Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Same Old Toxic Tories - Ruthlessly Exposed By Ed Miliband


George Osborne - "Come Back, was it something I said?"
Rats deserting a sinking ship 
Everyone waited for George Osborne to pull the rabbit out of the hat, it didn't happen. It is not usually the leader of the opposition that pulls rabbits out of their hats on budget day, but this is what happened today! Ed Miliband gave one of the best replies to any budget in history by any party leader.



In his usual quiet calm way Ed Miliband set about dissecting the budget piece by piece, his precision in dissecting Osborne's work and sleight of hand was fatally accurate. Osborne, Cameron and Clegg and the entire government front bench suddenly looked like bunnies caught in the headlamps. Gone was their back slapping bonhomie and we could visibly see the the smirks on their shaken faces literally fall away as they realised they were being duffed up by a Leader of the Opposition on brilliant form and they just did not know how to react.

The crest fallen looks on the faces of the government front bench will stay in people's memories for a long time.

The chancellor had a new buzzword that replaces "we're all in this together"  that's gone apparently and now "Britain is going to earn its way out". Really? Like the way the chancellor said in his first budget "Britain was going to manufacture our way out of trouble", of course that was before his austerity measures took pounds out of people's pockets and his massive VAT all but killed the fragile recovery that was underway in this country when Osborne took over and before this insane government gave big lucrative manufacturing contracts to overseas companies, just ask British companies like Bombardier and Sheffield Forgemasters etc what they think of this government giving away British orders and British jobs to overseas companies.

On tax cuts for 14,000 of the country's wealthiest people, Miliband asked the government where the entire front bench are among those wealthiest people in the country to nod or shake their heads if they benefited from the huge tax give away, they were paralysed, they knew Miliband had them and he knew it too and he wasn't about to let them go very easily.

Osborne justified reducing the 50p rate of income tax for the top earners by saying it raised less than expected, but this isn't down to the policy, this is down to the fact that these people hire teams of accountants to find loop holes so they do not have to pay tax. Osborne's point is not an argument for getting rid of it, it is actually and argument for clamping down just as heavily on tax avoidance as this government has done to so-called "benefit cheats". If as the chancellor said that the 50p rate did not bring in as much as it should have done, if that is so, then how will getting rid of it somehow magically create jobs and help "earn our way out"? Osborne called tax avoidance "morally repugnant" then if this is so then why is he rewarding it with these tax cuts?
In fact George Osborne himself hired a firm of accountants to help him avoid paying £1.6 million inheritance tax, isn't that "morally repugnant" and seriously hypocritical?

We badly needed a budget for growth, (we needed one last year which we never got one then either) but the measures announced by Osborne today will only in fact increase GDP by a paltry £0.51 million, the country will not grow on that, in fact it will probably contract.

As for increasing the personal taxation allowance good, fine, but you need to be in work to benefit and there are almost 3 million unemployed, many of them women and many others are in part time work because they cannot get full time work. Unemployment is at its highest for 17 years, ever since the Tories were last in power.

What the Tories are doing to pensioners by freezing their personal allowances, what they are doing to the most vulnerable people in this country like the chronically sick, the disabled, the terminally ill, the elderly, the young, women and the unemployed; what they are doing to the NHS in privatising it and how they are now hoping to privatise our roads and more - all of this is re toxifying the Tories.

A budget for the rich, designed by the rich - Same old Toxic Tories! Only this time being propped up by the Liberal Democrats.


I trust you will help give this government a bloody nose in the coming May elections?  Send them a message they will not forget in a long time and "Get out and vote,  and vote for anyone except the Lib Dems and Tories.

Thursday, March 15, 2012


Last night we probably saw the death of the NHS, this is in despite of all the efforts put in by the majority of all health care professionals and all who work within the NHS, the Labour party, in particular the Herculean efforts put in by Andy Burnham, Shadow health Sectary and especially by doctors like Consultant Oncologist, Dr Clive Peedell and his colleague Dr David Wilson.

Andy Burnham MP - Shadow Health secretary


Dr Clive Peedell - Consultant Oncologist

Sadly it looks like we have lost the fight to save our NHS and the green light has been given to the Tories to destroy it (just as they have always wanted to do) by Nick Clegg and his Liberal Democrat party. Respect is given to the handful of Lib Dem MPs who had the courage to stand up to their own leader and vote against the bill.

