You can't have an NHS which is based upon entitlement linked to contributions and be free of charge for all so there has to be budget limits. They are not magically going to become efficient and actually purchase and spend efficiently, simply too big and little understanding of how to do it so we are stuck with WCS under pressure from CCG's. The challenge is to change that across however many CCG's there are I'm not usually a defeatist but I can't see how it could be achieved in the current economic climate.
Burgerman wrote:Privatise it.
MichaelB wrote:Steve, if the Spectra doesn't fit your needs complain immediately and keep pushing, it might take time but you should be able to get a better option. Easy to say a lot harder to do!
You will still need the bureaucracy of the NHS to compile the guidelines that any private company will have to comply with, you will need the budgets to pay a private company, probably requiring the CCG to decide on them, you'll need more bureaucracy to check that service standards are met and patients getting what the NHS are paying for. Think CQC.
Biggest issue is how you would separate out taxes linked to the NHS, do you reduce VAT, income tax, NI to give people money to fund a health care package?
and would everyone do it or just spend on other essentials?
Plus you still don't have a guarantee of getting a better chair for all as you don't have service standards and policies, the health care providers would have to agree that. Definitely not an easy solution! I can't begin to imagine how big a f'ck up the government could make of it.
Oh, when you buy a lawn mower and almost every other product the government have had their fingers in it, they have defined the standard it is made to and the maker has to comply. Government controlling private companies.
If you were disabled you wouldnt get insurance and if it did it would cost you more than 20% of your income. Fit and healthy and young not a problem, old, disabled your on your own!
Unfortunately reducing VAT or income tax does little for those not earning and only just getting by, essentials like food are VAT free. They wouldn't be 20% richer and even if they were 20% of very little won't cover the cost of the health care insurance. All it would do is make the rich wealthier.
and would everyone do it or just spend on other essentials? if you give people more money there is no guarantee that they will purchase health insurance some would blow it on and fags. What do you do about those?
If you decide the level of cover for every element of your care policy it would be beyond the comprehension of the average person, you can't predict what will happen to you and have enough cover. I didn't expect to be paralysed from the neck down and breathing via a ventilator. Probably wouldn't have ticked those boxes.
To radically change a system like the NHS would require the government to do it. People would have to be told what will change and the government would have to produce the documents and explain it. It would need to be voted on in Commons and Lords and you might get some tough questions. Given the way people protect the NHS MP's might have some pressure applied to stop it
It's not done that way at all! With PIP they give you the money according to your assessment, purely a bean-counting assessment (and not a popular one) and don't care how you spend it. That's what I meant in the post above. With the personal wheelchair budget they faff around telling you what motors and whether you may get a manual chair etc. In my case the NHS supplier started their assessment of me with how much pain do I get using a rollator... the OT might as well not have referred me.
Burgerman wrote:So you believe in the rich paying for the poor? Wealth redistribution? You are a socialist. It doesent work that way.
Burgerman wrote:Then thats their problem. Its not the states job (the taxpayers job) to tell stupid people how to look after themselves. Rather waste your money on ? Your choice. Good luck with that. Its evolution in action. Why are they the problem of the sane rational people? Those are the darwin award specials...
Insurance works that way. Not because it's socialist, but because everybody who buys in pays a small amount, and a small number of those receive a large amount. It's not compulsory to be insured. With the exception of National Insurance.
I think we're more civilized than that! Imagine, all the stupid people in the country with no money living on the street. It's not that simple, spending taxpayers' money on what is worthwhile to the society, versus frittering it away.
It is civilized to care as a society for those individuals that do not care for themselves.
Who knows why they don't? There's millions of possible reasons and they are often not obvious. They could be depressed, or mentally retarded, or have a really bad background - do we just ignore them and let them end up on the street?
Do we pry into their private lives to help them, or is that just interfering?
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