General Election 12 December.

[nightrider 13]

2 hours ago, alchresearch said:

What about the old lie that Labour have been bandying about for decades - "Tories want to privatise the NHS". "Tories want to get rid of the NHS" and so on?  Selling it to the USA is just another.

I don't think they want to sell it to the USA - they just want to encourage/make it easier for US companies to bid to provide services to the NHS.

[apelike 10]

2 hours ago, melthebell said:

Think you need to watch a few interview clips from the past few years, it has been mentioned and not by labour, farage and Trump have both mentioned wanting to privatise it to mention 2

As pointed out when that comment was made before.. Farage never ever said such a thing as wanting to privatise the NHS. As for Trump?

[apelike 10]

1 hour ago, nightrider said:

I don't think they want to sell it to the USA - they just want to encourage/make it easier for US companies to bid to provide services to the NHS.

Which is already happening in England and Scotland so nothing new but makes a good sound bite come election time.

[Anna B 1,401]

Many services both to the NHS and others are already 'outsourced' through companies like Virgincare and Bupa. 

 

Matt Hancock, (Tory Health Minister) is already on the board and promoting a company (sorry can't remember what it's called,) that uses digital doctors, which according to a Panorama programme (?) takes funding from NHS GP services and provides less than satisfactory service to users via private company apps .

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/aug/20/gp-algorithm-nhs-health-screening

Bupa https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/aug/15/creeping-privatisation-nhs-official-data-owen-smith-outsourcing.

 

 

Edited December 9, 2019 by Anna B

[Baron99 778]

The old adage that the bookies very rarely get it wrong. 

 

Today, see one of the online bookies are offering a current spread bet, (& they'll have done their homework) of 343 to 349 seats for the Conservatives. 

Edited December 9, 2019 by Baron99

[Michael_W 11]

1 hour ago, Anna B said:

Many services both to the NHS and others are already 'outsourced' through companies like Virgincare and Bupa. 

 

Matt Hancock, (Tory Health Minister) is already on the board and promoting a company (sorry can't remember what it's called,) that uses digital doctors, which according to a Panorama programme (?) takes funding from NHS GP services and provides less than satisfactory service to users via private company apps .

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/aug/20/gp-algorithm-nhs-health-screening

Bupa https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/aug/15/creeping-privatisation-nhs-official-data-owen-smith-outsourcing.

 

 

Interesting all this propaganda about the NHS, the Tory candidate in my area for the upcoming election is an NHS doctor and with that background I reckon that he is probably just as experienced in whats going on in reality than the labour candidate Ms Louise Haigh but because we still put red rosettes on donkey's in this city she will take some shifting.

[Albert the Cat 0]

17 minutes ago, CaptainSwing said:

The NHS is a public service, not an "enterprise" in the business sense.

 

If "enterprise" is one of the first words that pops into people's heads when they think of the NHS, the propaganda campaign of the last 40 years really has been successful.  The ultimate goal of propaganda is to mould people's linguistic/conceptual frameworks so that they can't even think or express a viewpoint contrary to that of the propagandist, or at least can't formulate or express a thought without it being in the terms dictated by the propagandist.

You what? If you think single words somehow define things into absolute constants, then you need hardening up to beyond a snowflake. 
 

Thinking of the NHS as an entity that needs to be costed and run like a business is THE first step in protecting. It costs nearly £130bn/yr to run it, it isn’t some bottomless pit that you just throw money into. Why do you think organisations like NICE exist? If you don’t see the problem then you wouldn’t know how to solve it. For me, the bottom line is, you need to raise taxes. A 1% increase in income tax, NI or VAT will give the government about £5bn extra in each instance. We need to commit more if you want to keep it. 

[Anna B 1,401]

49 minutes ago, Albert the Cat said:

You what? If you think single words somehow define things into absolute constants, then you need hardening up to beyond a snowflake. 
 

Thinking of the NHS as an entity that needs to be costed and run like a business is THE first step in protecting. It costs nearly £130bn/yr to run it, it isn’t some bottomless pit that you just throw money into. Why do you think organisations like NICE exist? If you don’t see the problem then you wouldn’t know how to solve it. For me, the bottom line is, you need to raise taxes. A 1% increase in income tax, NI or VAT will give the government about £5bn extra in each instance. We need to commit more if you want to keep it. 

Nobody has said that it doesn't need improvement I think we all agree on that. But a business is run for profit, and profit has no place in the NHS.  Any 'profit' or savings should be ploughed back into the NHS, not given away to shareholders.

 

I've recently spent some time in hospital, and talking to doctors and nurses and various services. They all have suggestions where money can be saved, (I saw plenty,) and how things can be improved, but nobody listens to them. It is all in the hands of administrators who frankly haven't a clue.  And yes, income tax and NI does need to be raised to support it. How did we get into a position where no politician dare state the bleedin' obvious? 

