National Health Service…
There’s no more NHS. There’s an EHS and an SHS
There’s nothing national about the National Health Service
As anyone will know who has witnessed the death of a relative from multiple myeloma, it can be a grim way to go. Your very marrow is in revolt, as the cancer takes over the blood-making processes.
Since it could happen to any of us, I hope you will concentrate for a second on the case of a constituent of mine, a distinguished and charming author. When I last met him, he was running the second-hand book stall at the fête, and seemed very cheerful. I did not know it, but he was already well down the track that begins with radiography and then goes on to chemotherapy and stem-cell transplants, and then to courses of melphalan and steroids.
Now he has come to the last drug in humanity’s current pharmacopoeia. It is called Velcade, and it is a good drug, fully licensed in this country. His doctors have told him that it would improve the quality of his life, and perhaps prolong it by two to five years.
It is available free in the healthcare systems of virtually every other European country; and yet he cannot get it in Oxfordshire. It is not available to him, or anyone else, on the Oxfordshire NHS.
He says, rather mildly, that he feels this is “unjust”. I think that is an understatement. It happens that Oxfordshire is one of those counties particularly penalised by Labour, in that our per capita healthcare funding is only about 85 per cent of the national average. It is true — though obviously grossly unfair — that there are some primary care trusts (PCTs) in England that do feel rich enough to be able to afford Velcade, and today it is still being given to many multiple myeloma sufferers in other English counties.
And yet, in just a few days’ time, the position is about to become worse. The injustice will shortly become an outrage. On September 6, the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (Nice) is expected finally to rule, or “advise”, that Velcade should not be dispensed on the NHS, with chaotic consequences for those English PCTs that are still giving it out.
And why is it being stopped? Because each course of treatment costs between £16,000 and £17,000. We must accept, in this country, that there are some treatments the state just cannot afford, and Nice will shortly rule that Velcade is not cost-effective.
Did I say “this country”? Forgive me. There will certainly be one part of Britain, if not England, where the NHS will continue to distribute Velcade, free, to sufferers from multiple myeloma. The drug will be available in Scotland, as it has been for some time; and, much as I love the Scots, it makes my blood boil that they should be so preferred.
Do you remember that deathless moment when a heroic Labour backbencher ambushed Tony Blair at Prime Minister’s Questions, and asked him to describe his core political beliefs? The PM went white, and stammered, and, after a hilarious hiatus, he gargled, “Errr … the NHS”, and flopped back in his seat. And when Gordon Brown, his heir-presumptive, is struggling to sum up the “spirit of Britishness”, the thing that really unites the country, he always goes for the “unique values of the NHS”.
In a way, he is right. The NHS is an essential half of the symmetry of British politics. In property and economics, we may be more inegalitarian than some other European societies; but we compensate at the moments of birth, sickness and death with the total equality of the NHS ward.
So let me ask you this, Gordon: how can you call it a National Health Service? I mean, run that National bit past me again. Which nation are we talking about here? There are two nations, and England gets £1,085 per capita health spending and no Velcade, while Scotland gets £1,262 per capita and free Velcade for Scottish multiple myeloma sufferers, among many other benefits.
Gentlemen of England now abed, here is the position. The Scots have free nursing care for the elderly — subsidised, under the Barnett formula, by us, the English — while we cannot afford it in England. The Scots have the luxury of refusing to charge their students top-up fees — since they are subsidised by us, the English — while English students have to cough up. Now we learn that the Scots have free cancer drugs — subsidised by us, the English — while we in England are told they are not cost-effective.
And all this injustice is provoked by a fundamental constitutional imbalance. It was because of devolution that the Scottish equivalent of Nice was able to decide that it no longer needed to obey the rulings of this so-called “National” body. It is because of devolution that Scots are able to make their own health arrangements, in the comfortable knowledge that Whitehall will bung them an extra couple of hundred quid for every Scot. It is because of devolution that the numerous Scottish MPs, with their small constituencies, are able to vote on questions that affect England, while English MPs have no corresponding say over healthcare in Scotland.
It is just not good enough for Alistair Darling or John Reid or Charlie Falconer or Gordon Brown or any one of these smooth-talking Scots to say, as they do, that the only answer to the West Lothian question is to “stop asking it”.