The damage set to be done to one of this country's greatest achievements is immense. The NHS has been built into what it is today over 63 years and it has taken a much reviled Tory-led coalition government just 20 months to set about its destruction. Post war Labour party Aneurin Bevan, the chief architect of the NHS, would be turning in his grave, however, both the Conservative and the Liberal Democrat parties should remember something that Aneurin Bevan once said : 
"The political party cannot survive which destroys the NHS"
The Health and Social Care Reforms Bill is being forced into statute at a time when the country is undergoing severe austerity and government is forcing the NHS to save £20 billion, which is already resulting in cuts to front line staff. The bill itself is costing the country £3.5 billion, money that could have been really effectively targeted into patient care, like cancer treatments, cardiac treatments and children's services etc.

When this bill is enacted it will end up costing the country and business colossal amounts of money. This is money that will be taken out of the NHS and put into the bank accounts of private companies. Money will be siphoned off in fraud - like A4E -  and inflated management costs - like railways and the utilities. The bill replaces 3 layers of bureaucracy  with 7 layers of bureaucracy. 


One of the areas that this bill will impinge heavily upon is 'mental health'. Where the fragmentation of services that this Bill will bring in will only be mitigated by adding layers of red tape & bureaucracy that will tangle up the efforts of all those involved in administering mental health and will put mental health reform back decades.

With all the various reforms taking place in this country  soon we will have no effective policing, no health service, no support for the vulnerable in society, no support for the disabled or terminally ill, people are already being made homeless etc. Within the NHS serious problems are already  coming to the fore, increasing waiting times and waiting lists and the abolishment of the 4% cap Labour placed on treating private patients has now been extended to 49%, means that private patients will be treated before NHS patients, queue jumping for people who have money etc.  The government keep telling us they have no money but notably there is still plenty of bonuses for the bankers, and all manner of benefits created for those who financially support the Conservatives. Check out A4e HERE.  

Individuals connected to private health companies and private healthcare companies who stand to gain from Tory reforms of the NHS

Pharmaceuticals £58,5001. Lord Ballyedmond, owner Norbrook Pharmaceuticals £50,000
2. Norbrook Laboratories Ltd, Station Works £8,500
Health £37,250
1. Nadey Hakim £10,000
2. Abdool R Ebrahimkhan £9,500
3. Churchill Retirement (Group) Ltd £9,250
4. HCA International Ltd £8,500




 Care UK
John Nash and Caroline Nash also own the Hedgie a hedge fund company that profits out of miseries in recession Have donated £100,000 to the Tories including a £21,000 donation directly to Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley's office.
Lord Blyth - Boots Chemists deputy chairman. Tory Donor. Stands to gain from the break up and privatisation of the NHS wants to buy the Walk in Centres. (Rumoured that a deal has already been done, despite the reforms not on the statute book yet)

UK Pharmaceutical Industry Courting the Conservative party - 

The UK pharmaceutical industry has also begun gearing up for a change in government, as drug companies have been reshuffling their public affairs teams and courting the Conservative party. The American Pharmaceutical Group handed public affairs briefs to Hanover Communications, who also represents National Health Service (NHS) cancer screening departments, and in December 2009 hosted a meeting on the Conservatives’ approach to regulating busines 





Private Health Care -  companies had donated £750,000 to the Tory party, asking: Doesn't  the Prime Minister see the conflict of interest in this?

Sir Peter Gershon - Chair of Healthcare UK and whose company stands to benefit millions from NHS cuts, which Sir Peter himself helped the Tories to draw up! If ever there was a clear cut case of conflict of interests this is it.

Ryan Robson - Major Tory donor who has given the party £252,429.45 his company invests in numerous private healthcare firms including Choice and Christchurch Court, which provide specialist and residential care.
His donations included £50,000 to be a member of the party’s “Leader’s Group”, a secretive cash-for-access club. The would-be MP, who tried but failed to get selected as the election candidate in Bracknell, is managing partner at Sovereign Capital.

