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The NHS is very efficient
We now have more bureaucrats and administrators in the NHS than we have hospital beds.
- Nick Clegg, campaigning in London, 3 May 2010
To me this would imply that we are not as highly efficient as you seem to think.
Or that nick clegg is talking balderdash. Teh NHS is far more than inpatient hospitals and infact inpatinet beds have been falling for decades as treaments become more effective and efficinet
Continual reorganising has lead to higher admin costs but the last comparison I wsaw was that NHS admin costs were half of those of the german healthcare system - mainly due to the simple funding in the UK. Teh picture will not be so good in England now due to political nonsense - foundation trusts for example
We now have more bureaucrats and administrators in my doctor surgery than we have Doctors
well they have admin staff to answer the phone who work PT so there are more of them than Dr, one who deals with general admin for the whole centre , centre manager etc. It makes a good headline but what can be done as they need a lot of support to free up doctors to do their job. Would you prefer the Dr answers the phone and books appointments to reduce admin and bureaucracy or just treat people ?
Or that nick clegg is talking balderdash.
Factcheck seem to disagree but don't let that get in your way.
It is weird that all of the people I know who work for the NHS seem to bitch about it all the time but when someone else criticises it they leap to it's defence. It is similar to the way that parents treat their kids.
Someone recently said that the NHS is the closest thing we have to a national religion and it would appear TJ that you are an evangelist. The thing is that health provision should not be an emotional affair, it should be guided by reason and good accounting.
From an article in the Telegraph in 2008:
NHS productivity fell by 2.0 per cent a year between 2001 and 2005, according to the Centre for the Measurement of Government Activity, the ONS unit that monitors public spending. That was the period of the biggest funding increase in NHS history.From 2005 to 2006, productivity fell less quickly, by 0.2 per cent.
From 1995 to 2006, the NHS annual budget more than doubled from £39 billion to £89.7 billion.
As I said before, I am no fan of the Tories but to hear you lot bleat on about Labour as if it were all okay before the coalition was formed just makes me laugh.
It is a perfect example of fitting the world to your viewpoint rather than adjusting your viewpoint to fit the world.
Reason and good accounting eh
There are simple reasons why productivity in that crude measure fell
1) More flexibility = more waste. Long waiting times mean you can plan to use 100% of resources. want to be flexible you cannot as you need to leave capacity spare to create the flexibility
2) improvements in care. Spend more on treating one patient with a better outcome it appears as lower productivity
You see on healthcare I like facts and evidence based practice not cant and propaganda - and I have no time for some of Labours policies on healthcare either
The thing is that health provision should not be an emotional affair, it should be guided by reason and good accounting.
Good accounting? Is that why the NHS needs all those managers?
1) More flexibility = more waste. Long waiting times mean you can plan to use 100% of resources. want to be flexible you cannot as you need to leave capacity spare to create the flexibility
That is interesting and I am sure in some measure true but to more than double the spending and not see a considerable productivity gain is a propagandists wet dream and rightly so.
Do you not understand - [b]output[/b] increased greatly - [b]productivity [/b]fell for the two reasons I put.
Those two measures actually have little meaning in the context of healthcare. Price of everything and value of nothing.
£four trillion debt any one? borrowing money we have no chance of paying back anyone? its a cumulative effect. labour put us in this position then obviously pulled the wool over every ones eye with quantative easing (or borrowing on top of the massive debt we've already accumulated). by the way i didn't vote tory. i voted bnp (joking) it was UKIP (still joking). tandem jeremy for nick griffins position; i think you'ld make a good politician. 😆
We could bat statistics back and forth all day I am sure, but from what I have read and what I have seen, the labour government poured money into the NHS and for every 100 they put in they got 10 back out. Healthcare has improved but not in the order of magnitude of expenditure.
Anyways, this has nowt to do with a double dip recession so I shall at this point bow out of this exchange.
TJ - Serious question - Are you, by any chance, Polly Toynbee's next door neighbour?
Its just that I read her articles in the Guardian and the country she lives in seems fantastic. Its a socialist utopia built by Gordon and Tony.
Judging from your posts, you must live there too. Just the two of you. You and Polly. I wish I did. It sounds great. The country I live in is nothing like that at all unfortunately 🙁
yes but your country has Hora ...every cloud has asilver lining
So there you go- Tories the party of high tax, by a country mile.