Gordon Brown had better understand that if he wants to become prime minister, he must find a solution to this, fast. Scottish devolution — of which he was such an evangelist — has smashed its Mel Gibson broadsword through the NHS.
How can you call it a National Health Service when we officially sanction a financial division, by which sufferers from a horrifying disease will die between two and five years earlier in England than in Scotland?
There’s no more NHS. There’s an EHS and an SHS. This is no longer some abstract constitutional issue. This is life and death. Unless Labour sorts it out, the shires of England will not be asking for devolution, but revolution, and they will be right.
As for Nice, it’s absurd to pretend that there is anything National about it. It’s time to drop the N and put Nice on ice.
119 Comments
Auntie Flo -
And I was beginning to think it was only me who always travels at the back of the train in case the front end comes off the track…
Totally agree with you re Tescos. Staffless stores? Crikey. But I bet they are planning it – taking the staff out of the equation is a surefire quick hit to the shareholder value.
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Mark, thank god for you. I’ll hardly have to post at all if you become a regular here.
My father was an aviational engineer and he always told me to sit in the back of the plane, as “no plane ever backed into a mountain.”
I read the salary roundup with interest. Am warming up the passport as I type…
Staffless stores? As formerly retail personnel, I anticipate new and funky ways to get free stuff… bring it. I could use free groceries. The mere presence of a human being, and therefore presumably a judgemental being, stops a helluvalotta crime. Tesco will learn this at their cost.
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Alex Salmond, SNP leader, has challenged Blair to a head to head debate on the future of Scotland and independence. he wants a new first minister who’s ‘on the side of the people of Scotland’, all of which Blair claims will be economically suicidal for the Scots.
They’re having a laugh, aren’t they – all the way to the English ‘bank’ to grab even more subsidies for the c 5-6 million Scottish elite from the already pauperised public services and pay of the c 50 million of us in England. I don’t believe independence would lead to less subsidies, it will surely result in even more bribery of Scots voters by NuLab and even more slush funds being syphoned off from England’s desperately ailing NHS and education budgets to Scotland.
Just where does England fit into Blair and Salmond’s vote grabbing schemes? Nowhere, except as taxpayer drones who’ve been duped and betrayed by Blair/Brown and Scotland. What do we get in return? Nothing but insults from NuLab and Scotland. Just when did Blair or Brown last mention England? Salmond can’t even say the word without a snarl.
I Detest the BNP and I’m not a UKIP or English Democrat supporter. I was a life long Liberal and – reluctant – Lib Dem until becoming sick of their adoration of the corrupt EU and NuLab’s Dracula style alliance with the shrivelled corpse of my district’s Lib Dem council. Now, like so many others, I’m a floating voter, looking for some political honesty and integrity. Perhaps Boris & Cameron have that – however their pro war stance is a major stumbling block for me and so many others. So just who am I going to vote for?
One thing of which I am certain, I am English and will never view myself as British again. I lazily use the term UK, though the very idea of a United Kingdom on this island is a sick joke these days. The people of England have at last woken up and see been sold down the river by the rest of the Union and this Government. Your pro-England article has struck a very powerful chord in this part of the shires, Boris – just wish you didn’t strike such a discordant one with your pro-war position.
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Raincoaster’s right for once,
There’ll be no such thing as staffless stores, they need shelf stackers for a start.
In some areas they’ll just get plundered if they put in self-service tills. I wouldn’t be surprised if the crack-heads are already homing in on the stores with these new check-outs as we speak.
Apparently there is a new craze, called ‘grazing’ where troublesome youths walk around these big supermarkets ‘grazing’, i.e. eating as much as they can without paying for it.
And by the way, the supermarkets are not in front of the competition commission because Tesco and Asda haven’t got where they are by merging or buying out competitors. The Office of Fair Trading has found nothing anti-competitive about their buying habits; because they are competing fairly. I for one think Tesco and Asda are brilliant shops, cheap food, cheap booze, cheap T shirts and they open 24 hours!
Think about it, why would I want to go to a convenience store or small off licence to buy a few beers when I can get them cheaper, and 24 hours a day at Tesco? Good off licences like Odd Bins that sell nice wine and funky cigars will attract me when I’m felling a bit more plush, but when I fancy a pepperoni pizza washed down with a cheap bottle of red plonk Tesco will feed me for about £6. If I go to the pizza shop and off licence I’m looking at £12.