Dolar Popat - Nursing and care home tycoon  has given the Conservatives £209,000.
Has amassed an estimated £42million fortune as founder and chief of TLC Group, which provides services for the elderly.
Mr Cameron made the businessman a peer shortly after entering No10 last May, and Lord Popat’s donations include a £25,000 gift registered a week after the Tories’ health reforms were unveiled  in July 2010.

Sir Christopher Gent - non-executive chairman of GlaxoSmithKline, (drug company) has given £113,400 to the Conservative Party.

IC Technology- which provides computer services to the NHS, has handed the Tories £70,000 over the past two years.

Philip Scott - chief of the Priory Group, has donated £20,000.
The famous Priory Clinic is private but Mr Scott has revealed in the past most of its income comes from NHS or local council referrals.


The Trichological Clinic Limited - which operates out of Harrods has handed balding David Cameron and the Tories £10,000 last year.

Senior Tories - who helped formulate the party’s health policy in Opposition have had links to private health care and health insurance firms.

Julian Schild -  When in opposition Shadow minister Stephen O’Brien’s office received three payments totalling £40,000 from Julian Schild. Mr Schild’s family made £184million in 2006 by selling hospital bed-makers Huntleigh Technology.

BUPA - Mark Simmonds MP - A second shadow health minister Mark Simmonds accepted a US trip to Boston worth £4,512 from private health provider BUPA.

Lord McColl of Dulwich - Tory health spokesman in the Lords, is a consultant of Endeavour Healthcare. David cameron has previously defended Lord McColl of Dulwich, after it emerged that the peer is a paid consultant to a new private healthcare company that provides a paid-for rival to the NHS's GP service.

Dr Mark Lloyd-Davies - Defeated Prospective Tory MP for Bristol South. 
Would have made a valuable addition to the Conservatives’ pharma-friendly team. According to the Conservative website: “Mark is the UK head of the pharmaceutical government affairs and communications team in the world's largest healthcare company [Sanofi-Aventis], so he’s already familiar with the workings of Westminster.”

Mr Heathcoat-Amory- FORMER Tory MP for Wells and a former Treasury minister, registered a payment of "£1,671.08 and health benefit to the value of £86.17" in July from Western Provident Association, which provides private medical insurance policies.
The former  MP also worked as a non-executive director for the firm, which pays him around £20,000 a year, as well as his former duties as a constituency MP.


Helen Whately - Former Conservative parliamentary candidate has shrugged off any suggestion of a conflict of interest, after it emerged she works for the same consultants helping draw up plans which could see the A+E or maternity unit at Kingston Hospital removed.
Her website states she works as a management consultant specialising in healthcare, mainly in the NHS but does not mention her employer McKinsey.

Aventis Pharma
 - 


Andrew Lansley and Simon Burns  attended an oncology conference in the US paid for by Aventis Pharma.

Norbrook Pharmaceuticals - Millions of pounds donated to the Tories by Norbrook Pharmaceuticals, which boasts its mission is to "aggressively expand" its healthcare business.

Johnson & Johnson - Tory register reveals donations from a lobbying group that works for Johnson & Johnson, the US multi-national health and hygiene corporation.

London Secure Services - Mr Lansley has also registered a donation from London Secure Services, a care firm that sparked outrage after it ran up  £1.24million in debts and made its staff redundant with two hours notice.

Why are we as a nation standing by and watching while vultures from private health care companies swoop down and pick over the bones of our  NHS, an encouraged to do so by the Conservative led government? The same Conservatives who accept millions of ponds in donations from these companies and individuals connected with these companies.
Even if these donations are registered in "Members Interests" what does that prove? It doesn't make it right, all that goes to serve is that MPs and Lords are covering their own backs while they accept ludicrous amounts of money from what appears to be k fake positions within these companies.

Why aren't the press investigating this? The press are forever moaning they want a "free press" but they themselves fall over to write complete gush and muck that runs from the rat infested sewer of the Tory party.


These companies do not donate to political parties for nothing, they donate to try and influence g future policies, lucrative contracts etc 


 Cameron is forcing the NHS reforms through  Parliament the NHS reforms without listening to the bill's critics using outdated legislation. Cameron, Lansley and Clegg are also trying to stop us from viewing the transitional Risk Register. They have been order to publish the Risk register  twice by the Information Commissioner and twice they have ignored the order. One must ask what is in that is so bad that they do not want us to know?


