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Next Conservative leader |
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GPR - Rochester 
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Joined: 01 December 2014 Location: Rhydcymerau Status: Online Points: 17157 |
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 Posted: 13 December 2022 at 10:20am |
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Hardly comes as a surprise revelation as anyone unfortunate enough to have to use the hospital or indeed the care disservice will testify. If we don't at least try another government at the next election then we collectively deserve what we get.
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Posted: 13 December 2022 at 1:06pm |
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People have been saying for years now that the Tories are deliberately running the NHS down so that the public lose faith in it and they can go to a private health insurance model. But of course, we're "better together" even if it means we're governed by the Tories ... or so some folk say. What do I know?
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dr_martinov
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Joined: 06 August 2005 Location: Tycoch Status: Offline Points: 13226 |
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Posted: 13 December 2022 at 1:34pm |
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It's hard to conclude anything else. Systematically underfund something whilst selling off bits of it then, when it is completely unfit for purpose, sell off the remnants. Possibly even to your own financial backers. Manipulate public support by describing how terrible it is and hope they don't ask quite why that is... It is funny when they say "the money isn't there". The same money that conveniently was there to support tax breaks for the rich recently... or dodgy PPE to cronies... or test and trace run by a cronie... or to cover how much fraud during Covid? But I suppose that's gone now and all that's left is the debt. It is a myth that the Conservatives are good with money and good for the economy. They're not: they're spivs only good at lining their own pockets, those of their mates and, most importantly of all, their financial backers. They create this lie that this is best for everyone and that any alternative represents extreme socialism and chaos. Anyone who votes Tory is voting for this, simple as that. If enough people vote for them then this country deserves everything it gets.
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aber-fan
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Joined: 25 October 2004 Location: Wales Status: Offline Points: 18252 |
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Posted: 13 December 2022 at 1:52pm |
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Quite right - and you could not get more hypocritical than Hunt, who did a lot to help the private sector take over some parts of the NHS whilst underfunding the system (MORE cash, OK, but LESS than was needed annually to allow for increased demand - and a big cut compared to the previous Labour administration. Then, when he's no longer Health Minister, he chairs the Commons Health committee and criticises everything in sight, as if he was Mr Clean Hands! You are also absolutely right about the Magic Money Tree - it doesn't exist when you need it to fund public services, but - MAGICALLY - it appears when it comes to funding tax cuts for the super wealthy, or providing massive contracts for crap on non-existent PPE to be 'supplied' by Baroness Bra and the like.
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“You cannot reason a man out of what he never reasoned himself into.” (Jonathan Swift)
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dr_martinov
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Posted: 13 December 2022 at 3:26pm |
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Ah yes, Jeremy Richard Streynsham Hunt, descended from nobility, educated at an elite private school, PPE from Oxford of course and multi-millionaire. Am I getting personal just to be nasty or is there something in my not-so-subtle point that it is no surprise individuals with such credentials would have no respect for - or understanding of - public services, including education and health?
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Posted: 13 December 2022 at 3:52pm |
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Trouble is, here in Wales Labour get's the biggest vote and we still get governed by the Tories. I know folk will say, ah but health is devolved. So is the budget. And if the budget goes down in England because the Tories decide to finally kill off the NHS, we lose a vast chunk of our budget. No means of stopping it, no means of raising the money ourselves. Just screwed. I do not understand the mentality of people who think that the answer to Wales' problems is to vote Labour in the hope we get a Labour UK govt. Out of the last 120 years of elections in which Labour have stood, the Tories have been in Government for 90. We do not get what we vote for in Wales. We get England's biggest minority - a majoritarian Tory government most of the time. Labour's proposed constitutional reforms put the primacy of the House of Commons first and not a whisper on PR. I don't know how anyone can figure that anything in the UK is OK right now. I'm reminded of Gramsci's comment about the old being dead and the new yet to be born ... in the meantime many morbid symptoms appear.
