Either way, it needs closing down somehow, because it's consistent with the common prejudice about Rishi, that he doesn't get how normal people live, only squillionaire bankers.
See also his talk of "Unicorn Kingdom" yesterday. Great if you know what financiers mean by a unicorn, but otherwise dumb.
Envy of the world, said no-one who’s ever lived in another developed country.
Healthcare failing is not just a British problem though, many other countries, across the whole spectrum of organisational systems, have issues with backlogs built up during the pandemic. Canada is a lot worse, as is the US.
Interesting that in that report the UK still comes 4th - ahead of Germany and France which spend more, for example.
In my experience there are things that the NHS does better than Germany. For example, over Easter in England I fell and hurt my wrist. I went to the local minor injuries unit, was seen by a nurse who sent me for an x-ray, then looked at my x-ray, said there was nothing obvious that needed treatment sent me on my way with a printout of notes in English and German and splint to wear. I was in and out of there in less than an hour. A CD with my x-rays was sent to my Mum's address the next day, so I could take a copy to Germany.
In Germany I would have had to go to the equivalent of A&E, probably waited many hours, and would have had to be seen by a doctor before getting an x-ray.
On the other hand, the nurse in England recommended that I get another x-ray done in a week as sometimes things don't show up. We asked about an MRI but it seemed that would be impossible. So when I got back to Germany I popped into my GP, she gave me a prescription for an MRI, and I made an appointment for the same week. What's a bit funny is that in Germany I have to wait for the MRI people to give me a CD of the MRI which I then have to take to whoever I decide I want to look at it. At this point I cheated and got my wife to show it to a colleague.
Anyway definitely easier to get an MRI in Germany than in England, and if you look at the numbers of MRI machines per capita (supposedly about 5x as many in Germany) you can see why. Whether this is a good use of resources I don't know. Perhaps not.
Sky showing we are using 51.5% gas and just 23.7% renewables just now, no doubt as I look from our balcony to the Gwynt y Mor offshore wind farm they are barely turning and I assume other wind farms across the UK are the same
My car needed defrosting this morning and it’s nearly May!
Frosts in the North East can happen well into May.
Always plant my humble tomatoes and bedding plants out on the last bank holiday in May.
My car was also covered in frost this morning and there was some hail yesterday evening. This is a cold spring.
About May 23 is the cut off date for frosts in the far north west of England; this coincides with the the last day of summer in Scotland.
Still in the rainy season (just), so any large scale offensives are a little way off yet.
https://twitter.com/EuromaidanPress/status/1650761560166649857 Ukrainian forces establish a 20-km bridgehead on the Russian-occupied eastern bank of the Dnipro River, which gives them more freedom to launch sabotage and reconnaissance missions, and may assist in the main phase of the upcoming counteroffensive
@StigAbell on Times Radio: “Inflation isn’t halving. The NHS isn’t fixed. You’re not stopping the boats… can you confidently say that Brexit isn’t affecting our ability to recover?”
Trade minister @kevinhollinrake: “Don’t be so pessimistic Stig.”
Yet another exchange that reflects more badly on the journalist, than it does on the minister.
To think some people wanted tax cuts a few weeks ago due to the 'better' PSBR figures.
The chancellor has blamed the "eye-watering sums" spent on helping people through the coronavirus pandemic and energy crisis for an increase in public sector borrowing.
Public sector net borrowing was £21.5bn last month - the second-highest March borrowing since monthly records began in 1993.
The Office for National Statistics said that the government received 2% more in taxes and other income last month than in March last year.
But over the same period, spending increased by 16.8% to £104bn, in part due to the cost of the energy support schemes for households and businesses.
The idea that we could afford tax cuts or even avoid the consequences of fiscal drift was always illusionary. The underlying finances of the government are extremely weak. We have staggered from extraordinary spending on Covid to energy bills and the government is under huge pressure to address the cost of living crisis as well as waves of strike action in the public sector. Truss and Kwarteng were right that we need much more growth to square these circles but it is hard to see where that growth comes from. and their own disasters showed how little room there is left for manoeuvre.
We are where we are on public finances. Some very poor policy decisions by the incumbent government over the years have left public finances drained. We are left both with higher taxes and worse services.
We spent a decade trying to recover from the consequences of the GFC, not just the bank subsidies but, much more importantly, the loss of a significant part of our tax base. We were just about getting things back in balance when Covid came along and blew everything apart again. And then we have had the fuel crisis where the government have admittedly overreacted.
Your generality of "poor policy decisions" is, in my view, simply wrong. The government has done what it had to do to bring spending and sustainable tax back into line. We are not there yet. A Labour government would have done something very similar, no doubt seeking to spend just a little more and borrow and tax a little more but these differences would be at the margins and would be paid for by higher interest rates. There are no simple answers to the state we are in.
‘We’ve got no plan. What will we do?’: Boris Johnson ‘shock at Brexit result’ revealed in new book
"Mr Johnson, who is widely credited with delivering the slim majority for Brexit, is said to have walked around his living room “looking ashen-faced and distraught”, muttering: “What the hell is happening? ... Oh s***, we’ve got no plan. “We haven’t thought about it. I didn’t think it would happen. Holy c***, what will we do?”.
@StigAbell on Times Radio: “Inflation isn’t halving. The NHS isn’t fixed. You’re not stopping the boats… can you confidently say that Brexit isn’t affecting our ability to recover?”
Trade minister @kevinhollinrake: “Don’t be so pessimistic Stig.”
Yet another exchange that reflects more badly on the journalist, than it does on the minister.
You must be a true conservative, wanting a return to the days of "have you any thoughts you would like to share with us, minister ?"
Though with most of the current lot, that would still be a tough question.
‘We’ve got no plan. What will we do?’: Boris Johnson ‘shock at Brexit result’ revealed in new book
"Mr Johnson, who is widely credited with delivering the slim majority for Brexit, is said to have walked around his living room “looking ashen-faced and distraught”, muttering: “What the hell is happening? ... Oh s***, we’ve got no plan. “We haven’t thought about it. I didn’t think it would happen. Holy c***, what will we do?”.
Envy of the world, said no-one who’s ever lived in another developed country.
Healthcare failing is not just a British problem though, many other countries, across the whole spectrum of organisational systems, have issues with backlogs built up during the pandemic. Canada is a lot worse, as is the US.
What point are you trying to make there? The UK seems rather middling in that list.
I stick to my line that nothing is more important than health and we should invest more in it, in the people who deliver health services, in the infrastructure, in health education, in nudging people towards healthier lifestyles.
How's that going to be paid for? Taxes. But as I said 'nothing is more important than health'.
Sadly, or perhaps realistically, the voting public doesn't agree with you. Plenty of opportunity for parties to promise to spend more money on healthcare with the attendant taxes required but we have said no time and time again. 1997 was an exception, and perhaps we are moving back there again - I would be interested to know eg Lab's healthcare spending plans. Are they published somewhere?
@StigAbell on Times Radio: “Inflation isn’t halving. The NHS isn’t fixed. You’re not stopping the boats… can you confidently say that Brexit isn’t affecting our ability to recover?”
Trade minister @kevinhollinrake: “Don’t be so pessimistic Stig.”
Yet another exchange that reflects more badly on the journalist, than it does on the minister.
A view that can only be held by someone that doesn't live here and see the shitshow day to day
Is that for real? WTAF is the point of all those runners and riders?
Was really pathetic.
The video seems to be from Liz's remaining supporter. Can't be sandpit, he's too far away... Luckyguy, was that you?
Not guilty of making the video!
I do have the context to it though, which was that they had to get the PM’s car through a large group of protestors at the weekend. The sort of protestors who have been gluing themselves to roads and disrupting sporting events. There was a specific threat to the PM. The majority of the police there don’t look much like the armed Special Branch, who usually do this work.
The usual PM convoy is remarkably small for a head of government. 5 cars and 4 motorbikes normally in London, with the bikes running ahead holding traffic. https://youtube.com/watch?v=v6hPz48zrJU
Sky showing we are using 51.5% gas and just 23.7% renewables just now, no doubt as I look from our balcony to the Gwynt y Mor offshore wind farm they are barely turning and I assume other wind farms across the UK are the same
My car needed defrosting this morning and it’s nearly May!
Frosts in the North East can happen well into May.
Always plant my humble tomatoes and bedding plants out on the last bank holiday in May.
My car was also covered in frost this morning and there was some hail yesterday evening. This is a cold spring.
About May 23 is the cut off date for frosts in the far north west of England; this coincides with the the last day of summer in Scotland.
May is very often our best month of the year. Hopefully things will pick up soon.
Sky showing we are using 51.5% gas and just 23.7% renewables just now, no doubt as I look from our balcony to the Gwynt y Mor offshore wind farm they are barely turning and I assume other wind farms across the UK are the same
My car needed defrosting this morning and it’s nearly May!