There is absolute no need for this complete upheaval of the NHS. We have one of the most revered and cost effective NHS's in the world, we will NOT sit back and allow Cameron, Lansley and Clegg destroy it.

Time is running short for us to stop this bill, however we must give up, if you care for the NHS please fight for it against one of the most right wing governments this country has ever see, hell bent of destroying the NHS, welfare. Lord Owen has thrown campaigners against this bill a life-line please See Green Benches and please help.

Monday, March 12, 2012

Nick Clegg and the Nothing in Particular Award


This is a weird little story, the Liberal Democrats actually invented an award and then awarded it to themselves!

It was awarded to Liberal Democrat MP David Ward, for helping "thousands of people" and was presented by Nick Clegg, only no one seems to know what the award is or why it was awarded. or why Mr Ward was chosen to receive this "award". It doesn't even say how exactly he helped these "thousands of people" - very odd. We can only surmise that Nick Clegg  made the award up and awarded it to Mr Ward for doing his job as a constituency MP.  Perhaps Nick Clegg awarded the award to Mr Ward because his name was Ward? Pity his first name wasn't Anthony, Adam, or Alan or something then it could have been A Ward. Source: Political Scrapbook

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

Is Number 10 Censoring and Controlling Our News?

Not since the the Tories under Margaret Thatcher tried to introduce the poll tax, has there been such controversy over a bill, yet the Health and Social care Reforms Bill is creating massive waves and one gets the feeling that the tsunami of real protest is yet to come.

The hated NHS reforms haven't been out of the news for weeks now, so when the Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley visited the Royal Free hospital in Hampstead, north London last Monday and was met with stiff protest outside and inside, you would think that at least the BBC would have covered such a highly contentious news story of massive public interest, but no, strangely the BBC, ITN and Sky News, although had crews at the hospital and recorded everything, fell strangely silent.

Andrew Lansley was pursued and heckled through the hospital corridors by a GP of thirty years, who was shouting that his bill was rubbish. It would seem the majority of health care professionals agree with this doctor, it was a classic news moment (see video),

however, this film never made it to the news stations on TV, one really does have to ask why. This was Lansley's "Gillian Duffy moment" yet the nation was kept in ignorance and this is not the first time this has happened, it happened in a Newcastle hospital a couple of weeks back, see HERE.

The BBC ignored this doctor of over 30 years and his protests and serious concerns for the future of the NHS , yet last night @BBCpolitics tweeted that one nondescript caller to the heavily biased radio show BBC Radio 5 Live had  apparently told leader of the Opposition, Ed Miliband that he was "uninspiring". Who at the BBC rated this as "newsworthy" and yet chose to totally ignore a doctor of 30 years making a protest directly to the man responsible for the highly controversial health and Social care reforms Bill?

This "news blackout" is getting to be a real habit lately, especially with the BBC and we have to wonder why this is. Just a couple of weeks back there was massive interest and protest over the Government's welfare reform bill and how they are affecting disabled and sick people. Protesters shut down a Tesco store and public pressure managed to get a reversal of a couple of policies in the government's "workfare" programme, but it wasn't reported by the BBC, they ignored the growing backlash until they were in a position where they were compelled to report something.

Why is the BBC so reluctant to report and anti Tory government sentiment? Has it got anything to do with the fact that BBC Chairman is former Conservative Governor of Hong Kong, Lord Chris patten?

Has it got anything to do with the fact that former BBC newsroom editor Craig Oliver is now David Cameron's Director of Communications at Downing street? Is there any truth in the "rumours" circulating the BBC and Westminster that Craig Oliver telephones his former colleagues at the BBC and controls the BBC news agenda from Downing St?

For weeks now on BBC Question Time the Tory bias has been so top heavy in the audience of the show that it is a wonder it hasn't toppled over. Often on the show there is a ratio of four right wingers and Tories to one Labour MP, resulting in the Labour MP hardly ever being able to speak and when they do speak they are constantly harangued by the show's presenter David Dimbleby and are hardly ever allowed to finish their point.

BBC Newsnight has become such a joke it may as well be renamed Tory Newsnight, last night it went from the utter ridiculous to the profoundly ludicrous when it had no less than five Tories on, absolutely no balance whatsoever.

