PPlog

The GP's magazine Pulse reports that in several areas of the UK there is a growing trend for when Your GP decides you should have further medical assessment and attention, i.e. a referral to a hospital consultant, your referral goes to what is called a 'referral management system' and that system decides where to send you on to - or to even BLOCK your referral. This is one product of the privatisation of the NHS, taking decisions about you out of your GP's hands and making a nonsense of patient choice In the news there is much comment about Gadhafi's demonic craziness. I think the rabid privatisation of the NHS that is going on matches that as does the persecution of vulnerable and poor people via the Work Capability test - see the article in the Guardian today. This government has a cabinet of psychopaths. Mike.

Cameron's speech yesterday brought into the open his extreme right wing Tory ideology behind his unmandated reforms. We are likely to see in the future, providers of health and social services joining the Barclays Bank tax haven dodgers. Mike.

What a mess. The whole thing is archetypal Tory ideology - strategies to annihilate services provided by the state, NHS or local authorities (and more) so that the higher echelons of society and their cronies can provide them for profit. The definition of ‘Big Society’ is: ‘The strategy to hand over public services to private business.’ And are also in a mess because although this Tory led government has no constitutional mandate whatever to make these vast changes it seems that nothing can be done to stop them and the momentum is likely to return us to pre-industrial revolution conditions of life for ordinary people. What price the charge for keep in the new Tory workhouses? I did read the new mental health strategy, of which there several documents, the most informative of which I found to be ‘No health Without Mental Health, Delivering better mental health outcomes for people of all ages.’ However, by now, we all know that all governments are adept at crafting warm, slithery words a