I'm not sure that it is fair to describe it as "by a country mile". Yes maybe if you look at the whole picture taxation is a bit higher under the Tory governments than under Labour governments, but I'm sure some would want to argue that there are mitigating circumstances to explain this fact.
What is absolutely indisputable is that the Tories are NOT the party of low tax, despite the almost universally believed myth - even some on the left fall for that one.
And something else which is also false, is the other universally believed myth that the Tories are the party of low government spending. If you look at public spending as percentage of GDP between 1979 and 1997 when the Tories were in government, you will see that it averages [i]over[/i] 40%. In the period between 1997 and 2010 when Labour were in power, it averages [i]below[/i] 40%.
The claim that the Tories are the party of low taxation and low public spending, whilst labour are the party of high taxation and high public spending, is a complete, but very successful, myth.
And we are witnessing the creation of a completely new myth today - the myth that Labour are the party of budgetary deficits, whilst the Tories on the other hand are the party of budgetary balances.
In the period since the end of the second world war Britain has almost always experienced budgetary deficits. Even throughout the 1950s, a period when the British people were famously told by a Conservative prime minister "you've never had it so good" Britain had budget deficits.
There has only been 4 occasions since the end of WW2 when Britain [i]hasn't[/i] had budget deficits. 3 of those occasions occurred under Labour governments. Only once since the end of the War has Britain not had a budget deficit under the Tories. Despite the fact that he Tories have been in power most of that time.
The problem for the Tories is that they are not generally seen as the party which naturally serves the interests of ordinary people, that role has been historically been associated with the Labour Party.
The Tories however need to win general elections, if they are to serve the interests of the wealthiest sections of society. So they have very successfully, with the help of their billionaire buddies in the media, created myths which say that whilst Labour might have the best intentions, it is [i]they[/i] who can manage the economy best. And that ultimately benefits everyone (trickle-down economics as Ronald Reagan called it)
It is a common perception amongst working class people, that despite the fact that they don't like the Tories, the Tories [i]must[/i] be better at managing a capitalist economy - they are after all capitalists themselves.
There is a certain amount of logic there, however, actual facts prove this to be false. The problem with capitalism is capitalism itself. So for capitalism to work best, it requires governments which accept the failings of capitalism - something which is more likely to come from a Labour government.
And it is for this reason that the interventionist economic policies of John Maynard Keynes have historically been so successful. Keynes was not a socialist btw. It is also precisely for this reason that we are in mess today - decades of a deluded belief that capitalism and the markets always know best.
Binners - no I live in the real world not the world of tory (or labour) propaganda. For example - crime - down dramatically and significantly under labour. Its not what the propaganda sheets would have you believe but there is no doubt this is true.
I repeatedly say that many of the policies of Labour are not to my liking, that I don't always vote labour.
However I do live in the real world where I can see the results of increased healthcare spending.
With that I too will bow out as we are a long way from the original premise which has bee so succinctly put to bed by Ernie.
TandemJeremy - Member
"Reason and good accounting eh
There are simple reasons why productivity in that crude measure fell
2) improvements in care. Spend more on treating one patient with a better outcome it appears as lower productivity"
This is the one that boils my blood... When I broke my hip, I was given a very modern treatment which was a lot more complex than the traditional hip replacement and increased my hospital time. It also increased the physio time enormously, and chances are there'll be more surgery and more physio at some point. So that's inefficient apparently. But the reason there was so much more physio, is that a hip replacement would have had no real possibility of a full recovery, whereas with the in-situ traction methods it's possible to have almost a normal functioning, durable leg.
So it's [i]inefficient[/i] but it's lifechanging. I'd not be posting on here if I'd had a full hip replacement I reckon because it's not likely I'd be riding bikes. And I'm hardly alone. So screw your inefficiency- modern medicine is more complex, more expensive, often more time consuming and far, far better.
This made me laugh this morning
[img] 
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😀
As I said before, I am no fan of the Tories but to hear you lot bleat on about Labour as if it were all okay before the coalition was formed just makes me laugh.
It is a perfect example of fitting the world to your viewpoint rather than adjusting your viewpoint to fit the world.