 

Look back pre Thatcher. The system seemed to work fairly well in those days, not just hospitals, but GPs, dentists, home care, care homes and the subsidiary services. And it was all adminstered by far less people. Thatcher introducedTory economics, internal competition, and privatisation by the back door, and the whole system went to pot. I know the demographics and other things have changed since then, but that hardly came as a surprise. She took it in a whole new direction (neoliberalism again...)using language which we lesser mortals didn't really understand because we weren't supposed to, knowing there'd have been a public outcry if we did.  Worked well didn't it?  Look at it now.

I'd rather have National Insurance than Private Insurance any day. NI should have been rising incrementally for years.

 

Incidently, Captain Swing is quite right about language, it does design and inform the way we think. Any linguist will tell you that, and it has long been known as a favoured tool of all propagandists. Re-read my statement about politicians not being able to state the obvious, and think about it.

 

 

Edited December 9, 2019 by Anna B

[*_ash_* 88]

15 minutes ago, Anna B said:

 

 

Look back pre Thatcher. The system seemed to work fairly well in those days, not just hospitals, but GPs, dentists, home care, care homes and the subsidiary services. And it was all adminstered by far less people. Thatcher introducedTory economics, internal competition, and privatisation by the back door, and the whole system went to pot. Re-read my statement about politicians not being able to state the obvious, and think about it.

 

 

thatcher again.

 

The world revolves around Thatcher.

 

I doubt you'll want to watch it. It's learning rather than teaching. I'd recommend to others though.

 

All 15 Lectures in the  'Power and Politics in Today’s World' course at Yale. (All about 1 hour) - the first one is an intro, so worth a watch to see if you interested in more.

 

I'm up to L6 so far.

 

first one, rest can be found from it:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDqvzFY72mg

 

 

 

 

[Flanker7 20]

5 hours ago, Michael_W said:

You forgot the Independant and the leftist social media stuff in your desperation to prove some point about bias, there has always been bias and there always will, even on here, you won't change certain peoples views and they won't change yours !

Perhaps I could add up the circulation figures for both sides that would really show up the amount of 'reach' of each side. 

As you say "You won't change certain peoples views" I agree with you. Your choice of words leaves it open to others who are not 'certain people' who may be influenced by bias. Thank-you. Just because bias has always been there dosen't make it right - unless you are a traditional reactionary who hates anything new, different or an innovation. 

 

I take the information from the Guardian briefing, it wasn't there. It wasn't on the BBC either.

Thats strange! as YOU may think these two biased pinko organisation would twist and promote news to show the left in a good light .

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs/the_papers - not on here.

https://www.thepaperboy.com/uk/front-pages.cfm - at last, here it is.

 

The Independant - "Tactical Voters could deny Johnson majority"

 

BTW - I'm loving your use of 'desperation' not that it's true but it mimics the style of  most of the right wing stuff.

If you don't believe me look at the 'paperboy link' it actually shows how the front pages are presented. 

[Michael_W 11]

1 hour ago, Flanker7 said:

Perhaps I could add up the circulation figures for both sides that would really show up the amount of 'reach' of each side. 

As you say "You won't change certain peoples views" I agree with you. Your choice of words leaves it open to others who are not 'certain people' who may be influenced by bias. Thank-you. Just because bias has always been there dosen't make it right - unless you are a traditional reactionary who hates anything new, different or an innovation. 

 

I take the information from the Guardian briefing, it wasn't there. It wasn't on the BBC either.

Thats strange! as YOU may think these two biased pinko organisation would twist and promote news to show the left in a good light .

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs/the_papers - not on here.

https://www.thepaperboy.com/uk/front-pages.cfm - at last, here it is.

 

The Independant - "Tactical Voters could deny Johnson majority"

 

BTW - I'm loving your use of 'desperation' not that it's true but it mimics the style of  most of the right wing stuff.

If you don't believe me look at the 'paperboy link' it actually shows how the front pages are presented. 

Do you struggle to comprehend anything and everything, biased opinion would of course include your own bias, which of course you clearly have too, or are you going to deny that ?

Counting up circulation figures is all well and good if it's relevant and unbiased itself, what about social media bias which tends to lean to the left, does that not count because the numbers it reaches are too many to count ?

[Mister Gee 812]

3 hours ago, Michael_W said:

Interesting all this propaganda about the NHS, the Tory candidate in my area for the upcoming election is an NHS doctor and with that background I reckon that he is probably just as experienced in whats going on in reality than the labour candidate Ms Louise Haigh but because we still put red rosettes on donkey's in this city she will take some shifting.

I thought you disliked middle class professional types?