Frosts in the North East can happen well into May.
Always plant my humble tomatoes and bedding plants out on the last bank holiday in May.
My car was also covered in frost this morning and there was some hail yesterday evening. This is a cold spring.
About May 23 is the cut off date for frosts in the far north west of England; this coincides with the the last day of summer in Scotland.
I found this yesterday which explained the weather situation and, whilst I would love to pretend I did, I probably understood/absorbed less than half the technical info. The TL/DR is that this weather is poised to stay well into may. Bloody Sudden Stratospheric Warming event coming here running our great British spring.
Weirdly I can deal better with weather when I have a sound explanation for it being shit. Same with flight delays, if they tell me why it’s delayed I don’t get so annoyed as I can try to rationalise it.
Either way, it needs closing down somehow, because it's consistent with the common prejudice about Rishi, that he doesn't get how normal people live, only squillionaire bankers.
See also his talk of "Unicorn Kingdom" yesterday. Great if you know what financiers mean by a unicorn, but otherwise dumb.
It is just the most bizarre thing I've seen. Well not quite but almost.
Perhaps it started with someone saying - wouldn't it be a good idea/green/eco-friendly to have a bicycle escort and then someone said well it would look silly having just one and then someone else said well if there are bicycles then we need policemen on foot to protect them and then....and then....
I can only believe the engagement was happening down the road. It's not as if the cavalcade thus constituted could have nipped down the A413 to go to an engagement at Chequers. Even Oxford Street would have been a stretch.
Plus they all look so serious, those that aren't out of breath and can manage a voluntary facial expression.
@StigAbell on Times Radio: “Inflation isn’t halving. The NHS isn’t fixed. You’re not stopping the boats… can you confidently say that Brexit isn’t affecting our ability to recover?”
Trade minister @kevinhollinrake: “Don’t be so pessimistic Stig.”
Yet another exchange that reflects more badly on the journalist, than it does on the minister.
You must be a true conservative, wanting a return to the days of "have you any thoughts you would like to share with us, minister ?"
Though with most of the current lot, that would still be a tough question.
Not at all, but asking such stupid questions adds nothing to the discourse. The minister doesn’t need to be continually asked if he’s stopped beating his wife.
As we saw during the pandemic, with the daily press conferences. Not one mainstream news organisation ever thought to switch out the political journalist for a science, medicine, or statistical journalist.
Envy of the world, said no-one who’s ever lived in another developed country.
Healthcare failing is not just a British problem though, many other countries, across the whole spectrum of organisational systems, have issues with backlogs built up during the pandemic. Canada is a lot worse, as is the US.
What point are you trying to make there? The UK seems rather middling in that list.
I stick to my line that nothing is more important than health and we should invest more in it, in the people who deliver health services, in the infrastructure, in health education, in nudging people towards healthier lifestyles.
How's that going to be paid for? Taxes. But as I said 'nothing is more important than health'.
Biggest issue with NHS is they do nothing till people ar ereally ill, some money spent up front end would surely stop a lot of the chronic stuff that is very expensive in hospitals. Also because of the hero worship it is badly run , GP's are a shambles nowadays. Needs some people who know what they are doing coming up with a real strategy going forward, instead we get arses like Barclay.
Indeed - primary care and social care both need a serious strategic reform.
Unfortunately we’ve been governed by overconfident, over-promoted mediocrities for years now, in a government whose chief concerns have been ‘optics’ and self-enrichment.
@StigAbell on Times Radio: “Inflation isn’t halving. The NHS isn’t fixed. You’re not stopping the boats… can you confidently say that Brexit isn’t affecting our ability to recover?”
Trade minister @kevinhollinrake: “Don’t be so pessimistic Stig.”
Yet another exchange that reflects more badly on the journalist, than it does on the minister.
You must be a true conservative, wanting a return to the days of "have you any thoughts you would like to share with us, minister ?"
Though with most of the current lot, that would still be a tough question.
With Diane Abott that line could be a journalists goldmine!
I know that this is bit late, but like everyone else I sympathise with the situation in which OGH finds himself. My diary tells me that this time last year I was walking, although assisted by a stick, and finding typing so difficult that I was getting used to using the dictation facility on my various devices. Then I had a fall which made everything worse. By July I was using a walking aid, and by September it was a wheelchair. Fortunately I managed to get an NHS appointment in mid-September and an operation to relieve the diagnosed pressure on my cervical spinal cord. Recovery is a slow business but, apart from a couple of irritating glitches the NHS has looked after me well. I don’t expect to ever walk again, but the latest physiotherapist suggests that I might be able to drive again ‘one day’! At the moment nothing below my neck works as it should!
Mike, I really hope that after treatment you’re in a better place than I am!
So is Khartoum going to be Libya or Kabul? The defence from various worthies of why the UK hadn’t started evacs of nationals was because there were far more Brit nationals than those of EU countries. To me that seems a reason to start early not late.
The news just now said people on the ground had been told to make their own way to the airport north of Khartoum. That doesn’t sound great.
I know that this is bit late, but like everyone else I sympathise with the situation in which OGH finds himself. My diary tells me that this time last year I was walking, although assisted by a stick, and finding typing so difficult that I was getting used to using the dictation facility on my various devices. Then I had a fall which made everything worse. By July I was using a walking aid, and by September it was a wheelchair. Fortunately I managed to get an NHS appointment in mid-September and an operation to relieve the diagnosed pressure on my cervical spinal cord. Recovery is a slow business but, apart from a couple of irritating glitches the NHS has looked after me well. I don’t expect to ever walk again, but the latest physiotherapist suggests that I might be able to drive again ‘one day’! At the moment nothing below my neck works as it should!
Mike, I really hope that after treatment you’re in a better place than I am!
Either way, it needs closing down somehow, because it's consistent with the common prejudice about Rishi, that he doesn't get how normal people live, only squillionaire bankers.
See also his talk of "Unicorn Kingdom" yesterday. Great if you know what financiers mean by a unicorn, but otherwise dumb.
It is just the most bizarre thing I've seen. Well not quite but almost.
Perhaps it started with someone saying - wouldn't it be a good idea/green/eco-friendly to have a bicycle escort and then someone said well it would look silly having just one and then someone else said well if there are bicycles then we need policemen on foot to protect them and then....and then....
I can only believe the engagement was happening down the road. It's not as if the cavalcade thus constituted could have nipped down the A413 to go to an engagement at Chequers. Even Oxford Street would have been a stretch.
Plus they all look so serious, those that aren't out of breath and can manage a voluntary facial expression.
Reports that this all began with the PM swallowing a fly remain unconfirmed.
I know that this is bit late, but like everyone else I sympathise with the situation in which OGH finds himself. My diary tells me that this time last year I was walking, although assisted by a stick, and finding typing so difficult that I was getting used to using the dictation facility on my various devices. Then I had a fall which made everything worse. By July I was using a walking aid, and by September it was a wheelchair. Fortunately I managed to get an NHS appointment in mid-September and an operation to relieve the diagnosed pressure on my cervical spinal cord. Recovery is a slow business but, apart from a couple of irritating glitches the NHS has looked after me well. I don’t expect to ever walk again, but the latest physiotherapist suggests that I might be able to drive again ‘one day’! At the moment nothing below my neck works as it should!
Mike, I really hope that after treatment you’re in a better place than I am!
Good thoughts to you and OGH.
All the very best to both of you (I'm sorry I didn't log on earlier).
None of them seem entirely implausible but I would imagine, when it comes to the betting rules, there would be some implications.
I don't understand this:
"However, it is important here to remember two things: first, campaigns pick their own delegates; second, Democrat Party rules give campaigns effective veto power over their delegates. This means that if Biden were to drop out before the convention, his campaign would have the power to control who all of his delegates vote for – in essence allowing Biden to hand-pick his own replacement as the Democrat nominee, all without any input from voters."
IIUC the campaigns choose who the delegates would be, but once they're selected they can vote as they like. What's the specific mechanism by which they could control who the delegates vote for?
Some within Whitehall believe that James Cleverly, the foreign secretary, should publicly stand up for Elliott, who remains a high-profile diplomat, given that he is unable to speak out himself.
There is also disquiet about the fact that Sunak allowed Raab to resign as deputy prime minister and release a 1,000-word defence of his behaviour before the official report was published, and dismay that Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, has not been more robust in standing up for the complainants within the civil service...
Is that for real? WTAF is the point of all those runners and riders?
Was really pathetic.
The video seems to be from Liz's remaining supporter. Can't be sandpit, he's too far away... Luckyguy, was that you?
Not guilty of making the video!