With reference to Auntie Flo’s stop the war rot, do please remember Jimmy Carter never helped us out in the Falklands, he can go to hell, or the labour party conference, for all I care.
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Boris has highlighted a disgusting iniquity in NHS funding that I am fairly certain lags other bloggers (Guido?) by several days. It isn’t, however, an indication that the whole thing is crumbling.
Before 1999 I used the NHS very little for myself, but had sat in hospital A&E’s for hours with injured offspring and waited for consultant’s to see us some time long after the stated appointment.
In ’99 my health took a downturn and I have seen a lot of consultants and had an operation with another one, or two, pending. Nowadays I find that appointments are on time. If I turn up early I am usually seen early. I am treated with respect by all the staff, excepting car parking attendants, and explanations of my problems are given in language that I understand. I believe that the NHS is significantly better than it was and I certainly haven’t “lost faith” in it.
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Auntie Flo -
We have a lot in common in our lifelong, and now disenchanted Liberalism. But it’s sad to hear you abandon your Britishness like that. I’v always figured that if we live in these islands we’re almost 100% certain to be a genetic mix of English, Welsh, Scottish, Cornish, and probably Irish as well. And French, come to that. Not much I can do about sharing my common ancestorship with them, but I can and do regularly describe myself as British when asked.
That’s not to say that there arene’t inequalities brought about by devolution. Couldn’t agree with you more on that one. But we’ve been united through the good times (by which I mean – oh, I dunno – the 19th and 20th centuries) and it’s generally been to everybody’s benefit. It worries me a little when we start running for the national silos (and yes – I know the Scots and Welsh are even more inclined so to do) because the minute you take away the safety net of economic security, those silos can turn ugly and defensive.
It’s an extreme example, but didn’t Yugoslavia rip itself apart precisely because everybody suddenly decided they were safer with their own gang?
I’m just thinking out loud on this one, by the way.
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Raincoaster -
I’m blushing, obviously. But I tucker out easy. Couldn’t we just agree to share the load?
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I haven’t abandoned Britain, Mark, Britain’s abandoned me. I used to be proud to be British, but not any longer. Do you know what a Scot said to me? You bloody English are jealous of Scotland because we’re a nation and England doesn’t exist. We exist when they want their £16 billion+ subsidy from us every year though, don’t we?
Why would any English person want to be part of a union where the other parties use us as a cash cow yet despise us so much? Its a bit like a bad marriage, this union – and it is time to get a divorce. Let the Scots, Welsh and Irish, all 10 million of them, have those meaningless abstractions Britain and UK if they want them, which I doubt they do. Hope they enjoy funding their own services.
Look at Switzerland, less than 10 million of them and they are amazingly successful, very democratic and politically neutral, so no terrorist attacks there. That’s a great model to follow.
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AND Switzerland has overtaken us in the tolerance league.
Extract from Swissinfo.org. Note the last paragraph.
Ticino in the southern Italian-speaking part of Switzerland has become the first canton to ban smoking in public places.
Voters decided in a referendum on Sunday by an overwhelming majority (79.1 per cent) to follow the lead of neighbouring Italy by modifying current legislation on the issue. The law bans smoking in all restaurants, bars, discos and night clubs.
Owners of such establishments have the possibility to make separate areas for smoking but these have to be well ventilated. There is a grace period of one year for alteration work to be carried out.
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Then perhaps the c 12 million, scapegoated and stigmatised smokers on this island, who fund the entire budget of the health service yet, as research shows, consume far less health service funds than non-smokers, should migrate to Switzerland and leave the non-smokers and Scotland to fund their own health service.
As a twist on Boris’s article, could it not be argued that even Scotland’s smokers have elitist provison in relation to those of England, since Scots smokers’ taxes are refunded to them via their share of the subsidies funded by the smokers of England?
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Scotland has a ‘Tartan Tax’ Exemption too. It has the right to increase or reduce the rate of income tax paid by the Scots living in Scotland by 3%.
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My wife, who has spent much of her working life in the private sector, is retraining as an occupational therapist. The horror stories she brings back from her NHS placements make my hair stand on end.
While front-line staff put on a brave and efficient face, she can hardly believe the chaos behind the scenes. Thanks to locked offices, broken equipment and clockwatching culture, it took her 24 hours to send an important fax, only to find she’d been given the wrong number in the first place.