No, new Labour were in most ways a huge dissapointment, and I didnt vote for them last time. They did do a few good things though.
The new government has done a few good things too, but mostly really awful things.
[url= http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/jan/26/george-soros-david-cameron-recession ] George Soros tells David Cameron: change direction or face recession[/url]
So thats the outgoing Head of the CBI, A nobel prize winning economist and now a man who makes fortunes on the markets all telling Osbourne athat he is wrong. Quite a bit of economic expertise there compared to Osbournes 🙄
TandemJeremy - MemberGeorge Soros tells David Cameron: change direction or face recession
So thats the outgoing Head of the CBI, A nobel prize winning economist and now a man who makes fortunes on the markets all telling Osbourne athat he is wrong. Quite a bit of economic expertise there compared to Osbournes
I think he might as well resign if he needs to listen to all those "experts". He should have a bet with them to see if they can run the economy properly.
As a leader he can either listen to everyone who thinks s/he is an expert or run it his own way. The decision is his so good or bad he must live by it.
The rest of the so-called financial/economy experts ... why not be a politician and stand for an election to change things for good rather trying to look clever?
🙄
Well said, Northwind.
The rest of the so-called financial/economy experts ... why not be a politician and stand for an election to change things for good rather trying to look clever?
Because George Soros has worked his way from being a waiter, to become the 35th richest man in the world (despite giving £millions away) solely by speculating and working the financial markets - something he could not have done if he had been merely a politician ?
To be fair though, George Soros is passionately against free-market neo-liberalism - he coined the phrase "market fundamentalists", so I would hardly expect him to be supporting David Cameron's economic gobbledygook.
So it's inefficient but it's lifechanging. I'd not be posting on here if I'd had a full hip replacement I reckon because it's not likely I'd be riding bikes. And I'm hardly alone. So screw your inefficiency- modern medicine is more complex, more expensive, often more time consuming and far, far better.
Great to hear. Personally I am happy to pay more tax to hear more stories like that.
George Soros has worked his way from being a waiter, to become the 35th richest man in the world (despite giving £millions away) solely by speculating and working the financial markets - something he could not have done if he had been merely a politician ?
we should establish whether he has a "short" position on the UK economy before giving him air time. Or does that not matter as long as he agrees with your point?
I repeatedly say that many of the policies of Labour are not to my liking, that I don't always vote labour.
who else UKIP? 😉
Time, again, for my favourite Radio 4 quote of recent times....
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"The Tories - Putting the N into Cuts"
The problem as I see it is that the standard economic cycle is screwed up! You need two terms with the Tories to get the Economy back on its feet and then one term of Labour to spend everything that has been saved. Then the Tories are supposed to get back in to sort everything out again and this was messed up when Labour won a second and third term. It's all about balance.
Add another leading economic authority to the list of those saying the government is getting it wrong.
I preferred the article in the Reuters release. According to Reuters the National Institute for Economic and Social Research, which they describe as "non-partisan" has stated :
[i][b]"The reason why there is a bias towards a spending-based consolidation in the UK ... is not because it's optimal in some sense, but because some politicians have a desire for a smaller state" [/b][/i]
So there you have it, the cuts have nothing at all to do with the state of the economy and are primarily driven by idealogical considerations - but we already knew that didn't we ?
They also said :
[i][b]"There is no real evidence recently that spending-based consolidations are more effective than tax-based consolidations, at least in advanced European economies"[/b][/i]
So in other words the Tory/LibDem 80/20 percent argument, ie 80% in cuts and 20% in tax increases, is simply just bollox.
Finally they say :
[b][i]NIESR forecast that unemployment would rise further in 2011, peaking at 8.8 percent of the workforce in the third quarter. Due to lasting damage from the financial crisis, it was unlikely to fall below 6 percent in the long run compared to an underlying rate of 5 percent beforehand.
Real disposable income would also fall to a five-year low by the end of 2011 due to limited wage increases, higher taxes and inflation [/i][/b]
It's gonna be grim ............ best demo on 26 March and try and stop the ****ers then. And don't believe that the coalition isn't for turning - they are if public opposition is big enough. But obviously not if they think they can get away with it.
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2011/02/01/uk-britain-economy-niesr-idUKTRE71001D20110201?pageNumber=2