I do have the context to it though, which was that they had to get the PM’s car through a large group of protestors at the weekend. The sort of protestors who have been gluing themselves to roads and disrupting sporting events. There was a specific threat to the PM. The majority of the police there don’t look much like the armed Special Branch, who usually do this work.
The usual PM convoy is remarkably small for a head of government. 5 cars and 4 motorbikes normally in London, with the bikes running ahead holding traffic. https://youtube.com/watch?v=v6hPz48zrJU
BMW, Mercedes, Volvo. Does any other government do less to support its own car-making industry? Does Macron ride in a Volkswagen, or Scholtz a Peugeot? There were a couple of Range Rovers, which is something.
Marie Curie, the charity for those with terminal illness, threatened to take a volunteer to court if he spoke to the press about its handling of bullying allegations.
Philip Stogdon, a charity shop volunteer for 12 years, was dismissed and told the charity could take “legal remedies”.
Senior executives at Marie Curie, which has an annual income of £165 million, instructed a City law firm to issue legal threats to Stogdon, 71, after he repeatedly complained that he had been unfairly sacked for complaining about the treatment of a colleague.
People who work for charities and have their halo are just the same as us all. My wife experienced one bully at a charity she worked for. Nasty piece of work. Frankly I find a lot of higher paid charity work to be galling, as all those donations contribute to the salary. The best charities have few overheads.
A clear out in the charitable sector is due. A lot of charities are not very charitable.
My favourite is giving their shop managers a target to reduce paid hours. Methods include - if enough volunteers come in on the day, cancel the paid workers shift then and there.
So telling a person on minimum wage - “no work today” on no notice.
As a NeonNaziCapitalistImperialistEnslaverOfTheOppressed, I find that a bit much.
I know that this is bit late, but like everyone else I sympathise with the situation in which OGH finds himself. My diary tells me that this time last year I was walking, although assisted by a stick, and finding typing so difficult that I was getting used to using the dictation facility on my various devices. Then I had a fall which made everything worse. By July I was using a walking aid, and by September it was a wheelchair. Fortunately I managed to get an NHS appointment in mid-September and an operation to relieve the diagnosed pressure on my cervical spinal cord. Recovery is a slow business but, apart from a couple of irritating glitches the NHS has looked after me well. I don’t expect to ever walk again, but the latest physiotherapist suggests that I might be able to drive again ‘one day’! At the moment nothing below my neck works as it should!
Mike, I really hope that after treatment you’re in a better place than I am!
OLB sends positive energy to both OKC and OGH for their recuperation and recovery, and hopes for a government that isn't intent on running the NHS into the ground.
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
7m of a waiting list. That is more than 10% of the population, for goodness sake. More than 10% of us are waiting for what? Some sort of hospital procedure?
When are you "waiting"? When you have an appointment in 4 weeks? Is that "waiting"? My son has an appointment in 10 weeks to see a consultant. It is fixed for then because he will be back from University again. Is he one of the 7m?
I find this figure almost impossible to believe. I would love to know more about how it is calculated.
That all said, it is clear that the NHS is not delivering as it should for the money spent on it. Healthcare is being privatised by the back door because so many people take the same decision as Mike has done: they are not prepared to wait in pain and have lost confidence in the service provided. When I was young only the really rich went private. Now it seems to be a slightly predictable expense of later middle age.
The figures are calculated by a set formula known as RTT (Referal to Treatment). So everyone referred by GP or other services gets logged, and the period ends when the appointment ticks the box that treatment commenced. So yes, your son is on the waiting list (though not one of the 7 million as that is the England figure, as each of the 4 nations has its own figures with Health being devolved).
There is scope to game the figures, for example ticking the box as treatment commenced when starting physio, rather than joint surgery. There is too the problem of crystallisation in that a patient waiting a year for an appointment and then the decision to operate immediately becomes a 1 year breech of the RTT target.
The RTT time only applies to new appointments and treatments too, which is why they get priority over follow ups and further treatments. Figures on follow up backlogs are even more nebulous, but probably equal those waiting for new appointments.
In that case my son won't be on the list because he has started treatment and this is a follow up appointment. This makes the figure even more staggering: 10%+ are waiting for treatment to start? What proportion are already in treatment? Presumably multiples of the first figure. I have seen the UK referred to as the sick man of Europe, it actually seems to be true.
This level of demand for health services is simply unsustainable. @malcolmg is right that we must find ways of doing more preventative work but above all we must take more responsibility for our own health (says the 61 year old man carrying an excess 15kg who drinks about double the recommended maximum and cannot resist a cake for love nor money).
7m of a waiting list. That is more than 10% of the population, for goodness sake. More than 10% of us are waiting for what? Some sort of hospital procedure?
When are you "waiting"? When you have an appointment in 4 weeks? Is that "waiting"? My son has an appointment in 10 weeks to see a consultant. It is fixed for then because he will be back from University again. Is he one of the 7m?
I find this figure almost impossible to believe. I would love to know more about how it is calculated.
That all said, it is clear that the NHS is not delivering as it should for the money spent on it. Healthcare is being privatised by the back door because so many people take the same decision as Mike has done: they are not prepared to wait in pain and have lost confidence in the service provided. When I was young only the really rich went private. Now it seems to be a slightly predictable expense of later middle age.
It's one of those useless aggregated statistics a bit like GDP, or GDP per capita, like I was explaining last week, which tells you very little about what is happening to the average person.
What you really want is to look at the median wait for certain categories of ill health and procedures like initial consultations, diagnostics, surgery, post-operative care and so on. Lumping things together to get one big number rarely tells us anything useful as it mixes in a whole load of different things of varying importance.
Focusing on the "big number" can make an organisation take the easy route to reduce it, and as a consequence neglect the most important cases.
I would recommend reading this by Marmot, which explains a lot of why the NHS performance has worsened over the last 13 years.
"Health spending per person, adjusted for demographic change, grew at 2% a year under the Conservatives from 1979 to 1997; at 5.7% a year under Labour from 1997 to 2010; at -0.07% from 2010 to 2015; and at -0.03% from 2015 to 2021. (snip) Other European countries have taken a different approach. If the UK had increased its healthcare expenditure from 2010 to 2019 as much as France did, we would have increased our current spend by 21%, and by 39% if we had matched Germany."
I am not saying that we either could or should have matched peer countries in their health spending, but not doing so does have consequences.
I agree with this. Partly we are doing and are able to do more for patients, partly the ranks of the elderly and sick are growing, and yes we have failed to keep spending an increasing amount to cope with that. I blame governments for not taking hard choices. Labour spent oodles of future health money with PPI - cunningly keeping it off the current spend. We are still paying now. The Tories, rightly or wrongly decided that austerity-lite* was needed in 2010. This is not the time or place to say who was right or wrong, but the consequences are now becoming clear in the waiting lists. But. If we had increased spend by equivalent to say France or Germany, what would the bill have been? And almost every voter who says when polled ‘I’d pay more tax for the NHS’ then forgets that in the privacy of the polling booth.
We need to grow up as a nation and realise that you get what you pay for. I’d turn NI into part of income tax, and replace it with mandatory health insurance, with support for the low paid, those unable to work. The NHS would still be free at the point of use, but the insurance money would get spent. If you went over drawn, not matter, your account just goes into the red. No change on what you pay, but you get to see where you stand with the cost of the care you have had. Me, I’d be heavily into the red, and I’m grateful.
If “the insurance money would get spent” why is that an attractive business proposition for an insurer?
Fundamentally health insurance is insurance against a catastrophic risk. The insurance company charges 12 people £100 and then pays £1000 in medical expenses for 1 person. If they are right they make a nice profit and the risk has been pooled. If they are wrong then they lose money and the risk has been pooled.
Unless insurance results in lower costs in the healthcare system (which is possible) then it means the amount that people will pay goes up.
Not if the insurer is the government. I see it as an actual NI, rather than just the Tax NI is now.
The point mainly is to show people what their care costs. The biggest flaw for me right now is that too many fail to understand the consequences and costs of their actions. Seeing a GP is 'free', except there is a cost behind it. Cancer medication is 'free' except it costs potentially tens of thousands a year. Getting a knee replaced is 'free', yet the true cost is in 5 figures.
Go to the vet - costs you significant money. My poor dog has a low grade tumour - chemo is going to be around 400 to 500 a month until she is no longer with us.
In the NHS you wouldn't know this. At the vets your credit card burns...
If you knew your GP appointment cost say 40 quid, you wouldn't miss it.
I would recommend reading this by Marmot, which explains a lot of why the NHS performance has worsened over the last 13 years.