Supplies, sent by “urgent” overnight delivery, spent three days in Goods In because jobsworths couldn’t (or wouldn’t) find them. When they eventually did, they wouldn’t release the supplies because she presented a pink form instead of a green one (or was it the other way round?). Astonishingly, they then told her it would have been be better to fax the release form – overlooking the fact that faxes are monochrome!
Any attempt at getting things moving is met by a blockade of managers whose role, she has decided, is to STOP anything from happening – unless, of course, it helps to meet some spurious target. Issuing special wheelchairs, she says, is like pulling teeth because of an alleged shortage of wheelchairs. Her solution: Sack the obstructive managers and spend the money on more wheechairs. Nah, far too simple.
Home-visit staff were issued with mobile phones in an attempt to improve efficiency and personal security. They soon discovered the phones had no sim cards or chargers. Too bad, you’ve got the phones. Another box ticked.
Perhaps worst of all is the lack of people with real authority. The decision-makers exist at unreachably high level or in remote committees whose edicts eventually filter down via memos and emails, leading to bucks being passed in every direction and palpably low morale on the shop floor.
Of course she may have been unlucky in the placements she’s had so far, but if this gives even a half-accurate picture of working practices in Europe’s biggest employer it’s a miracle anyone gets treated.
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‘Look at Switzerland, less than 10 million of them and they are amazingly successful, very democratic and politically neutral, so no terrorist attacks there. That’s a great model to follow.’ (Auntie Flo’)
Switzerland was a neutral country right through the twentieth century. It is naive to think if we scrap our nukes and declare neutrality all of our enemies will simply stop being our enemies and start preaching their hatred against some other nation.
Besides, defence technology remains an important industry for the UK, are you seriously suggesting we pull out of the Eurofighter and F35 Joint Strike Fighter projects that are bringing so many jobs and investment to the UK.
What makes you think we can just re-write our financial services laws overnight and suddenly compete with Switzerland in the ‘anonymous/neutral stash your gold here’ market whilst retaining our market share in insurance and shipping services?
You sound like you basically want to surrender/quit!
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Steven_L said:
There’ll be no such thing as staffless stores, they need shelf stackers for a start…In some areas they’ll just get plundered if they put in self-service tills….Apparently there is a new craze, called ‘grazing’
Stone Age thinking, Steven. You’re envisaging purely staffless checkouts, whereas I wrote of staffless *stores* – and one of the first staffless grocery stores, Piggley Wiggley, was operating in 1937. http://66.249.93.104/search?q=cache:l8aqrPVy-rQJ:www.pigglywiggly.com/cgi-bin/customize%3Faboutus.html+automated+stores,+grocery&hl=en&gl=uk&ct=clnk&cd=2
There are already staffless internet cafes and coffee shops and internet stores which are staffless at the point of purchase. There are also arcades of vending machines which selling 200 grocery and household items per machine. You might say that an arcade isn’t a store – but what else would staffless stores be?
I imagine there’ll be tarted up, high tech machines in smaller retail outlets initially. As Mark rightly says, they’ll rip the heart out of community shopping areas – and employment. It might not interest you that automated stores will remove the only daily contact many elderly people have and destroy many people’s jobs, but it matters to them.
Automated vending machines would be loaded with fillers which have been prepacked at a vast, remote distribution centre, where a hybrid of shelf stacking might be found. There’ll be delivery and collection staff, of course, but they’ll spend very brief periods at each automated store. Net result, unemployment will rise and local employment will dwindle as more and more outlets become staffless or largely automated. So your £6 pizza and beer may come at a much higher price than you believe.
It’s claimed that automated stores can totally eliminate pilfering and vandalism, by the way. As for grazing, that’s been going on in staffed stores for many years, but you’d be hard put to graze a vending machine.
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Steven L -
I’ve no idea who bought the subject up, but can I seriously suggest we scrap the Eurofighter and F35 projects?
Those things kill people. They’re built to kill people, and they have no other purpose. You can call it ‘defence’ if you want but I call that Doublethink. If they’re used, they destroy what ought not to be destroyed; if they’re not used, they’re a total waste of money.
While we’re at it, let’s scrap Trident. Which is even more pointless.
And please don’t whitter about jobs. Just redirect the investment into something we actually need – there’d be a little confusion at first, but everybody would soon be working again, at something they could hold their hands up to.