Radio 5 Live and Nicky Campbell should receive the "joke of the year for political bias" award, morning after morning they broadcast politically biased material, they have caller after caller backing the government and hardly ever show a balance, I would not be at all surprised to learn at some point that they are stacking callers. Casting my mind back to post Gillian Duffy after Brown forgot to remove his mike, I wonder, how did the photograph of a downcast Gordon Brown in Nicky Campbell's 5 Live studio get released? How come this gets released, yet nothing untoward ever gets reported about what is happening with the present Tory-led government?

The BBC also guilty of making spurious claims, they claimed that Vince Cable's recent letter was leaked to them, however, this comment in the Telegraph proves it was covered in the Financial Times (FT) 3 weeks ago! (behind pay-wall but you can trial it for free) Once again the BBC is giving false impressions, anything that signifies a tussle in the so-called Coalition government is used repeatedly by the Tories and the Lib Dems 1).. to divert attention away from bad news days (like the NHS reforms and frustrated doctors and pensioners) and 2)..To help the Lib Dems, this way this duplicitous government can stay looking unified, when it is anything but.

It is understood that Labour party officials have monitored invitations, and time given, to senior Tory and Liberal Democrat figures on the BBC's main news outlets against that allotted to Labour counterparts and while acknowledging that the Tories and Liberal Democrats form the government, their analysis has shown that Labour has been represented less than half as often as the coalition. This is something that has been born out, ever since the coalition government took over.

These are not just isolated incidents at the BBC it is now happening with regular monotony, day after day, after day and looks as if it could be a concerted effort to conceal what is actually happening regarding this government, or give a distorted picture. This did not just happen, someone at the BBC is responsible for this, someone is making and taking these decisions - who? Is the news agenda being censored and controlled by David Cameron and his team in  Downing Street? If it is, I believe that this is in the public interest, if they are attempting to censor and control our news then we have a right to know about it.

The BBC is obliged to show impartiality - why isn't it? 


Saturday, March 3, 2012

Is McKinsey The Real Reason Why Cameron Will Not Dump His Hated NHS Reforms?


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The Health and Social Care Reforms Bill  should have been dropped weeks ago, however, it looks like David Cameron is set on getting it onto the statute books, the damage from the political fall-out that this is causing him and his government is beginning to resonate with the electorate, so one has to wonder why he is insisting with these reforms when the general public and 98% a of all medical professionals and NHS workers generally etc., are fundamentally opposed to the Conservative reforms (which are also backed by the Liberal Democrats) and want them withdrawn. Is it really just Cameron's and Lansley's vacuous political vanity, or could it be something altogether more sinister?


The reforms are officially said to be costing in the region of £3.5 billion.  However, the bill had not been officially passed, in fact, it had not even been properly debated in the House of Commons when the changes in the NHS started to be made and now millions of pounds of funding has already been spent (and is still being spent) on implementing  the changes that the Health and Social Care Reforms Bill will bring to the NHS. 


The government have also already began awarding contracts to private healthcare companies and some of these companies that have won contracts just happen to be financial backers of the Conservative party.  
The KPMG Partnership for Commissioning has won one of the first contracts to support the development of the early waves of pathfinders across NHS London and help them to become commissioners of services in the future. KPMG is also a donor to the Conservative party. KPMG has given both cash and non-cash donations to the Tory party. 

How deep does the Conservative party's involvement with private health providers actually go and could this be the main reason why Cameron, Lansley and Clegg refuse to pull back from the Health and Social Care Bill now? Has this government already signed other large and lucrative NHS contracts with private health companies which it would find not only embarrassing to break away from, but also illegal?


