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Do you believe the NHS is safe in Tory hands after Brexit?

will the NHS be safe from further privatisation under a post Brexit Tory governement?

  • Yes

    Votes: 16 17.4%

  • No

    Votes: 76 82.6%
  • Total voters
    92
lazycat said:
It's easy. Folk need to pay more tax. Everyone. Decent services cost money. Don't expect a politician to say that tho'.
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Quite probably, though govt needs to get spending priorities in order, which is part of why we need a change of govt.

A greater amount of money is diverted from the public purse to the private sector in return for poor value under a tory govt than should be the case. This needs sorting.

The correct tax due needs to be collected from ‘the big guys’ as well as the ‘little guys’.

Govt spending needs to be examined as a whole, the money is there for decent public services, including care services.

All of this is obvious, imo.

First result from a bing on care...
https://www.which.co.uk/later-life-care/financing-care/care-home-finance/care-home-fees-akdbv8k3kwln
 
fatmarley said:
Regardless of whether the NHS will be privatised. We all know it's gradually going downhill, and in the end, that will force people to go private.
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Yes but, is it being deliberately run down to make it more attractive (read cheap) to outside bidders?
A quick heads up just in case no one else has noticed this Channel 4 programme Tonight
DispatchesEpisodesS18 E24 · Trump's Plan for the NHS

 
It’ll take more than that to make council run care homes acceptable.

when we needed a care home for mother in law the council run ones here weren’t fit for a dog.
 
Bob McC said:
It’ll take more than that to make council run care homes acceptable.

when we needed a care home for mother in law the council run ones here weren’t fit for a dog.
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If you think that's difficult - try finding care for someone who isn't old or suffering from dementia.
 
Brian said:
I think you need to consider what people mean when they refer to ‘privatisation of the NHS’. Farming out certain services to the private sector may sometimes make sense and is not on its own ‘privatising the NHS’.
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For me - and I’ll declare an interest as someone who works in a private sector healthcare provider - this is the key thing. There is a sort of instant allergy to the idea of any non-state involvement in the NHS.

And yet the first point of contract most have is either with a GP (who holds a series of contracts with the NHS and aims to profit from them) or a pharmacist, who does exactly the same.

And yet I don’t hear a great deal of discord about the value those roles play. Neither of whom charge the patient for their (NHS contracted) services.

So is it about profit being made from the delivery of services into the NHS or is it about users having to pay in addition to their tax contributions?

The left refer to “privatise” in the broadest sense because the purist line is that profit = bad. And the right neatly sidestep by referring to healthcare being “free at the point of use”.

I’m certain that it must remain free at the point of use. Whether we can afford that and need to up our contributions, who knows?

And I’m not convinced that excluding cost - or more accurately, value for money - from publicly procured contracts where “hardworking taxpayers’” money is being spent is exactly a bad thing - the public money goes further..!

Anyway - what do we mean by “private”?
 
Compare the voting record of the leaders of the 3 main parties on privatisation of the NHS

Compare the voting record of the leaders of the 3 main parties on provision of care for disabled etc

Discuss
 
Seeker_UK said:
If you think that's difficult - try finding care for someone who isn't old or suffering from dementia.
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she was 97 and didn’t know who her own daughter was.

It was dead men’s shoes getting a place at somewhere that would take her in the end.

And when we did find a place they did not tell us about the 12 week disregard for fees until I brought it up and the contract they expected my wife and I to sign guaranteed that we would personally make up the difference in fees once the proceeds from her her house sale had gone!
I struck it out and reported them.
 
Oh the joys of American medicine. I had a screening colonoscopy nearly 3 weeks ago. As part of Obamacare this is supposedly a covered preventative benefit once you turn 50 (once every 10 years). However stories abound of insurers wriggling out of paying so before I went I checked that the
- facility
- gastroenterologist
- anesthetist
were all part of my covered network (doctors and anesthetists can be in-network when they work at one in network facility, but out of network at another in-network facility, so you have to ask very carefully). I checked on BlueCross's national provider finder, and I called the providers directly and asked them to check.

Insurance refuses to pay and I'm looking at $5500 of bills. I call the insurance company - bills are denied because providers are out of network. I have them go check their online provider network. Oh, you're right sir, they are in network - let me look into it. They had a computer "glitch" that classified all providers as out of network and denied the charges. They will reprocess the claims. Fast forward to today - two charges still under review, two still showing I owe the full amount. I call again. Their screen shows 3 of the charges were reprocesed and I owe $0 - great if true, but I know not to trust what insurance agents tell me over the phone. The 4th bill was not a covered service (polyp removal - I googled the billing code) and I owe $1450. Hmm - I mention polyp removal is a key part of colonoscopy - how come it's not covered? Another 5 minutes of silence and "this was also flagged as out of network in error - I will resubmit for payment". I have been advised to wait 2 weeks and call them again.

This was for a routine preventative service - imagine the hours you'd spend on the phone if you were really sick and regularly going for appointments.
And my company pays the best part of $20k a year for this supposedly excellent insurance.
 
Channel 4 Dispatches last night has been mentioned in another thread, but feel it deserves to be put here too.

There has been much talk about privatisation, but this thread is asking a broader question, if the NHS safe in Tory hands? If the Dipatches programme, 'Trumps plans for the NHS', is anything to go by, the answer is a resounding 'NO'. It seems that even if we are not offering Trump the NHS for privatisation, we are offering it to him as a cash cow by entering into secret talks to agree buying all our NHS drugs from US Big Pharma. The cost of buying branded drugs from US Drug companies, rather than buying generic drugs, will add an additional £500m per week onto the NHS budget.

£500m

How much did it say we were going to gain on the side of that bus?
 
ks.234 said:
Channel 4 Dispatches last night has been mentioned in another thread, but feel it deserves to be put here too.

There has been much talk about privatisation, but this thread is asking a broader question, if the NHS safe in Tory hands? If the Dipatches programme, 'Trumps plans for the NHS', is anything to go by, the answer is a resounding 'NO'. It seems that even if we are not offering Trump the NHS for privatisation, we are offering it to him as a cash cow by entering into secret talks to agree buying all our NHS drugs from US Big Pharma. The cost of buying branded drugs from US Drug companies, rather than buying generic drugs, will add an additional £500m per week onto the NHS budget.

£500m

How much did it say we were going to gain on the side of that bus?
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I hope you won’t confuse me with a tory apologist by saying this.

Much like the costs of EU membership that should consider benefits in the opposite direction, perhaps even this inept govt would negotiate something of benefit to the UK in return for agreeing such a deal?

Whatever though, the answer to the thread question is no, the NHS is not safe from a tory govt regardless of brexit.
 
Its a little worrying that as I type this, from a sample of 72 responses, 10 think the NHS is safe with the Tories despite the evidence to the contrary.
 
Brian said:
I hope you won’t confuse me with a tory apologist by saying this.

Much like the costs of EU membership that should consider benefits in the opposite direction, perhaps even this inept govt would negotiate something of benefit to the UK in return for agreeing such a deal?

Whatever though, the answer to the thread question is no, the NHS is not safe from a tory govt regardless of brexit.
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Sorry, struggling to think what would compensate for £500m a week flying from the NHS to the US. Nothing that will be of benefit to our public services or the ordinary people of this country, on that you can be sure
 
A sorry state of affairs. Mr Loach should make a film about it when Brexit is up and running... on three wheels. Remember those cars? :D
 
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