Besides, if the ‘defence’ industries could make weapons without the trouble of having to actually employ anybody, you bet the would. They don’t care about jobs any more than they care about purpose or morality.
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Mark,
If you can think of something equally valuable to sell the Saudi’s as 72 Eurofighters that they want to buy, or something equally valuable as the F35 that Lockhead-Martin is going to award lot’s of manufacturing contracts to the UK for go for it.
If British people has spent the last 30 years buying cars and other consumer durables that were made in Britain we might not have this problem.
Can you say your car, fridge, hi-fi etc were all made in the UK? Can anyone here?
UK consumers want German cars, Japanese electrical goods and clothing made in the third world. The Saudis want British built Eurofighters – so be it!
Don’t get on your high horse with me either, I don’t own a car and use a British hire company when I need one. I buy ‘made in Britain’ cotton shirts and wool suits for work.
I smoke 20 a day (all UK duty paid) to fund the EHS (and the SHS and WHS) and never pester my GP because I have a cold or a blocked up nose.
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Mark,
“If they’re used, they destroy what ought not to be destroyed; if they’re not used, they’re a total waste of money.”
I am sorry, but I beg to differ. If they are used, they are used to destroy a threat. If they are not used it is because they have been succsessful as a deterrent.
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Surely the most fundamental principle of any government is equality for those citizens and residents under its curatorship?
If we accept this platitude then, by extension, any government has an obligation to regulate disbursements to subnational groups where the allocation is unfairly high. If they fail to do this, after having been notified of an imbalance, it seems reasonable to pursue the matter in the international court of human rights as an issue of discrimination.
The heads of argument would draw the Court’s attention to evidence that two people, paying the same amount of taxation in two different parts of the country, receive different levels of compensation for their tax contributions. The crucial word being, as Boris has amplified, the term NATIONAL Health Service. The case should hinge not on a request for an order of the court to cause the NHS to dispense Velcade to Boris’ constituent (as as a number of recent high court actions have unsuccessfully attempted) but to demonstrate to the court that Boris’ constuent’s position has been prejudiced through negligence by the government in the allocation of NATIONAL healthcare funds.
The present position, as described by Boris is clearly unfair and, on the basis of prima facie examination, probably unlawful.
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“…that Boris’ constuent’s position has been prejudiced through negligence…”
Neglect, of course, means to avoid or refrain from doing something which rationally is a reasonable thing to do and ought to be effected where possible.
I should therefore add that there must be a presumption of negligence (on the part of the government) because of the very existence of ‘the Barnett formula’ which, on inspection, is geared toward bringing per-capita financing (in Scotland and England etc.) closer together over a period of time. The very fact that the treasury apply ‘the Barnett formula’ is an admission that there is an imbalance which needs to be rectified. Consequently, it would not require a leap of intuition, legal or otherwise, to infer that present the situation is untenable and only persists because the government lacks the political will to rectify this situation in the short term.
The question this would beg of the court is: “Why should Boris’ cancer patient suffer prejudicial financial circumstances (due to funding restraints in his local NHS) because the Government is scared of losing votes by properly apportioning public money within the nation’s health centres?”
Delictual claim deriving from unlawful conduct not arising from breach of statute, contract or common law.
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kdapt speaker to Tories said
The question this would beg of the court is: “Why should Boris’ cancer patient suffer prejudicial financial circumstances (due to funding restraints in his local NHS) because the Government is scared of losing votes by properly apportioning public money within the nation’s health centres?”
Interesting posting, kdapt, encouraging too. In your view, could this same principle be applied to other aspects of the government’s policies?
I wonder if this principle might also be applied to students paying proportionately higher fees, or elderly persons denied proper care for the same reasons?
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I’ve been to a Piggly Wiggly; the staff there were very nice.
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Raincoaster,
Where have you been? On a 48 hour bender or something? Or am I missing something?
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raincoaster said:
I’ve been to a Piggly Wiggly; the staff there were very nice.
Double checked on this, the owner of Piggly Wiggly opened his automated shops under the name Keedoozle (Key Does All)
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Steven_L said
Besides, defence technology remains an important industry for the UK, are you seriously suggesting we pull out of the Eurofighter and F35 Joint Strike Fighter projects that are bringing so many jobs and investment to the UK…What makes you think we can just re-write our financial services laws overnight and suddenly compete with Switzerland in the ‘anonymous/neutral stash your gold here’ market whilst retaining our market share in insurance and shipping services?
