Unfortunately all parties are equally guilty on this. Remember “24 hours to save the nhs”?.

The long term trend is away from treatment at hospital towards treatment in the community or at home. This is driven largely by clinical developments.

The truth is there is overcapacity and therefore too many District General Hospitals. Lansley’s solution to this appears to be to let them battle it out and the weakest fail – while he washes his hands.

What is needed is a carefully planned review leading to a deduction in capacity, but what politician is going to stand on a platform advocating that?

“The free market when it comes to re-configuring local health services is neither strategic, thought out, nor fair. But then the free market never is. Mr Cameron’s pledges lie fallen by the waste side”.

Of course Labour did brilliantly on not privatising the NHS, didn’t they ?

Did anyone see Shadow Health Secretary, John Healey campaigning against this Labour privatisation ????……

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/8408774/Labour-left-taxpayer-60billion-bill-for-new-hospitals.html

“Labour left taxpayer £60billion bill for new hospitals

The last Labour government left taxpayers with a £60 billion bill for the scores of new hospitals it built during its 13 years in power, new figures reveal.”

The British “love hospitals”? You what?

Do you live on a spaceship? People hate hospitals!

Good grief, what nonsense.

Did anyone see Shadow Health Secretary, John Healey campaigning against this Labour privatisation

See this:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/may/20/labour-john-healey-competition-nhs

Allow me to rerun your argument again.

The Labour Government tried to do the wise thing, a proper review, really plan everything properly. This didn’t work because people got up in arms about it.

So now the current government should do the same thing that didn’t work last time?

It does seem to lack a certain logic when properly laid out, doesn’t it?

@2. Labour and PFI

“Labour left taxpayer £60billion bill for new hospitals ”

I am not an apologist for PFI, but that statement is misleading. The so-called £60bn is over the lifetime of the projects (Barts, for example, have a 63 year PFI – I kid you not). The average length is around 30 years, one pound in 30 years time will be worth very little than what one is worth now, so how can you aggregate the PFI contributions in 30 years time with those contributed next year? It makes no sense.

It is also silly to assume that money is free, that £5bn of building will cost £5bn: you have to pay to borrow the money. Even if the government were to issue gilts to pay for the building, they would have to pay something like 4.5% every year for the 30 years in interest.

@5. Tim Worstall

The Labour Government tried to do the wise thing, a proper review, really plan everything properly. This didn’t work because people got up in arms about it.

So now the current government should do the same thing that didn’t work last time?

So I take it that you didn’t read what I wrote. Labour had a strategic review and Cameron campaigned against it. Now Cameron is in charge he does not have a strategic review, he merely cuts funding and waits for the weakest to die. That’s the free market. If you look at the version on my site you’ll see the lists of hospitals involved. While there is some overlap it turns out that the hospitals that are likely to close are not the same as those that Labour wanted to downgrade. So there is no way that you can say that the current government is “doing the same thing”.

The logic of getting the private sector anywhere near people is somewhat undermined by this example of corporate greed:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/21084f7e-8e2a-11e0-bee5-00144feab49a.html?ftcamp=rss#axzz1OPKuXItX

So I take it that you didn’t read what I wrote. Labour had a strategic review and Cameron campaigned against it. Now Cameron is in charge he does not have a strategic review, he merely cuts funding and waits for the weakest to die.

But I did read what you wrote. Labour had a strategic review and it didn’t work. Now you want Cameron to have a strategic review, that thing which didn’t work last time.

Why?

@2,

I’ll need to have a proper look at that Telegraph article, but I suspect it’s essentially wrong.

Have a read of this:
https://liberalconspiracy.org/2010/08/18/why-the-nhs-65bn-pfi-cost-may-be-a-good-deal/

and you’ll understand my scepticism.

There are issues with PFI, but they are consistently exaggerated and moreover the main issue is the functioning of the contracts, not the cost.

AFZ

The British may blindly see the NHS as a national treasure but the notion we love hospitals any more than we love the tax office is absurd – just necessary evils in any society. Personally I resent every minute spent in either but hey…

The big challenge is taking on the vested interest groups in the public sector and ripping out layers of management while clattering the political correctness industry. Bags of savings to be made there.

The NHS should be run on an opt-in or opt-out voucher system. The good hospitals will keep their customers and the bad ones driven out of business, just as they should be. Putting funding under pressure is the only way to ultimately sustain higher standards and better value for taxpayers’ money.

http://outspokenrabbit.blogspot.com/2011/06/england-are-crap-capello-out-any-other.html

Did anyone see Shadow Health Secretary, John Healey campaigning against this Labour privatisation

See this:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/may/20/labour-john-healey-competition-nhs

Yes, that was in 2011 – whilst in opposition!

Why didn’t he speak out when Labour were in Government or was his Government Minister job more important to him?

Lansley’s arguments over the last year have been inconsistent and the goal-posts have been constantly moving. In his latest speech, Lansley highlights the costs of hospitals, which is a new talking-point. I suspect that this is closer to his real motives than much of what he has said in the last year, and there is some truth in the assertion that the costs of hospital could be reduced. However it is not necessary to abolish PCTs and hand commissioning to GPs in order to reduce the costs involved in hospitals: there is simply no link between the policy and the intended outcome.

Cost saving could probably be made by reducing the use of A+E for non-urgent cases, by reducing referral to hospital for tests and consultations when the GPs could do it themselves, by reducing the number of hospitals with really expensive facilities. Study of treatment pathways shows that some diagnoses and treatments could be speeded up, and be more efficient, though with some small increases in risks. This would probably not require the closure of A+E units or maternity units or complete hospitals.

Will this be achieved by handing commissioning to GPs? This is very hard to say. Many of the problems lie with GPs themselves at present, so it is not clear how GP commissioning is a solution. Tougher and clearer budgetary limits may lead to savings, but it is unclear where GPs will make the savings: will they seek to make savings on servioces for the less vocal sections of society?

@ 11 Daz

“The British may blindly see the NHS as a national treasure but the notion we love hospitals any more than we love the tax office is absurd – just necessary evils in any society.”

I’m really not sure how you decided that a place that saves your life is a “necessary evil”.