A great number of for profit companies have been circling Cameron and the Conservatives even before this Tory led government assumed power, and one has to ask why? How did they Know  about Cameron and Lansley's plans for the NHS, especially when according to David Cameron shortly before the May 2010 general election, there was to be "no top down reorganisation of the NHS? Doesn't make sense does it?
These companies did not just sniff out the possibility of the biggest reforms in the NHS 63 year history and waste millions in Tory donations and lobbying companies on the off chance of a contract here and there, this is just not how they operate, no they knew something was going to happen and this really needs exposing, because it will take the general public right to the rotten corrupted heart of the present government. They have staked claims to large parts of the £100 billion NHS budget and the involvement of the of the private sector always means they are in it for profit and that profit will end with money being drained out of the NHS and into the bank accounts of private company shareholder and this will mean fewer services, fewer operations, fewer treatments, unless of course you have the money to pay for expensive health insurance and even that may not cover people's health requirements should they or their families fall ill.
Thanks to Prime Minister David Cameron, Chancellor George Osborne, Deputy PM Nick Clegg and Health Secretary Andrew Lansley, these Private Commissioning Companies are pretty close to getting what they want out of our NHS.
These are the companies  who hire lobbying agencies and think tanks who they pay to push their agenda with our MPs. Lansley's reforms have been heavily criticized for opening the doors of the NHS to private FOR profit companies. Looking deeper the true extent of Andrew Lansley and David Cameron's involvement with such agencies is really quite astonishing. See Here for details and see the sidebar for many more examples.

Turning NHS Direct into NHS 111 is a typical case of Tory sleight of hand with the NHS even before the bill was debated, see HERE for further details. Many in NHS Direct were worried by the scale and pace of changes they were being forced to accept without prior consultation, they were also worried about Lansley intention to replace properly trained medical staff with NHS 111 operators who had little or no medical experience and let them loose of the public after just 60 hours training. Lansley said these were pilot schemes, yet these pilot schemes were many and took place without prior consultation with parliament.
NB: Since the commencement of these so-called "pilot schemes" many reports have been leaked that telephone operator/advisers unable to get the one qualified nurse's advice, have felt unable or unhappy to give medical advice over the phone and this has resulted in a sharp increase of traffic in A& E departments, as many more people are now being referred to hospitals as was previously the case under the old NHS Direct scheme, whereby the ratio of trained to untrained staff was 40%. This is a clear example of how "saving" on properly trained medical staff salaries has resulted in costing the NHS far more in the long run and is just one example of one 'sickness' that is present throughout out the Health and Social Care Reforms Bill!


Now I refer you back to something I mentioned on this blog one year ago in March 2011.


I was told that Derby City Primary Care Trust had already been put out to tender and had  at that point three expressions of interest From;

  1. BUPA;
  2. Boots; 
  3. AN-other 
Even more worrying the deadline for tenders had apparently already passed a few weeks before  proper notice had been given, so even if "any other" interested groups under the Tory government's preferred "any other provider" wanted to bid for contracts it couldn't and this is exactly the same as happened with the change from NHS Direct to NHS 111. At this point the Tories had only been in power just 10 months. So in the space of 10 months the Tories had gone from: 


  • No top down reorganisation of the NHS; 
  • To within 8 weeks, introducing a highly complex White Paper (Liberating the NHS) with the intention of following it with the Health and Social Care Reforms Bill;
  • To informing the public that the government were going to introduce the biggest revolution in the NHS 63 year history;
  • Lansley had was also introducing widespread "pilot schemes" which would replace NHS Direct within NHS 111 using a majority of untrained staff; 
  • To putting Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) to tender and in some cases the tendering period had already closed!

At the time Andrew Lansley said that GP Commissioners will have to honour present contracts. However, I was informed by a reliable source that there appeared to be a lot of contracts being signed in a "hurry" and with absolutely no clear evidence of tendering. 


Councils across the country are now outsourcing huge swathes of their work as they struggle to operate with a 20% cut in funding from central government. This is resulting in care for disabled children and the elderly etc being cut, Libraries closed, Sure Start Centres closing and also thousands of redundancies from local authorities wi hich are having a devastating effect on local economies.


As I tried to warn at the time THIS closure of Normanton Medical Centre Derby could be a shape of things to come right across the country and with more and more private sector involvement in the NHS, we will not have just one NHS, we will have hundreds of little NHS's and these little providers will all be competing to give health care, and services will be so fragmented and disjointed that health care will suffer.. The UK has one of the best primary care services in the world, only the Swiss have something similar and under the government's plans we stand to lose this. Remember this was already underway in private soon after Lansley began publishing his plans! Coincidence? You decide.


