This pisses me off so much. Particularly because its just what New Lab would have done but more so.

What we want, to make the NHS work, is less bloody continuous change to aggrandise witless, arrogant politicians and simply good quality management on public service contracts.

I don’t want Kaiser Permanente, Dr Fosters, Beardy bloody Branson or any other bunch. Proper doctors, nurses etc. and proper managers working to make a health service, not a profit. Give me that and I’ll vote for you!

“if the British people detect that we no longer have the zeal to embrace real and difficult change to our schools, hospitals, and welfare system, they may not show any great zeal for renewing their embrace of us”

Ah yes, those British people, with their zeal for “embracing real and difficult change”. Whoever is the next Labour leader needs to stop MPs talking in this vacuous SpAd-talk as a first priority.

Nothing wrong with reform. Reform can help to take a service forward and improve it for staff and users alike.

That isn’t the same though, as privatisation and dodgy deals with big companies at the expense of vulnerable people.

Some of Labour’s reforms made sense. Letting people choose their hospital was a common sense reform enabled largely by improved technology and responsive to the public’s greater comfort with information and consumer choice.

Vying to match the zealotry of idiot torys (of both colours) motivated by a desire to hand public cash to wealthy friends is not the same as being a party of radical reform in any meaningful sense.

Just another example of New Labour still alive and kicking.

Will

Nothing particularly “new” labour about making changes to support patients and other service users. Nothing particularly labour about the cuts mascarading as reform that the tories are planning though – so Labour MPs should not start competing for that ground either.

so Labour MPs should not start competing for that ground either.

Labour MPs wouldn’t, New Labour MPs; most definitely would, have done, and will continue to do so.

Don – did you see Luke Akehurst’s piece on this? For once, I agree with every word of that too:
http://lukeakehurst.blogspot.com/2010/08/improvement-doesnt-always-need-reform.html
I’m shocked.

Woodcock’s not shy in unrepentantly flying the flag for New Labour, is he? Naturally he is a David Miliband backer.

I’d be concerned about any health service reforms that create an oligopoly for companies, who have to secure their contracts from government. That is not what a market is about, as it hardly encourages competition. In many ways, this would just be the same problem as the botched railway privitisation all over again.

A proper internal market reform would allow any doctor with responsibility for a patient’s care to buy treatment from any seller that the patient was comfortable with (so if he or she doesn’t want to go to Germany to avoid a waiting list, the choice is his or hers). Lord Freud seems not to have learnt the valuable lesson that running a government service by outside companies does not make the service better, although it may make it cheaper. Markets should do both.

An ex-spad, a neo-Blairite, a safe seat, and a David Miliband endorser. I don’t know why these things seem to go so reliably together, but if there’s one thing that puts me off DM, it’s the number of his supporters who spout this kind of stuff. Vacuous when it isn’t dangerous, and dangerous when it isn’t vacuous.

PFI and outsourcing were introduced, mainly because there was no longer the trust that civil servants and politicians could complete projects acoording to the specification a, on time and to budget. If projects had been successfully completed PFI and outsourcing would not have introduced. Too often PFI and outsourcing cause problems, in part because of the inability of civil servants to draft suitable contracts and manage them.

If Labour had promoted the competent, sacked the incompetent and demanded value for money, then they would have had far more support. If the average sick leave taken in the state sector had been reduced from 12 to 6 days( private sector average) and the paid holiday entitlement was the same for the public and private sectors, then they would have far more support. Manufacturing has had to cut costs for the last 30 years, it is called lean manufacturing: there is no reason why the public sector should not be subject to the same rigour. The reality is that public sector unions will not accept a reduction in employment because of a loss in earning and power.