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dr_martinov
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Posted: 14 December 2022 at 9:34am |
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But that's inevitable considering populations of each. In some ways areas/countries are arbitrary as England could equally argue that their cities (which vote Labour almost totally) are getting England rural's vote for Conservatives. So yet another sub-plot is cities versus rural in England. Preaching to the converted here but overall I feel your post is one of frustration due to our voting system and FPTP. I completely agree with this and even when you naturally side with the vote (how long has Llanelli been Labour for now, 100 years?) it still leads to people feeling disillusioned and apathetic.
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Posted: 14 December 2022 at 10:13am |
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That's part of the picture. The other is that I identify as Welsh. Wales is my nation. Yet I'm constantly being told that makes me a nationalist by people who tell me that their nationality is British and that I should shut up and put up with being governed by a (usually Tory) UK Government because "we're better together" and that somehow it's "progressive". It is nothing but dogma. It is also quite pernicious. It makes me quite indignant to be told that my Welshness is secondary to Britishness. Ok then, we're all European. Let's have a federal European state instead then is it? Take note of Janet Finch-Saunders comments in the Senedd on the recent census stats on nationality. She rejoiced in the small drop identifying as Welsh because that's better for the UK according to her. Disgusting. Just being Welsh is "divisive" according to her. But it's not just Tories promulgating this effluent - Labour do it to. I'm a British pluralist. I simply recognise the nations of Britain and identify with one of them. If the UK really was a "voluntary union of nations" as Drakeford falsely claims, then the constitution of the UK would be very different. It is no voluntary union. It is a post-imperial state in terminal decline, beset by an anglo-British nationalism that has led to an exceptionalist mindset. The political establishment refuses to reform so it is inevitable that the UK will break up chaotically. I'm doing my best to promote the advantages of building a new union along confederal lines but Labour have bent over for the right wing on the constitution as well as in other policy areas as it pursues power within the UK's political landscape. It's as if they can't help themselves. One of those morbid symptoms.
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Sir Duckling Tuft
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Joined: 27 May 2012 Location: wales Status: Offline Points: 698 |
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Posted: 14 December 2022 at 12:27pm |
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The idea that the tories are patriotic is laughable....Theyve sold off everything, flushed our industries down the toilet, so made in britain has become a thing of the past, flooded our mines, closed our quarries and steel works too...stole our gold, flooded our villages ...destroyed our national health service, ruined our economy, taken billions of tax avoiders profits abroad, thousands of jobs taken abroad too...indirectly helped snp take over scotland towards their independence march....now the ongoing irish border debacle too
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sir duckling tuft
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Posted: 14 December 2022 at 12:45pm |
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Sorry, didn't intend for this to be quite so tub thumping. Not aimed personally at you Dr Martinov.
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Posted: 14 December 2022 at 12:56pm |
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They Tories are always patriotic when it comes to the structures that entrench their privilege. I've lived too long in the hope that Labour would dismantle those structures only to be disappointed when they show no motivation to do so. I understand the Tory mindset. It's so transparent. I don't understand Labour. They preach the Left but serve the Right. An endless sounce of frustration for me. I find I have a great deal in common with ordinary members but end up loathing the politics of their leadership.
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ladram
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Joined: 08 April 2005 Location: United Kingdom Status: Offline Points: 26454 |
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Posted: 14 December 2022 at 1:48pm |
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Didn't labour flog the gold?