Lord Blyth - Tory donor and Boots Deputy Chairman stands to gain from the break up and privatisation of the NHS and apparently he wants to buy all the NHS Walk In Centres! There is no official confirmation of this (I have been told privately) so remember where you heard it first!  However, I have been told that Boots have already agreed a cut price deal with Cameron and Lansley for these centres. Many of the centres which are stationed in buildings where Boots operate, makes them first choice to fill the lucrative prescription trade!  More privatisation by stealth and yet more apparently dubious practises from this Conservative government.
Boots incidentally are profiting from the government sending them "free labour" on the "Workfare" or"Work Programme" in form of placements from Job Centres and those sent were sent under the threat of a sanctions of having their JSA removed if they refuse to work for nothing. Despite the Lies Of Iain Duncan Smith and Chris Grayling and the DWP efforts to remove all incriminating documentation that proves this, this was written by the DWP as "mandatory" see HERE.



 David Cameron has made much about GPs across the country backing his reforms, but in reality, they had little choice. Cameron should not confuse GPs trying to do the best for their patients as backing for his reforms. The Royal College of GPs has recently asked David Cameron to withdraw the bill.


If the reforms go ahead we will have Consortia replacing PCTs and GPs forming
commissioning and this may add further complications, as large companies (like Boots, Bupa, United Healthcare, Care UK etc) could buy up up practices which could potentially gain control of the consortium's commissioning decisions.

The current NHS reforms initially focused on the development of "local autonomy", whereby existing purchasers of healthcare by primary care trusts, would be replaced by Clinical Care Groups led by local GPs. The thrust of coalition's reforms was to make the CCGs autonomous and able to make decisions reflecting local choices about what healthcare should be provided, and how, but already with over 300 amendments/concessions to the Health and Social Care Reforms Bill this is going to pose serious problems. The NHS works by continuity, if you break one link of the chain there will be a reaction and a problems in other areas right down the line. The Bill is in total chaos and disarray, any bill that has to make 300 changes is obviously ill-thought out and seriously flawe, yet this is the bill that Cameron, Lansley and Clegg are trying to force 98% of highly trained healthcare professionals accept and implement .
Even Andrew Lansley's  previous adviser on CCG's, Dr Sam Everington, has written to the Prime Minister asking him to withdraw this bill, see his actual letter HERE


To add to David Cameron's embarrassment, City and Hackney CCG have also added their voice to the growing dissent and they  said it believed the bill would ‘hamper future improvements, not help us', and described the CCG authorisation process as a ‘huge disruption and very bureaucratic See Full letter Here.

We are almost to the point of this bill becoming law, yet, still have received no explanation why the NHS needs such a radical shake-up, when actually all reports are indicating otherwise and pointing to the fact that the NHS is continuing its improvement and innovation, or why these reforms are being railroaded through parliament at break neck speed at the time when the government is forcing the NHS to make £20 billion worth of "savings" (cuts). So we have to look at other possible causes for this and one of those reasons could be because of a company called Mckinsey. we must know how deep the present Conservative government's connections go with this company and if the government has already entered into contracts with one or more of McKinsey's clients.


McKinsey and Company


There have been recent revelations about McKinsey and Company (not real news to those who read this blog, we exposed much of this months ago). However, I think we need to learn much more about exactly how much money to date has been earned out of the NHS by McKinsey, and how many NHS contracts have been awarded to McKinsey's clients and how many of these companies donate financially to the Conservative party. In the interests of transparency and good governance, this information must be exposed, however, as McKinsey is a private consultancy company, UK law has no precedence to force McKinsey to reveal information about its clients, even if it is in the public interest and McKinsey & Co refuse point blank to be open about who their clients are and what they do and what their interest is in the British NHS. Considering McKinsey's reluctance, is it appropriate that this country be kept in the dark about the dealings of private health care companies in the country's treasured health service?


During the debate for the "Publication of the government's strategic NHS Risk Register in the House of Commons on February 22 2012, Andrew Lansley,  the Health Secretary,  made a point of saying that he had not met with McKinsey.  I found this an extraordinary admission, not least because if true it beggars belief that that Lansley is trying to say he has not met with any of the companies that are fighting to be in powerful positions for providing services for the carve up of the £100 BILLION NHS budget.  


Has Andrew Lansley not met with David Bennett head of  Monitor who is going to be taking such a pivotal role supposedly  overseeing regulation of the private sector involvement in the NHS,  and that neither he nor the Prime Minister know anyone passing through the 'revolving door' of employment between the Government and McKinsey? Why is this government so intent on keeping the public in the dark and making deliberately misleading statements?


Monitor their roll is to authorise and regulate NHS foundation trusts and ir dentify actual and potential financial and non-financial problems. Monitor features heavily in Lansley's controversial Health and Social Care Reforms Bill 


David Bennett - Monitor , a former partner of the global US consultancy McKinsey for 20 years.  While at McKinsy, Mr Bennett produced a report which urged the purchase of off-the-shelf software from major commercial companies or paid them to adapt of one of their systems for the Blair government. This is the failed NHS National Programme for  IT project,  (NPfit). Note that this is the very programme which David Cameron and Andrew Lansley like to blame on the  Labour government and  the very programme which was actually sold to Tony Blair by a McKinsey team at a meeting in February 2002. The team chief was David Bennett, who is now the head of Monitor. Politicians are politicians and probably not IT experts, in fairness what would the majority of them know about IT systems? How easy was it for companies like McKinsey to leach money out of the British taxpayer for projects like this? It also begs the question; if the present government were so affronted by this failed IT contract then why are they hiring David Bennett and why are they heavily involved with McKinsey now?  Does Andrew Lansley still maintain he has had no connections at all with McKinsey?


  • McKinsey & Company paid for NHS regulator staff to go to lavish events
  • Many Health and Social Care Bill proposals drawn up by the McKinsey & company
  • Document shows it has used access to Government to help form policy and then share that information share information with other clients
  • McKinsey also worked closely with previous Tory government on disastrous Railtrack privatisation under John Major
Dr Nicolaus Henke McKinsey Director met with David Cameron, Prime MinisterDavid Willetts  Secretary of State for Science and Universities o discuss science issues in June 2011. Mr Henke is also a member of a No 10 ‘kitchen cabinet’ which advises the Prime Minister on health policy


Paul Bate former McKinsey Director and the former adviser to Tony Blair, Mr Bate was appointed by David Cameron to run the "kitchen cabinet" in March 201. There is a ‘revolving door’ between McKinsey and the health service means that there are numerous former employees of McKinsey already embedded in jobs which will be critical if the Health and Social Care Reforms Bill is enacted. 

Adrian Masters  Director of Strategy Monitor -  was previously Director of the Health Team in the Prime Minister's Delivery Unit. Before that his career included spells with McKinsey, IBM and Price Waterhouse. Has accepted hospitality from Mckinsey's.

Helen Whately - Former Conservative parliamentary candidate has shrugged off any suggestion of a conflict of interest, after it emerged she works for the same consultants helping draw up plans which could see the A+E or maternity unit at Kingston Hospital removed.
Her website states she works as a management consultant specialising in healthcare, mainly in the NHS but does not mention her employer McKinsey

The Tory government's plans for the NHS (and welfare, education and policing) are basically all about outsourcing. By outsourcing as many  NHS and social care services as possible, the government will hope to reduce its expenditure on the NHS and social care. This is the actual ethos of the Conservative party, they have always wanted "small government" and they have always wanted to rid themselves of the NHS which they have previously described as a "millstone", in effect and by their own admission, the Tories want "small government".
Small government to the Tories means that they can absolve themselves from the responsibility of providing NHS, social and welfare care, which is why there was so much consternation about a clause in the government's Health and Social Care Bill which will allow the Health Secretary to stop being responsible for providing healthcare to the public. The Tories aim is to privatise all our public services. This will almost certainly result in a fragmented health and welfare services, police and education will follow. This means that the private sector will be providing all our services, they will not be doing this for philanthropic reasons, they will be doing this with the sole intention of making a profit. It means they will be given a set amount of money by the government to run services and providing they can run those services for less money then they will pocket the profits. This will mean a cut in the standard and quality of care it will mean fewer services offered, the profit motive to cut jobs, wage levels, staff conditions or the quality of services will become all encompassing. These private companies are out to make profit, it is why they are in existence, they are not in existence to provide health education or policing for nothing, at the end of the day, money will be taken out of our public services and into the pockets of the very people that caused the global recession. many private health companies also have their fingers in Hedge fund pies, and venture capitalism etc. Anyone who doubts what I am saying read  John Nash here, or Emma Harrison here.