Precisely where do you claim I either stated, suggested or implied ANY of the above? You’ll be mightily hard pressed to find it, Steven, because its not there. Where precisely do you claim I said that we should compete with Switzerland in their own specialist market and rewrite our financial service law – overnight, or in any other period of time? Ditto, it’s not there. Rewrite my postings and criticise the daft version of them that you’ve written to your heart’s content, but please don’t attribute them to me.
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Steven_L kindly said
You sound like you basically want to surrender/quit!
You sound like Tony Blair, spinning my posting to suit yourself then ripping apart a posting of your own invention. Attacking the person, not the issue. That’s precisely what Blair does!
Am I quitter? I’m severely to profoundly deaf – depends on which ear you talk to – yet have run my own successful – and ethical – business since I was your age. Do I sound like a quitter to you?
What have you done with your life?
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Auntie Flo’
With all due respect you said:
‘Look at Switzerland, less than 10 million of them and they are amazingly successful, very democratic and politically neutral, so no terrorist attacks there. That’s a great model to follow.’
You can’t be neutral and sell lots of arms to one side now can you, that’s not being neutral.
You will notice that neutral countries (i.e. Switzerland and The Republic of Ireland) have different fincancial services laws than the rest of us too.
You also said:
‘Its a bit like a bad marriage, this union – and it is time to get a divorce’
‘Divorce’, doesn’t that imply quitting, i.e. you want to quit the union.
You go on to say:
‘Let the Scots, Welsh and Irish, all 10 million of them, have those meaningless abstractions Britain and UK if they want them, which I doubt they do.’
This implies you want England to quit the union.
We don’t need to break up the UK anymore. South-East England has always paid on net into the coffers of the other regions.
All we need is:
a) For Scots and Welsh MP’s to stop voting on issues that only affect England.
b) An end to the oxymoron that is ‘positive discrimination’ to ensure the same level of NHS service throughout the union.
London is our financial centre, there are always going to be higher earnings on average in the South-East because the financial centre is there, higher earnings generate higher tax per capita.
I think the point we started from in the article is that there are unacceptable inequalities in NHS spending and availability of treatments in various regions of the UK, not that because Oxforshire pays more tax per capita than Glasgow that Oxford residents deserve more than Glaswiegans; the point was we should all be able to expect the same level of care from our National Health Service.
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“I wonder if this principle might also be applied to students paying proportionately higher fees…”
Whilst these issues look similar to the cancer patient issue (viewing from a discriminatory perspective) they are somewhat different in complexion. I wouldn’t like to hazard an opinion on either matter unless the full facts were in front of me.
What makes the cancer patient action (in my view) feasible is that the consequence of English NHS trusts not having enough money to prescribe Velcade is likely to be death. British courts are used to hearing cases of negligence leading to death and the rules are fairly well set out.
When considering a cause of action based in whole or part on negligence, the court must consider the following elements:
Duty/Duty of care
A person owes a duty of care to another when the reasonable person would foresee that the other will be exposed to the risk of injury if the particular acts or omissions are continued.
Breach of duty
Having established that there is a duty of care the next test is to determine if that duty has not been fulfilled.
Causation
For the defendant to be held liable, it must be shown that the particular acts or omissions were the cause of the loss or damage sustained. There are two elements in the test of causation, namely: actual cause (sometimes referred to as “cause in fact”) and legal cause. Cause in fact relates to the defendant having actually caused the damage to the plaintiff . The plaintiff must identify the specific conduct alleged to be the cause of that loss or damage and, further, demonstrate that the specific loss or damage would not have occurred “but for” the specific conduct of the defendant. Legal cause applies to loss or damage which is consequent to the negligent action.
Damage
The plaintiff/claimant must have suffered loss or damage flowing naturally from the breach of the duty of care if damages are to be awarded.
To demonstrate that the government has been negligent in this matter one only needs to ask four questions (and a small qualification):
1) Is the decision not to offer Velcade to Oxfordshire NHS patients a financial one? (If not, why then is it prescribed in Scotland and out of wealthier English NHS trusts?)
2) If Scotland did not receive a significantly higher per-capita contribution from the exchequer than England would the English NHS have enough money to put Velcade on it treatment list? The answer to this question must be based on the ‘NICE’ criteria for treatment allocations (of which I have no copy).
3) Could it be reasonably foreseen that the British government’s failure to address this per-capita payment issue could cause harm of the nature envisaged here?
4) Was the government’s failure to address the issue of financial apportionment between Scotland and England based on selfish motivations (malfeasance) or was it simply because they couldn’t be bothered (nonfeasance)?
Although public bodies are generally considered to be immune (except in certain circumstances) from claims arising out of tort, the Human Rights Act 1998 has been interpreted in Osman as imposing positive duties to act rather than allowing mere powers and discretions to be an excuse for inactivity. The current state of the law seems to be that there will be no general right to claim damages from a public body unless the body has assumed a separate duty of care, e.g. in the fire brigade, education services, and NHS. It is my view, however, that The Human Rights Act 1998 provides the motive force for this action and the legal mechanism to lift the veil of impunity under which the government is shrouded. In particular, the 1998 Act makes it unlawful for any public body to act in a way which is incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights, unless the wording of an Act of Parliament means they have no other choice. The Act makes available in UK courts a remedy for breach of a Convention right. This latter extension of the British courts has caused a furor in the press recently and allegedly made Dr. Reid blow a gasket (deportation of Afghan hijackers).
The worst is yet to come I’m afraid; the Act provides the best tool for exploitation of the British government since Harold Wilson.
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Or you could say:
The Act is the biggest tool to be used for exploitation of the British public since John Prescott.
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Auntie Flo
Just as Britain is divided into England, Scotland and Wales so Switerland is divided into German, Italian and French regions. The result is a very similar (and often bitter) rivalry between the regions.
Also, do you really think that Switzerlands “neutral” stance is to be admired?
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I only wish I’d been on a 48 hour bender. Instead, I took the daughter of a friend to the Pacific National Exhibition, where she insisted on going on every stomach-churning ride she could find, often dragging me with her.
A tequila hangover is NOTHING compared to the hangover generated by eight hours of the Cobra, Breakdance, Crazy Beach Party, 1001 Nights, the Scrambler, the Corkscrew, Mouse Trap, and one I cannot remember the name of although I shall never, as long as I forget, the combination of rotation, inversion, strobe lights and heavy metal.
Besides, I have nothing whatsoever to say about English vs Scottish nationalism except to say that it might be easier to give due attention to this issue if you withdrew from Northern Ireland.
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Raincoaster
Every single Northern Irish person I have met regards themselves as much a member of the UK as the English, Scottish and Welsh. Out of the four nations in the UK it is England alone which does not have its own parliament.
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We have different friends. And relatives.
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Raincoaster
“We have different friends. And relatives.”
You don’t say
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Raincoaster
Are your friends/relatives actually Northern Irish or are they North Americans with celtic ancestory?
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Friends Irish. Relatives: Irish-Canadian, Anglo-Irish, and Irish.
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Raincoaster
When you say Irish I assume you mean Northern Irish.
One could possibly get away with Anglo-Northern Irish although this would make somebody unarguably British. As for the Canadian-Irish, there is not really any such thing. The fact that someone has Northern Irish ancestory does not make them Irish any more than Anglo-saxon ancestory makes me German.
Also I referred to Northern-Irish people I have met not all of which were actual friends. When using the attitudes of ones friends (and relatives) to support ones own beliefs it must be remembered that the simple fact that they are friends means they will be a strong chance they share our views anyway.
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“Every single Northern Irish person I have met regards themselves as much a member of the UK as the English, Scottish and Welsh”
You don’t get out much, k, do you.
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K,
Raincoaster is a socialist, like Ken Livingstone, they tend to sympathise with the PIRA because they dispise everything the British Empire stood for.
Just remind her that if ti wasn’t for the greatness of the British Empire she would be eating snails right now.
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Merci k. I should perhaps let you know that I was born in France.
And I’m not sure what qualifies you to define how people are allowed to describe their cultural heritage, but I’m sure your qualifications are absolutely unimpeachable.
And now I shall return you to your nationalistic thread. Enjoy.
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Raincoaster prefere les escargo a la rosbif!
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Raincoaster prefere les escargo a la rosbif!