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Sir Duckling Tuft
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Joined: 27 May 2012 Location: wales Status: Offline Points: 698 |
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Posted: 14 December 2022 at 2:31pm |
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sir duckling tuft
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Posted: 14 December 2022 at 11:49pm |
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Keith Darlington (some folk here might know him) has written this letter in the Guardian on Brown's proposal:
Your editorial is right to say Labour sees electoral reform as at best a distraction. However, Labour has sometimes gained from FPTP in the past – particularly when the Tories are unpopular. I suspect that this is why Sir Keir Starmer is opposing change. For example, in Tony Blair’s victory in 1997, he had a lower vote share than Boris Johnson had in 2019 but was rewarded with a landslide majority of 179 seats – more than twice that of Johnson. The vagaries of FPTP delivered another reward for New Labour in the 2005 general election. Blair had just 36% of the vote share but won a 66-seat majority. This was a lower vote share than David Cameron’s Tories had in 2010. Unfortunately for Cameron, the distribution of votes did not translate into a majority, so he had to form a coalition with the Liberal Democrats. Yet Labour could benefit from electoral reform if it were prepared to share power with other parties on the liberal left. The combined vote share of the progressive left parties, such as Labour, the Greens, Plaid Cymru, SNP and Lib Dems, usually exceed those of parties on the right in general elections. If Labour worked with other parties on the left, as it has in Wales, it would be more likely to make this century a non-Tory one. In the last century, FPTP mostly rewarded the Tories with long periods of power. Labour would also fulfil the wishes of the 83% of its members who want a change from FPTP, according to a YouGov poll in 2021. I agree to a very large extent with this. The one other point I'd add is Brown's insistence on retaining the primacy of the House of Commons. It cannot be retained if we are to have a functional British Union. The Senedd must have primacy in Wales, Holyrood in Scotland and the HoC in England. That neccesitates an entirely new form of union, be it Federal or Confederal. It is the only fair way to proceed. |
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Legendinmybathroom
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Joined: 29 May 2017 Location: Burry Port Status: Offline Points: 2843 |
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Posted: 15 December 2022 at 9:49pm |
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As a person who has worked in the health service for over 30 years I could have told you exactly what was going to be in the report. The fact that it was commissioned by the government and didn’t hold back with its criticism was a surprise (unless it was leaked), I would have thought that the government would have tried to water it down, or at least tried to paint a slightly glossier picture.
This Tory party have squeezed the purses of each and every department within the NHS year on year since coming back into power in 2010. Some departments within the health field that I work in have seen staffing numbers nearly halved in that period of time, with staff not being replaced. That has put immense pressure on the remaining staff members to cover the workload, whilst only receiving one pay rise in that time (1.5%) and often working extra hours without receiving payment for it. It was a sad day today, seeing some of my colleagues striking (first time in 106 years of the RGN) but I fully support their decision to do so. Whilst I doubt whether they ever believed that they would get an inflation plus 5% pay rise (between 15-17% - not the 19-20% that the government say that they want), they need to start negotiations high and come to a compromise - my gut feeling suggested they would probably accept a pay rise in line with inflation or just below (say 10%). The government’s rhetoric in the past days is that a 18-20% pay rise would cost £10billion, which they claim they can’t afford without borrowing or raising taxes. Yet they could find the money required to pay for dodgy PPE contracts for those on the ‘preferred list of suppliers’ during the pandemic inc contracts worth 1/4 billion for companies linked to baroness bra (to name just one). Also the so called independent pay review board (which has its remit set by the government- so not that independent in my book) came up with their recommendations in February when inflation was at around 3-4%, not at today’s levels. It was interesting listening to one of the nurses on the picket line today stating that whilst the NHS has seen just one miserly pay increase in the past 12 years and conditions worsen, in the same period the MPs have seen 9 pay rises and arguably conditions improved. That just sums up everything that is wrong with this government.
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Posted: 15 December 2022 at 10:54pm |
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I can't get over how a fair tax system isn't front and centre of the conversation in the public sphere. The UK taxes at a considerably lower rate than the average European country - by some 7%. In real money that's £150 Bn. How far would that go in rebuilding public services? From a Wales perspective it would equate to an extra £4Bn a year. Austerity, the cost of living crisis, economic inequality and the poverty it causes ... every single damned one is a political choice. We're saddled with a vile political/economic dogma, held hostage as we are by the UK's majoritarian, post imperial constitution. I'm watching Newsnight as I'm writing. Nobody is talking about the UK's comparitively low tax/GDP ratio. One of the richest States on Earth and the government is trying its damnednest to kill off the remnants of the post-war social contract and usher in a hard right hellvision in which the rich get richer and have power over the rest of us. That the protests and strikes are as civilised as they are is remarkable to me.
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dr_martinov wrote: