebody can do better, they should be allowed to.

    And the worst part of it is that we spend a fucking shit load of money on the NHS, comparable to other nations which have better health outcomes...
    Do we ?
    As a % of GDP, what's the Swiss spend per capita in healthcare; or Germany or France ? From what I can quickly find, it's a bit more than we spend.
    OECD have comparative health statistics. https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?ThemeTreeId=9

    For 2019, UK is at 9.9% of GDP, France 11.1%, Switzerland 11.3% and Germany 11.7%.
    I am sure Max will be along very soon to correct his earlier mistake.
    That's 2019, what does 2022 look like?
    Healthcare spending is distorted from 20 onwards, so 19 is likely our best metric until we get 23 or even 24 figures.
    But the government isn't cutting spending, it's increasing it from COVID levels.
    Sure, to paper over the cracks of past underspend and mis-management. How much is being spent on agency staff because we don't pay enough to permanent staff or can't get the numbers due to lack of training places? How much spent managing old, inefficient buildings because we haven't invested in modern facilities?
    Yes lack of investment drives higher running costs. My city has 3 hospitals, each with acute services, so each needing on call teams across a variety of specialities. For about 30 years there have been plans to rebuild and consolidate on two sites. There have been a number of proposals, all reaching the design stage and then falling at the funding stage, so gets abandoned.

    A couple of years later new proposals are raised, though increasingly hard to get clinician engagement, as bitter experience is that these too will be abandoned. The current SMT has a more evolutionary approach, refurbishing obsolete estate, and gradually shifting departments. We plod on on a building site, hampered by unsuitable buildings. There will still be 3 hospitals here when I retire.

    In part because politicians, local and national, would step in "to save our hospital"

    Incidentally, what is your opinion of the sprawling mess that some hospital sites are? I've walked miles in some to get to from the entrance to the ward.

    Wouldn't hi-rise with a pile of big lifts be better?
    Our two children were born in 2 very different hospitals. The first in Chelsea and Westminster, the second in Lewisham. C&W is exactly what you describe: a modern multi-
    storey block that looks and feels like an office. Somewhere I imagine it’s quite pleasant to work, and very quick to get from one department to the other. Lewisham is all dingy corridors and long walks through old Victorian blocks, it’s dark and unwelcoming and there’s a sense of ennui hanging over the place.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 12,994

    ...

    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    Absolutely scandalous from Harry and I, for one, am shocked beyond measure at his treachery.

    Can't believe he used the word "ass" rather than "arse". He's only been in the United States for five minutes, FFS.

    Being an equine fan, perhaps she really did spank his ass.
    This was the Spanish edition after all
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 48,659

    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    Sounds like a chip off the old block.
  • Harry strikes me as the sort of person who, if he can't get exactly what he wants when he wants it, will try and destroy and bring down everyone else around him.

    I am not sure he used to be like this.

    I think they both (and all his family) have been dealt a difficult but gilded (*) lifestyle. I reckon the gilding would mostly make up for the difficulties. But William and Harry lost their mother in a massively public way, and still have to deal with that, and what they see as the cause - the press.

    I feel great sympathy for the position Harry finds himself in, and the title of his book neatly encapsulates the problem. But I think he's dealing with it really poorly.

    The whole things just tragic. Though I must admit that the story about the horsey lady is hilarious.

    (*) Not 'gelded'; though I expect some of his family would quite like to do that to him now...
    It reminds me of when rich celebs write in the press about how much they hate being famous. I always think "Just walk away, then. Take the money you've got and do something else". Harry had that chance, and I really thought he was a switched on kiddy, got a lovely wife, and a chance to be something different in a new country. Granted, he'd have always of been of interest to the press and pursued, but saying you want out of the Royal family, but still want all the titles and trappings was never going to play well.
  • Harry strikes me as the sort of person who, if he can't get exactly what he wants when he wants it, will try and destroy and bring down everyone else around him.

    I am not sure he used to be like this.

    I think they both (and all his family) have been dealt a difficult but gilded (*) lifestyle. I reckon the gilding would mostly make up for the difficulties. But William and Harry lost their mother in a massively public way, and still have to deal with that, and what they see as the cause - the press.

    I feel great sympathy for the position Harry finds himself in, and the title of his book neatly encapsulates the problem. But I think he's dealing with it really poorly.

    The whole things just tragic. Though I must admit that the story about the horsey lady is hilarious.

    (*) Not 'gelded'; though I expect some of his family would quite like to do that to him now...
    Gilding doesn't make up for it, it's all at the bottom of Maslow's hierarchy. Looks to me as if it looks to him as if his mum was repeatedly betrayed and effectively killed by his dad and his floozie, who gets rewarded with marriage and a crown, and his natural ally against her has betrayed him because he wants a crown next, and his wife even more so.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,404
    Couldn't give a monkey's about the Royals.
    Saves certain newspapers talking about the shambles the government they trumpeted have created I suppose.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 49,863
    Two of the rebels have jumped from Donalds to Hern, otherwise this is playing out as before
  • Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    Absolutely scandalous from Harry and I, for one, am shocked beyond measure at his treachery.

    Can't believe he used the word "ass" rather than "arse". He's only been in the United States for five minutes, FFS.

    Since the lady was a horse lover, perhaps a variatietyof Equus was involved?
  • TimS said:

    ...

    Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    Absolutely scandalous from Harry and I, for one, am shocked beyond measure at his treachery.

    Can't believe he used the word "ass" rather than "arse". He's only been in the United States for five minutes, FFS.

    Being an equine fan, perhaps she really did spank his ass.
    This was the Spanish edition after all
    She was after his burrito?
  • Apparently (according to various newspaper sites) Harry is bragging (that's what it is, no matter how he says it) about how many Taliban he's killed in Afghanistan .
    The lad just doesn't know when to shut up.

    Never mind that, read this

    Prince Harry describes losing his virginity as 'a humiliating episode'
    In his autobiography, Prince Harry has spoken about how he lost his virginity with an "older lady" who "loved horses very much".

    He described the moment as "a humiliating episode" and says it took place "in a field".

    The excerpt read: "I mounted her quickly, after which she spanked my ass and held me back… one of my mistakes was letting it happen in a field, just behind a busy pub.

    "No doubt someone had seen us."

    https://news.sky.com/story/prince-harry-book-live-updates-spanish-version-of-spare-mistakenly-put-on-sale-and-sky-news-has-a-copy-12780329

    Off the scale eeeuwness wise
    Shagged by Camilla?
    Well that just might be the utterly awful innuendo of the passage.

    It all sounds made up by people who don't know how English life works, like, say, Meg and the ghostwriter. 97.5% of women at that level of society love horses very much so you don't have to specify, arse is not spelled like that, English pubs are not California bars - if it is dark enough to shag outside it's winter, and they are not a credible venue for this episode. It's house party stuff.
    Reminds me of the tale of a Tory MP being caught having al fresco sex with a guardsman in Green Park when Churchill was PM.

    Churchill is told about it and says, "You mean last night? It's the middle of winter - coldest night of the year wasn't it?"

    His aide confirms it was indeed last night and the weather was as described.

    "Makes you proud to be British" says the PM.
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