People called Romans they go the ‘ouse? What’s all this then?
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It’s not English, dammit: Send him to Gitmo!!!
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“prefere les escargo a la rosbif!”
Cripes, Steven_L, your French is atrocious.
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Steven_L said
You can’t be neutral and sell lots of arms to one side now can you, that’s not being neutral.
With great respect, Steven_L, that’s precisly what Switzerland did when the Swiss government turned a blind eye to their arms industry breaking the anti-Aparteid arms embargo on South Africa in the 1980s.
The Swiss also supply Israel.
Unlike here, the Swiss arms industry isn’t government subsidised. Remind me, exactly how much has our arms industry contributed to the economy over recent years, £1-4 billion depending on the economic climate? How much of that is wiped out by government subsidy? Almost a £billion.
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*anti-Aparteid
*should have said ‘anti- Apartheid’
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Kdapt speaker to Tories said:
Although public bodies are generally considered to be immune (except in certain circumstances) from claims arising out of tort, the Human Rights Act 1998 has been interpreted in Osman as imposing positive duties to act rather than allowing mere powers and discretions to be an excuse for inactivity. The current state of the law seems to be that there will be no general right to claim damages from a public body unless the body has assumed a separate duty of care, e.g. in the fire brigade, education services, and NHS. It is my view, however, that The Human Rights Act 1998 provides the motive force for this action and the legal mechanism to lift the veil of impunity under which the government is shrouded. In particular, the 1998 Act makes it unlawful for any public body to act in a way which is incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights, unless the wording of an Act of Parliament means they have no other choice. The Act makes available in UK courts a remedy for breach of a Convention right. This latter extension of the British courts has caused a furor in the press recently and allegedly made Dr. Reid blow a gasket (deportation of Afghan hijackers).
The worst is yet to come I’m afraid; the Act provides the best tool for exploitation of the British government since Harold Wilson.
Which is why Cameron wants to set up a panel of experts to work on a British Bill of Rights. That makes sense to me. Thank you for your excellent and most informative reply to my query, Kdapt.
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Impeach_Bush,
Was that wrong, I though it might be, I haven’t done french since early 1996, she still like snails more than the English mind!
Auntie Flo’
said ‘The Swiss also supply Israel’
Israel are good buyers, last thing I heard they want to buy the F-22 Raptor, like the UK, Japan, Australia and Isreal do (well who wouldn’t). The Saudi’s are biting our hand off for the Eurofighter and we scored more F-35 contracts in May!!
Don’t be so down, we’re winning.
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Winning what Steven_L?
it certainly isn’t the war on terror if that’s what you’re implying, the ‘terrorists’ are running away with that one!
Iraq is on the verge of civil war (it’s only a matter of time before the Yanks are driven out with their tails between their legs as per Vietnam); Afghanistan is a constant problem; Lebanon is in ruins (as the result of an incursion by a ‘terrorist state’); British and US citizens have had their civil rights cut to the bone and all any terrorist has to do to send the oil price orbital and the stock-market into a tail-spin is to make a phone call to Ryanair in a comedy accent.
Sorry Steven, if you think the US and Britain are winning this fight you must be on some phenomenally good gear or have the odd chat to Elvis and Bigfoot.
It’s so bad one might almost consider gift-wrapping Bush & Blair and posting them to the head terrorist with a little note saying: “Really sorry about being so twattish recently, here’s a little peace offering. Love & XXXX, the West”
It’s a long shot but it might just work.
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By the way Kdapt speaker to Tories, is my last comment in breach of the ‘glorifying terrorism’ laws? In which case I offer in mitigation a big raspberry and a fervant ‘up yours’ to Tony Blair (may his reign last 1000 nanoseconds).
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“It’s so bad one might almost consider gift-wrapping Bush & Blair and posting them to the head terrorist with a little note saying: “Really sorry about being so twattish recently, here’s a little peace offering. Love & XXXX, the West”
Scoplin:
You’re worth your weight in gold. You gave me my first bellylaugh of the week. People talk so much sense on this blog, I wonder why Sky News sounds so ludicrous by comparison …
I tell a lie. I know very well.
Steven_L:
“Les escargots” may be available somewhere “a la (why feminine?) rosbif”, but I can’t imagine you using a derogatory French term for an English person, most of whom don’t cook snails anyway. So not sure what you meant … !
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