"Health spending per person, adjusted for demographic change, grew at 2% a year under the Conservatives from 1979 to 1997; at 5.7% a year under Labour from 1997 to 2010; at -0.07% from 2010 to 2015; and at -0.03% from 2015 to 2021. (snip) Other European countries have taken a different approach. If the UK had increased its healthcare expenditure from 2010 to 2019 as much as France did, we would have increased our current spend by 21%, and by 39% if we had matched Germany."
I am not saying that we either could or should have matched peer countries in their health spending, but not doing so does have consequences.
I agree with this. Partly we are doing and are able to do more for patients, partly the ranks of the elderly and sick are growing, and yes we have failed to keep spending an increasing amount to cope with that. I blame governments for not taking hard choices. Labour spent oodles of future health money with PPI - cunningly keeping it off the current spend. We are still paying now. The Tories, rightly or wrongly decided that austerity-lite* was needed in 2010. This is not the time or place to say who was right or wrong, but the consequences are now becoming clear in the waiting lists. But. If we had increased spend by equivalent to say France or Germany, what would the bill have been? And almost every voter who says when polled ‘I’d pay more tax for the NHS’ then forgets that in the privacy of the polling booth.
We need to grow up as a nation and realise that you get what you pay for. I’d turn NI into part of income tax, and replace it with mandatory health insurance, with support for the low paid, those unable to work. The NHS would still be free at the point of use, but the insurance money would get spent. If you went over drawn, not matter, your account just goes into the red. No change on what you pay, but you get to see where you stand with the cost of the care you have had. Me, I’d be heavily into the red, and I’m grateful.
If “the insurance money would get spent” why is that an attractive business proposition for an insurer?
Fundamentally health insurance is insurance against a catastrophic risk. The insurance company charges 12 people £100 and then pays £1000 in medical expenses for 1 person. If they are right they make a nice profit and the risk has been pooled. If they are wrong then they lose money and the risk has been pooled.
Unless insurance results in lower costs in the healthcare system (which is possible) then it means the amount that people will pay goes up.
Is that for real? WTAF is the point of all those runners and riders?
Was really pathetic.
The video seems to be from Liz's remaining supporter. Can't be sandpit, he's too far away... Luckyguy, was that you?
Not guilty of making the video!
I do have the context to it though, which was that they had to get the PM’s car through a large group of protestors at the weekend. The sort of protestors who have been gluing themselves to roads and disrupting sporting events. There was a specific threat to the PM. The majority of the police there don’t look much like the armed Special Branch, who usually do this work.
The usual PM convoy is remarkably small for a head of government. 5 cars and 4 motorbikes normally in London, with the bikes running ahead holding traffic. https://youtube.com/watch?v=v6hPz48zrJU
Pedal bikes though? Very easy to cause carnage with them, for protestors so inclined. I know that applies in priniciple for motorbikes too, but it would be a brave/foolish protestor who would take on a motorbike. Plod running along makes some sense over a short distance - you can immediately engage any threats. but the bikes just seem like an impediment.
What is needed is surey some kind of carnival float, loaded with cops able to jump off and engage at a moment's notice, or just distract protestors so much they forget what they're about
The idea that we could afford tax cuts or even avoid the consequences of fiscal drift was always illusionary. The underlying finances of the government are extremely weak. We have staggered from extraordinary spending on Covid to energy bills and the government is under huge pressure to address the cost of living crisis as well as waves of strike action in the public sector. Truss and Kwarteng were right that we need much more growth to square these circles but it is hard to see where that growth comes from. and their own disasters showed how little room there is left for manoeuvre.
I find the idea that borrowing a huge but smaller than expected sum gives us "wiggle room" bizarre. It's merely a stay of execution, we aren't out of jail.
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
7m of a waiting list. That is more than 10% of the population, for goodness sake. More than 10% of us are waiting for what? Some sort of hospital procedure?
When are you "waiting"? When you have an appointment in 4 weeks? Is that "waiting"? My son has an appointment in 10 weeks to see a consultant. It is fixed for then because he will be back from University again. Is he one of the 7m?
I find this figure almost impossible to believe. I would love to know more about how it is calculated.
That all said, it is clear that the NHS is not delivering as it should for the money spent on it. Healthcare is being privatised by the back door because so many people take the same decision as Mike has done: they are not prepared to wait in pain and have lost confidence in the service provided. When I was young only the really rich went private. Now it seems to be a slightly predictable expense of later middle age.
I am waiting for a procedure that is not imminently needed but prevents an A&E nasty, potentially fatal, condition later on. It's lower priority than treating acute conditions, so I'm on a waiting list just like OGH was. If the system had more capacity we wouldn't be.
I think it does actually mean anyone waiting at all rather than being treated as soon as one wants:
And I agree that's silly. I had to wait a month for a cataract op - it didn't even occur to me as a problem. When the much-maligned Brown brought waiting times down to 18 weeks for everything (and 2 wweeks for cancer and similar), I felt that was fine, no need to do more.
But I agree that demand for private care is soaring as people are faced with waiting times of 2 years+, and I don't blame them - in the end you do need to look after yourself if you can, while favouring a tax and care system that makes that possible for everyone. Under Brown the private companies did have a major profits drop, because most people no longer saw any point in paying to get a procedure a couple of weeks faster.
The idea that we could afford tax cuts or even avoid the consequences of fiscal drift was always illusionary. The underlying finances of the government are extremely weak. We have staggered from extraordinary spending on Covid to energy bills and the government is under huge pressure to address the cost of living crisis as well as waves of strike action in the public sector. Truss and Kwarteng were right that we need much more growth to square these circles but it is hard to see where that growth comes from. and their own disasters showed how little room there is left for manoeuvre.
I find the idea that borrowing a huge but smaller than expected sum gives us "wiggle room" bizarre. It's merely a stay of execution, we aren't out of jail.
Yes, the underlying assumption, however, is that the markets will bear a certain amount of borrowing if they accepted the original guesstimate so we then have the capacity to spend more or tax less back to that figure. It is, in reality, fanciful.
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
Some within Whitehall believe that James Cleverly, the foreign secretary, should publicly stand up for Elliott, who remains a high-profile diplomat, given that he is unable to speak out himself.
There is also disquiet about the fact that Sunak allowed Raab to resign as deputy prime minister and release a 1,000-word defence of his behaviour before the official report was published, and dismay that Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, has not been more robust in standing up for the complainants within the civil service...
Case is possibly the worst cabinet secretary of all time. An unedifying combination of middling intellect, slappable mush and a gross supinity, with all the strategic nous of a drugged mayfly.
7m of a waiting list. That is more than 10% of the population, for goodness sake. More than 10% of us are waiting for what? Some sort of hospital procedure?
When are you "waiting"? When you have an appointment in 4 weeks? Is that "waiting"? My son has an appointment in 10 weeks to see a consultant. It is fixed for then because he will be back from University again. Is he one of the 7m?
I find this figure almost impossible to believe. I would love to know more about how it is calculated.
That all said, it is clear that the NHS is not delivering as it should for the money spent on it. Healthcare is being privatised by the back door because so many people take the same decision as Mike has done: they are not prepared to wait in pain and have lost confidence in the service provided. When I was young only the really rich went private. Now it seems to be a slightly predictable expense of later middle age.
I am waiting for a procedure that is not imminently needed but prevents an A&E nasty, potentially fatal, condition later on. It's lower priority than treating acute conditions, so I'm on a waiting list just like OGH was. If the system had more capacity we wouldn't be.
I think it does actually mean anyone waiting at all rather than being treated as soon as one wants:
And I agree that's silly. I had to wait a month for a cataract op - it didn't even occur to me as a problem. When the much-maligned Brown brought waiting times down to 18 weeks for everything (and 2 wweeks for cancer and similar), I felt that was fine, no need to do more.
But I agree that demand for private care is soaring as people are faced with waiting times of 2 years+, and I don't blame them - in the end you do need to look after yourself if you can, while favouring a tax and care system that makes that possible for everyone. Under Brown the private companies did have a major profits drop, because most people no longer saw any point in paying to get a procedure a couple of weeks faster.
My dad has chosen to go private for a knee replacement as at 83, he may not have many years left to enjoy it, and wants it asap. He has the money, so it makes sense.
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
I wonder how many other scientists we can get in the car? Thinking caps on.
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
Marie Curie, the charity for those with terminal illness, threatened to take a volunteer to court if he spoke to the press about its handling of bullying allegations.
Philip Stogdon, a charity shop volunteer for 12 years, was dismissed and told the charity could take “legal remedies”.
Senior executives at Marie Curie, which has an annual income of £165 million, instructed a City law firm to issue legal threats to Stogdon, 71, after he repeatedly complained that he had been unfairly sacked for complaining about the treatment of a colleague.
People who work for charities and have their halo are just the same as us all. My wife experienced one bully at a charity she worked for. Nasty piece of work. Frankly I find a lot of higher paid charity work to be galling, as all those donations contribute to the salary. The best charities have few overheads.
A clear out in the charitable sector is due. A lot of charities are not very charitable.
My favourite is giving their shop managers a target to reduce paid hours. Methods include - if enough volunteers come in on the day, cancel the paid workers shift then and there.
So telling a person on minimum wage - “no work today” on no notice.
As a NeonNaziCapitalistImperialistEnslaverOfTheOppressed, I find that a bit much.
Yes. There are too many and so many new ones are basically about 'awareness raising'.
There are fantastic charities, large and small. The good small ones (the Little Snoring Duck Pond Preservation Society type) don't require the same sort of regulation as Oxfam.
The charities which both take vast sums off the taxpayer (and hide this from donors) and have a bloated over paid career structure need sorting out.
As do the charities that keep telling government what to do rather than providing that service.
But some small ones do need overseeing. The animal charities that exist in so many places to provide a wage for the founder from sentimental donors for looking after a few dogs and cats.
On the plus side, the best function of some charities is to provide the best bookshop by far in many towns.
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
I wonder how many other scientists we can get in the car? Thinking caps on.
Einstein - "The car was stationary from my perspective"
The idea that we could afford tax cuts or even avoid the consequences of fiscal drift was always illusionary. The underlying finances of the government are extremely weak. We have staggered from extraordinary spending on Covid to energy bills and the government is under huge pressure to address the cost of living crisis as well as waves of strike action in the public sector. Truss and Kwarteng were right that we need much more growth to square these circles but it is hard to see where that growth comes from. and their own disasters showed how little room there is left for manoeuvre.
I find the idea that borrowing a huge but smaller than expected sum gives us "wiggle room" bizarre. It's merely a stay of execution, we aren't out of jail.
Yes, the underlying assumption, however, is that the markets will bear a certain amount of borrowing if they accepted the original guesstimate so we then have the capacity to spend more or tax less back to that figure. It is, in reality, fanciful.
As you said originally, the finances were actually in pretty good shape in Feb 2020. Everything that’s happened since then, is what’s screwed them up beyond all recognition, and there’s now little room for manoevre - as Ms Truss discovered.
I would recommend reading this by Marmot, which explains a lot of why the NHS performance has worsened over the last 13 years.
"Health spending per person, adjusted for demographic change, grew at 2% a year under the Conservatives from 1979 to 1997; at 5.7% a year under Labour from 1997 to 2010; at -0.07% from 2010 to 2015; and at -0.03% from 2015 to 2021. (snip) Other European countries have taken a different approach. If the UK had increased its healthcare expenditure from 2010 to 2019 as much as France did, we would have increased our current spend by 21%, and by 39% if we had matched Germany."
I am not saying that we either could or should have matched peer countries in their health spending, but not doing so does have consequences.
Overall, though, health spending in this country does not appear to be out of line with the rich world average:
Is it that we face much worse than average demographic issues?
Not out of line but (from the graph in your link) still spending a lower proportion of GDP on health than, among others, Holland, Sweden, France and Germany. Those who tell us these countries have better systems than the NHS might be right but rarely advocate increased spending.
The expenditure in france and germany though does not all come from taxation as their is a component of private insurance in there, havent checked on holland and sweden however. While as the header notes more people are going for private insurance I don't think we are anywhere near german or french levels yet
7m of a waiting list. That is more than 10% of the population, for goodness sake. More than 10% of us are waiting for what? Some sort of hospital procedure?
When are you "waiting"? When you have an appointment in 4 weeks? Is that "waiting"? My son has an appointment in 10 weeks to see a consultant. It is fixed for then because he will be back from University again. Is he one of the 7m?
I find this figure almost impossible to believe. I would love to know more about how it is calculated.
That all said, it is clear that the NHS is not delivering as it should for the money spent on it. Healthcare is being privatised by the back door because so many people take the same decision as Mike has done: they are not prepared to wait in pain and have lost confidence in the service provided. When I was young only the really rich went private. Now it seems to be a slightly predictable expense of later middle age.
The figures are calculated by a set formula known as RTT (Referal to Treatment). So everyone referred by GP or other services gets logged, and the period ends when the appointment ticks the box that treatment commenced. So yes, your son is on the waiting list (though not one of the 7 million as that is the England figure, as each of the 4 nations has its own figures with Health being devolved).
There is scope to game the figures, for example ticking the box as treatment commenced when starting physio, rather than joint surgery. There is too the problem of crystallisation in that a patient waiting a year for an appointment and then the decision to operate immediately becomes a 1 year breech of the RTT target.
The RTT time only applies to new appointments and treatments too, which is why they get priority over follow ups and further treatments. Figures on follow up backlogs are even more nebulous, but probably equal those waiting for new appointments.
In that case my son won't be on the list because he has started treatment and this is a follow up appointment. This makes the figure even more staggering: 10%+ are waiting for treatment to start? What proportion are already in treatment? Presumably multiples of the first figure. I have seen the UK referred to as the sick man of Europe, it actually seems to be true.
This level of demand for health services is simply unsustainable. @malcolmg is right that we must find ways of doing more preventative work but above all we must take more responsibility for our own health (says the 61 year old man carrying an excess 15kg who drinks about double the recommended maximum and cannot resist a cake for love nor money).
The best ways we can actually take responsibility for our own health are generally collective things that need government support:
Greater emphasis on cooking, food and nutrition in schools Greater emphasis on sport and other physical actitivies in schools Low cost access to the above for those who have left school Tax schemes to incentivise food manufactures and supermarkets to encourage healthier food Controls on advertising for addictive and unhealthy foods.
For silly ideological reasons the right are very reluctant to tackle the above list of easy wins that would make our nation happier and healthier and instead obsess about trying to game the economy in search of 0.2% extra GDP rises that are much harder to achieve, and they fail to deliver anyway.
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
I wonder how many other scientists we can get in the car? Thinking caps on.
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
I wonder how many other scientists we can get in the car? Thinking caps on.
Einstein - "The car was stationary from my perspective"
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
I wonder how many other scientists we can get in the car? Thinking caps on.
Einstein - "The car was stationary from my perspective"
Zeno - 'I have no idea how you caught us officer - every time you moved to where we were, we had moved on..."
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
I wonder how many other scientists we can get in the car? Thinking caps on.
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
How do you know they don't?
It was you who complained that more time was needed for planning. I would hope there are plans.
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
I wonder how many other scientists we can get in the car? Thinking caps on.
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Of course. It was obvious that something was being planned, with the various military and civilian assets involved working through the details.
It’s one thing to send a handful of SAS to rescue a few dozen from the embassy, but a different order of magnitude to sort out transport for thousands of people.
There’s military aircraft from all over Europe, Mid East, and the US, heading for Khartoum now, they’ve got three days to get as many foreigners out as possible. The Americans estimate 16,000 of their own, four times as many as the Brits. Many of the European countries only have dozens of people, and have accomodated Brits on their flights out yesterday. Well done to everyone involved.
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
Really sorry to hear that, Mike. The NHS will certainly be a key focus of the next election - above and beyond the "normal" rhetoric of it being in bad shape, more and more people know of those close to them who are experiencing the issues.
In a subsection of it, CAMHS is in near-collapse. Getting a child diagnosed and obtaining help takes months or even years. SEND provision is hard to obtain. And quite a few people are impacted by this or related to those who are badly impacted by this. The helplessness and rage you feel as a parent when this happens can't be overstated.
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
Surely that's David Miliband's job?
Remind me which one of the Thunderbirds he pilots again?
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
How do you know they don't?
It was you who complained that more time was needed for planning. I would hope there are plans.
Oh come on - you have a plan - you then see how the current situation sits and adapt the plan.
I have no idea if such a plan existed or didn't so don't take my post as proof that they just started planning yesterday!
Really sorry to hear that, Mike. The NHS will certainly be a key focus of the next election - above and beyond the "normal" rhetoric of it being in bad shape, more and more people know of those close to them who are experiencing the issues.
In a subsection of it, CAMHS is in near-collapse. Getting a child diagnosed and obtaining help takes months or even years. SEND provision is hard to obtain. And quite a few people are impacted by this or related to those who are badly impacted by this. The helplessness and rage you feel as a parent when this happens can't be overstated.
CAMHS has been a complete disaster for years, chronically underfunded. With massive costs from a lack of timely action, it makes no sense at all.
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
It's a lot more feasible now that there's a ceasefire. Baldy Ben didn't want to end up having to tweet tributes to professionalism about something that starts as Raid on Entebbe but turns into Black Hawk Down.
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
Farad wanted to join them but there wasn't enough capacity
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
I wonder how many other scientists we can get in the car? Thinking caps on.
This could turn out to be quite a Bohr.
I am not sure which of you most deserves a prize but there are certainly some Nobel efforts this morning.
Really sorry to hear that, Mike. The NHS will certainly be a key focus of the next election - above and beyond the "normal" rhetoric of it being in bad shape, more and more people know of those close to them who are experiencing the issues.
In a subsection of it, CAMHS is in near-collapse. Getting a child diagnosed and obtaining help takes months or even years. SEND provision is hard to obtain. And quite a few people are impacted by this or related to those who are badly impacted by this. The helplessness and rage you feel as a parent when this happens can't be overstated.
Yes - my eldest (9yo) is clearly to any reasonably informed observer on the spectrum; tics, squeals, fear of noises etc. etc. yet getting a diagnosis (we still don’t have one!) has taken literally years. Concerns first raised when he was six; the pandemic seemed to basically stop everything, and now here we are, waiting another three months to get phone appointment.
Really this is to make sure he gets the support he needs in school, but in the government’s less-than-perfect reforms to SEN, schools have far less discretion in self-diagnosing support via School Action/SA+ - he needs the EHC which, entirely predictably as an inter-agency enterprise, is a truly Homeric journey through a variety of inexplicable and contradictory nonsense. Another bit of Gove/Classic Dom legacy which has led to unnecessary anguish for thousands.
7m of a waiting list. That is more than 10% of the population, for goodness sake. More than 10% of us are waiting for what? Some sort of hospital procedure?
When are you "waiting"? When you have an appointment in 4 weeks? Is that "waiting"? My son has an appointment in 10 weeks to see a consultant. It is fixed for then because he will be back from University again. Is he one of the 7m?
I find this figure almost impossible to believe. I would love to know more about how it is calculated.
That all said, it is clear that the NHS is not delivering as it should for the money spent on it. Healthcare is being privatised by the back door because so many people take the same decision as Mike has done: they are not prepared to wait in pain and have lost confidence in the service provided. When I was young only the really rich went private. Now it seems to be a slightly predictable expense of later middle age.
The figures are calculated by a set formula known as RTT (Referal to Treatment). So everyone referred by GP or other services gets logged, and the period ends when the appointment ticks the box that treatment commenced. So yes, your son is on the waiting list (though not one of the 7 million as that is the England figure, as each of the 4 nations has its own figures with Health being devolved).
There is scope to game the figures, for example ticking the box as treatment commenced when starting physio, rather than joint surgery. There is too the problem of crystallisation in that a patient waiting a year for an appointment and then the decision to operate immediately becomes a 1 year breech of the RTT target.
The RTT time only applies to new appointments and treatments too, which is why they get priority over follow ups and further treatments. Figures on follow up backlogs are even more nebulous, but probably equal those waiting for new appointments.
In that case my son won't be on the list because he has started treatment and this is a follow up appointment. This makes the figure even more staggering: 10%+ are waiting for treatment to start? What proportion are already in treatment? Presumably multiples of the first figure. I have seen the UK referred to as the sick man of Europe, it actually seems to be true.
This level of demand for health services is simply unsustainable. @malcolmg is right that we must find ways of doing more preventative work but above all we must take more responsibility for our own health (says the 61 year old man carrying an excess 15kg who drinks about double the recommended maximum and cannot resist a cake for love nor money).
The best ways we can actually take responsibility for our own health are generally collective things that need government support:
Greater emphasis on cooking, food and nutrition in schools Greater emphasis on sport and other physical actitivies in schools Low cost access to the above for those who have left school Tax schemes to incentivise food manufactures and supermarkets to encourage healthier food Controls on advertising for addictive and unhealthy foods.
For silly ideological reasons the right are very reluctant to tackle the above list of easy wins that would make our nation happier and healthier and instead obsess about trying to game the economy in search of 0.2% extra GDP rises that are much harder to achieve, and they fail to deliver anyway.
So less cake and less wine is your prescription? I won't be voting for you!
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
Farad wanted to join them but there wasn't enough capacity
He asked to be inducted into the car but Ohm resisted.
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
I wonder how many other scientists we can get in the car? Thinking caps on.
This could turn out to be quite a Bohr.
I am not sure which of you most deserves a prize but there are certainly some Nobel efforts this morning.
Such a flagrant breach of the law might reach Boyleing point soon.
To think some people wanted tax cuts a few weeks ago due to the 'better' PSBR figures.
The chancellor has blamed the "eye-watering sums" spent on helping people through the coronavirus pandemic and energy crisis for an increase in public sector borrowing.
Public sector net borrowing was £21.5bn last month - the second-highest March borrowing since monthly records began in 1993.
The Office for National Statistics said that the government received 2% more in taxes and other income last month than in March last year.
But over the same period, spending increased by 16.8% to £104bn, in part due to the cost of the energy support schemes for households and businesses.
The idea that we could afford tax cuts or even avoid the consequences of fiscal drift was always illusionary. The underlying finances of the government are extremely weak. We have staggered from extraordinary spending on Covid to energy bills and the government is under huge pressure to address the cost of living crisis as well as waves of strike action in the public sector. Truss and Kwarteng were right that we need much more growth to square these circles but it is hard to see where that growth comes from. and their own disasters showed how little room there is left for manoeuvre.
We are where we are on public finances. Some very poor policy decisions by the incumbent government over the years have left public finances drained. We are left both with higher taxes and worse services.
We spent a decade trying to recover from the consequences of the GFC, not just the bank subsidies but, much more importantly, the loss of a significant part of our tax base. We were just about getting things back in balance when Covid came along and blew everything apart again. And then we have had the fuel crisis where the government have admittedly overreacted.
Your generality of "poor policy decisions" is, in my view, simply wrong. The government has done what it had to do to bring spending and sustainable tax back into line. We are not there yet. A Labour government would have done something very similar, no doubt seeking to spend just a little more and borrow and tax a little more but these differences would be at the margins and would be paid for by higher interest rates. There are no simple answers to the state we are in.
The austerity policy failed in its primary purpose of balancing the books. The UK also did relatively poorly coming out of the GFC compared with peers. Disclosure: I supported the policy at the time for the reasons you give but have to change my view when confronted with compelling evidence.
The government was also responsible for Brexit with opportunity loss in revenue of tens of billions of pounds per year party analysis.
Also a poor economic response on Covid and the Trussterfuck.
re @MikeSmithson sorry to hear that - spines are tricky as fuck to sort as I'm sure you will have been told umpteen times.
As for private of bloody course you are going to go private. Trusting the NHS with something like that would be madness.
Individuals might or might not say they do; institutionally of course they would say they do but actually the NHS doesn't care at all about health outcomes. It is a machine that feeds people in at one end and watches them emerge at the other. Whether you are successful or not is a lottery. I think the odds are not completely mad, let's say - sticks finger in air - you have an 80-85% chance of success. That is far below your chances going private.
So having been depressed by some of the news stories this morning and also depressed by the treatment by one of major credit card companies of a friend who has turned to me for help, I needed to lighten the mood and saw this joke that made me smile:
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
Coulomb was also in the car and was the only one charged
Farad wanted to join them but there wasn't enough capacity
He asked to be inducted into the car but Ohm resisted.
Anyone watching The Diplomat (no spoilers, obvs - I'm on ep.5).
About a situation in Iran (amongst other things) and all this talk about evacuating people from Sudan has blurred the distinction between fact and fiction and I am reading news from Sudan and applying The Diplomat's backstories to it.
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
Surely that's David Miliband's job?
Remind me which one of the Thunderbirds he pilots again?
Really sorry to hear that, Mike. The NHS will certainly be a key focus of the next election - above and beyond the "normal" rhetoric of it being in bad shape, more and more people know of those close to them who are experiencing the issues.
In a subsection of it, CAMHS is in near-collapse. Getting a child diagnosed and obtaining help takes months or even years. SEND provision is hard to obtain. And quite a few people are impacted by this or related to those who are badly impacted by this. The helplessness and rage you feel as a parent when this happens can't be overstated.
CAMHS has been a complete disaster for years, chronically underfunded. With massive costs from a lack of timely action, it makes no sense at all.
So much of the issues that are chronic to our country would require an upfront expenditure in order to save the economic impact from them going forwards. But to do so would need to jump in with extra spending (tax or borrowing) with the benefits not instantly visible, so is difficult politically. And the longer and longer we put it off, the more and more the damage builds up and the more and more we get poorer from not having resolved it and the harder and harder (and more expensive) that initial outlay becomes.
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
Surely that's David Miliband's job?
Remind me which one of the Thunderbirds he pilots again?
British evacuation operation under way in Khartoum. Initially room for 2,000 nationals on a number of military flights, also looking into a naval evacuation from Port Sudan, with two vessels in the area.
Much media bloviating yesterday about why hadn't the government done anything. Seems no-one is allowed time to plan stuff nowadays. Far better to just wing it.
Our media is pathetic.
Or our planning is pathetic. Why does the Foreign Office not have plans for evacuations from every potential hotspot?
There's only so much that is practical to plan beyond generalities. They have no idea what the next 'hotspot' will be, what conditions will pertain, what assets will be needed and what might be available when it all kicks off.
The UK forces don't have such a surplus, or even sufficiency of resources, that they can guarantee to have exactly what is needed at an instant's notice. It's much more likely that the plan will have to be furiously wanked out given what's available. Hence the rather bizarre mixed A400M/C-130J operation on this week's "Khartoum Express". That's what they had that was currently working so that's what the plan was.
To think some people wanted tax cuts a few weeks ago due to the 'better' PSBR figures.
The chancellor has blamed the "eye-watering sums" spent on helping people through the coronavirus pandemic and energy crisis for an increase in public sector borrowing.
Public sector net borrowing was £21.5bn last month - the second-highest March borrowing since monthly records began in 1993.
The Office for National Statistics said that the government received 2% more in taxes and other income last month than in March last year.
But over the same period, spending increased by 16.8% to £104bn, in part due to the cost of the energy support schemes for households and businesses.
The idea that we could afford tax cuts or even avoid the consequences of fiscal drift was always illusionary. The underlying finances of the government are extremely weak. We have staggered from extraordinary spending on Covid to energy bills and the government is under huge pressure to address the cost of living crisis as well as waves of strike action in the public sector. Truss and Kwarteng were right that we need much more growth to square these circles but it is hard to see where that growth comes from. and their own disasters showed how little room there is left for manoeuvre.
We are where we are on public finances. Some very poor policy decisions by the incumbent government over the years have left public finances drained. We are left both with higher taxes and worse services.
We spent a decade trying to recover from the consequences of the GFC, not just the bank subsidies but, much more importantly, the loss of a significant part of our tax base. We were just about getting things back in balance when Covid came along and blew everything apart again. And then we have had the fuel crisis where the government have admittedly overreacted.
Your generality of "poor policy decisions" is, in my view, simply wrong. The government has done what it had to do to bring spending and sustainable tax back into line. We are not there yet. A Labour government would have done something very similar, no doubt seeking to spend just a little more and borrow and tax a little more but these differences would be at the margins and would be paid for by higher interest rates. There are no simple answers to the state we are in.
The austerity policy failed in its primary purpose of balancing the books. The UK also did relatively poorly coming out of the GFC compared with peers. Disclosure: I supported the policy at the time for the reasons you give but have to change my view when confronted with compelling evidence.
The government was also responsible for Brexit with opportunity loss in revenue of tens of billions of pounds per year party analysis.
Also a poor economic response on Covid and the Trussterfuck.
Overall a very poor record on public finances.
The initial austerity programme was probably essential, after all Darling was proposing much the same in 2010 GE too. The problem was continuing it too long.
The King's Fund report on the NHS is worth reading in full:
re @MikeSmithson sorry to hear that - spines are tricky as fuck to sort as I'm sure you will have been told umpteen times.
As for private of bloody course you are going to go private. Trusting the NHS with something like that would be madness.
Individuals might or might not say they do; institutionally of course they would say they do but actually the NHS doesn't care at all about health outcomes. It is a machine that feeds people in at one end and watches them emerge at the other. Whether you are successful or not is a lottery. I think the odds are not completely mad, let's say - sticks finger in air - you have an 80-85% chance of success. That is far below your chances going private.
That is as helpful as saying that private hospitals are only concerned about profits, and guessing outcomes rather begs the question. Almost all private doctors in this country also work for the NHS. It's not as if one group has bigger brains than the other lot.
Anyone watching The Diplomat (no spoilers, obvs - I'm on ep.5).
About a situation in Iran (amongst other things) and all this talk about evacuating people from Sudan has blurred the distinction between fact and fiction and I am reading news from Sudan and applying The Diplomat's backstories to it.
Done the whole thing.
Part of its skilfulness is the way it succesfully interweaves contemporary events, places and characters (their characteristics if not names) into its fabric. Quite unsettling if engrossing.
Of course the RN having an operational, combat-ready carrier stretches credibility a bit.
Comments
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12007615/Rishi-Sunaks-police-escort-compared-scene-NORTH-KOREA-officers-jog-motorcade.html?ito=native_share_article-nativemenubutton
Either way, it needs closing down somehow, because it's consistent with the common prejudice about Rishi, that he doesn't get how normal people live, only squillionaire bankers.
See also his talk of "Unicorn Kingdom" yesterday. Great if you know what financiers mean by a unicorn, but otherwise dumb.
https://thecritic.co.uk/my-little-unicorn/
In my experience there are things that the NHS does better than Germany. For example, over Easter in England I fell and hurt my wrist. I went to the local minor injuries unit, was seen by a nurse who sent me for an x-ray, then looked at my x-ray, said there was nothing obvious that needed treatment sent me on my way with a printout of notes in English and German and splint to wear. I was in and out of there in less than an hour. A CD with my x-rays was sent to my Mum's address the next day, so I could take a copy to Germany.
In Germany I would have had to go to the equivalent of A&E, probably waited many hours, and would have had to be seen by a doctor before getting an x-ray.
On the other hand, the nurse in England recommended that I get another x-ray done in a week as sometimes things don't show up. We asked about an MRI but it seemed that would be impossible. So when I got back to Germany I popped into my GP, she gave me a prescription for an MRI, and I made an appointment for the same week. What's a bit funny is that in Germany I have to wait for the MRI people to give me a CD of the MRI which I then have to take to whoever I decide I want to look at it. At this point I cheated and got my wife to show it to a colleague.
Anyway definitely easier to get an MRI in Germany than in England, and if you look at the numbers of MRI machines per capita (supposedly about 5x as many in Germany) you can see why. Whether this is a good use of resources I don't know. Perhaps not.
https://twitter.com/EuromaidanPress/status/1650761560166649857
Ukrainian forces establish a 20-km bridgehead on the Russian-occupied eastern bank of the Dnipro River, which gives them more freedom to launch sabotage and reconnaissance missions, and may assist in the main phase of the upcoming counteroffensive
Your generality of "poor policy decisions" is, in my view, simply wrong. The government has done what it had to do to bring spending and sustainable tax back into line. We are not there yet. A Labour government would have done something very similar, no doubt seeking to spend just a little more and borrow and tax a little more but these differences would be at the margins and would be paid for by higher interest rates. There are no simple answers to the state we are in.
"Mr Johnson, who is widely credited with delivering the slim majority for Brexit, is said to have walked around his living room “looking ashen-faced and distraught”, muttering: “What the hell is happening? ... Oh s***, we’ve got no plan.
“We haven’t thought about it. I didn’t think it would happen. Holy c***, what will we do?”.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/we-ve-got-no-plan-what-will-we-do-boris-johnson-shock-at-brexit-result-revealed-in-new-book/ar-AA1ahKeY?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=d071652dce87419d9afb0950de7e9843&ei=58
Though with most of the current lot, that would still be a tough question.
I do have the context to it though, which was that they had to get the PM’s car through a large group of protestors at the weekend. The sort of protestors who have been gluing themselves to roads and disrupting sporting events. There was a specific threat to the PM. The majority of the police there don’t look much like the armed Special Branch, who usually do this work.
The usual PM convoy is remarkably small for a head of government. 5 cars and 4 motorbikes normally in London, with the bikes running ahead holding traffic. https://youtube.com/watch?v=v6hPz48zrJU
https://www.severe-weather.eu/global-weather/forecast-trend-polar-vortex-stratospheric-warming-cold-anomaly-spring-united-states-canada-europe-fa/
Weirdly I can deal better with weather when I have a sound explanation for it being shit. Same with flight delays, if they tell me why it’s delayed I don’t get so annoyed as I can try to rationalise it.
Perhaps it started with someone saying - wouldn't it be a good idea/green/eco-friendly to have a bicycle escort and then someone said well it would look silly having just one and then someone else said well if there are bicycles then we need policemen on foot to protect them and then....and then....
I can only believe the engagement was happening down the road. It's not as if the cavalcade thus constituted could have nipped down the A413 to go to an engagement at Chequers. Even Oxford Street would have been a stretch.
Plus they all look so serious, those that aren't out of breath and can manage a voluntary facial expression.
As we saw during the pandemic, with the daily press conferences. Not one mainstream news organisation ever thought to switch out the political journalist for a science, medicine, or statistical journalist.
Unfortunately we’ve been governed by overconfident, over-promoted mediocrities for years now, in a government whose chief concerns have been ‘optics’ and self-enrichment.
Then I had a fall which made everything worse.
By July I was using a walking aid, and by September it was a wheelchair. Fortunately I managed to get an NHS appointment in mid-September and an operation to relieve the diagnosed pressure on my cervical spinal cord. Recovery is a slow business but, apart from a couple of irritating glitches the NHS has looked after me well.
I don’t expect to ever walk again, but the latest physiotherapist suggests that I might be able to drive again ‘one day’!
At the moment nothing below my neck works as it should!
Mike, I really hope that after treatment you’re in a better place than I am!
The news just now said people on the ground had been told to make their own way to the airport north of Khartoum. That doesn’t sound great.
"However, it is important here to remember two things: first, campaigns pick their own delegates; second, Democrat Party rules give campaigns effective veto power over their delegates. This means that if Biden were to drop out before the convention, his campaign would have the power to control who all of his delegates vote for – in essence allowing Biden to hand-pick his own replacement as the Democrat nominee, all without any input from voters."
IIUC the campaigns choose who the delegates would be, but once they're selected they can vote as they like. What's the specific mechanism by which they could control who the delegates vote for?
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/apr/25/rishi-sunak-urged-to-condemn-invective-against-civil-service-unleashed-by-dominic-raab
...It comes amid concern among senior civil servants that Raab has been allowed to publicly traduce those who were subjected to his bullying behaviour, including the British ambassador to Spain, Hugh Elliott.
Some within Whitehall believe that James Cleverly, the foreign secretary, should publicly stand up for Elliott, who remains a high-profile diplomat, given that he is unable to speak out himself.
There is also disquiet about the fact that Sunak allowed Raab to resign as deputy prime minister and release a 1,000-word defence of his behaviour before the official report was published, and dismay that Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, has not been more robust in standing up for the complainants within the civil service...
My favourite is giving their shop managers a target to reduce paid hours. Methods include - if enough volunteers come in on the day, cancel the paid workers shift then and there.
So telling a person on minimum wage - “no work today” on no notice.
As a NeonNaziCapitalistImperialistEnslaverOfTheOppressed, I find that a bit much.
Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Ohm were driving when the police pulls them over.
'Do you know how fast you were going?'
Heisenberg replies: 'No but I know exactly where I am.'
'You were doing 55 mph.'
'Great, now I am lost.'
The policeman decides to check the car out and orders the boot to be opened.
'You have a dead cat here'
'We do now' complains Schrodinger.
The policeman decides to arrest them. Ohm resists.
This level of demand for health services is simply unsustainable. @malcolmg is right that we must find ways of doing more preventative work but above all we must take more responsibility for our own health (says the 61 year old man carrying an excess 15kg who drinks about double the recommended maximum and cannot resist a cake for love nor money).
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/apr/24/he-ought-to-go-on-a-course-how-voters-in-dominic-raabs-seat-see-him
What you really want is to look at the median wait for certain categories of ill health and procedures like initial consultations, diagnostics, surgery, post-operative care and so on. Lumping things together to get one big number rarely tells us anything useful as it mixes in a whole load of different things of varying importance.
Focusing on the "big number" can make an organisation take the easy route to reduce it, and as a consequence neglect the most important cases.
The point mainly is to show people what their care costs. The biggest flaw for me right now is that too many fail to understand the consequences and costs of their actions. Seeing a GP is 'free', except there is a cost behind it. Cancer medication is 'free' except it costs potentially tens of thousands a year. Getting a knee replaced is 'free', yet the true cost is in 5 figures.
Go to the vet - costs you significant money. My poor dog has a low grade tumour - chemo is going to be around 400 to 500 a month until she is no longer with us.
In the NHS you wouldn't know this. At the vets your credit card burns...
If you knew your GP appointment cost say 40 quid, you wouldn't miss it.
What is needed is surey some kind of carnival float, loaded with cops able to jump off and engage at a moment's notice, or just distract protestors so much they forget what they're about
For example:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/04/25/uk-announces-full-evacuation-plan-on-military-flights-sudan/
https://www.datadictionary.nhs.uk/classes/waiting_list.html
And I agree that's silly. I had to wait a month for a cataract op - it didn't even occur to me as a problem. When the much-maligned Brown brought waiting times down to 18 weeks for everything (and 2 wweeks for cancer and similar), I felt that was fine, no need to do more.
But I agree that demand for private care is soaring as people are faced with waiting times of 2 years+, and I don't blame them - in the end you do need to look after yourself if you can, while favouring a tax and care system that makes that possible for everyone. Under Brown the private companies did have a major profits drop, because most people no longer saw any point in paying to get a procedure a couple of weeks faster.
Our media is pathetic.
Whoever wins the next election, he’ll be toast.
There are fantastic charities, large and small. The good small ones (the Little Snoring Duck Pond Preservation Society type) don't require the same sort of regulation as Oxfam.
The charities which both take vast sums off the taxpayer (and hide this from donors) and have a bloated over paid career structure need sorting out.
As do the charities that keep telling government what to do rather than providing that service.
But some small ones do need overseeing. The animal charities that exist in so many places to provide a wage for the founder from sentimental donors for looking after a few dogs and cats.
On the plus side, the best function of some charities is to provide the best bookshop by far in many towns.
Greater emphasis on cooking, food and nutrition in schools
Greater emphasis on sport and other physical actitivies in schools
Low cost access to the above for those who have left school
Tax schemes to incentivise food manufactures and supermarkets to encourage healthier food
Controls on advertising for addictive and unhealthy foods.
For silly ideological reasons the right are very reluctant to tackle the above list of easy wins that would make our nation happier and healthier and instead obsess about trying to game the economy in search of 0.2% extra GDP rises that are much harder to achieve, and they fail to deliver anyway.
Something about Faraday getting caged....
It’s one thing to send a handful of SAS to rescue a few dozen from the embassy, but a different order of magnitude to sort out transport for thousands of people.
There’s military aircraft from all over Europe, Mid East, and the US, heading for Khartoum now, they’ve got three days to get as many foreigners out as possible. The Americans estimate 16,000 of their own, four times as many as the Brits. Many of the European countries only have dozens of people, and have accomodated Brits on their flights out yesterday. Well done to everyone involved.
In a subsection of it, CAMHS is in near-collapse. Getting a child diagnosed and obtaining help takes months or even years. SEND provision is hard to obtain. And quite a few people are impacted by this or related to those who are badly impacted by this. The helplessness and rage you feel as a parent when this happens can't be overstated.
I have no idea if such a plan existed or didn't so don't take my post as proof that they just started planning yesterday!
Really this is to make sure he gets the support he needs in school, but in the government’s less-than-perfect reforms to SEN, schools have far less discretion in self-diagnosing support via School Action/SA+ - he needs the EHC which, entirely predictably as an inter-agency enterprise, is a truly Homeric journey through a variety of inexplicable and contradictory nonsense. Another bit of Gove/Classic Dom legacy which has led to unnecessary anguish for thousands.
Hope you can get well soon, Mr. Smithson.
The government was also responsible for Brexit with opportunity loss in revenue of tens of billions of pounds per year party analysis.
Also a poor economic response on Covid and the Trussterfuck.
Overall a very poor record on public finances.
As for private of bloody course you are going to go private. Trusting the NHS with something like that would be madness.
Individuals might or might not say they do; institutionally of course they would say they do but actually the NHS doesn't care at all about health outcomes. It is a machine that feeds people in at one end and watches them emerge at the other. Whether you are successful or not is a lottery. I think the odds are not completely mad, let's say - sticks finger in air - you have an 80-85% chance of success. That is far below your chances going private.
Physics gives me a Hadron.
About a situation in Iran (amongst other things) and all this talk about evacuating people from Sudan has blurred the distinction between fact and fiction and I am reading news from Sudan and applying The Diplomat's backstories to it.
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2023/04/22/business/ukraine-pacific-trade-deal/
The UK forces don't have such a surplus, or even sufficiency of resources, that they can guarantee to have exactly what is needed at an instant's notice. It's much more likely that the plan will have to be furiously wanked out given what's available. Hence the rather bizarre mixed A400M/C-130J operation on this week's "Khartoum Express". That's what they had that was currently working so that's what the plan was.
The King's Fund report on the NHS is worth reading in full:
https://twitter.com/TheKingsFund/status/1646041711506751490?t=eEUe3yesCGC6fEiTUQ8xYA&s=19
ETA: Gawd, this could go on all day - we've not even started on the quarks yet. Sorry everyone. Or can we blame kjh?
Part of its skilfulness is the way it succesfully interweaves contemporary events, places and characters (their characteristics if not names) into its fabric. Quite unsettling if engrossing.
Of course the RN having an operational, combat-ready carrier stretches credibility a bit.
The big question however is what replaces it. My gut says very slim Labour majority. But a healthier one and a HP are all entirely plausible.