NHS study: Globalisation is bad for your health

[tiggat]

Further evidence that you have little idea of just how far the effects of PFI actually stretch.

And you a full-blown Barista too!!

You seem to be holding some secret knowledge, please share if it exists

[contractorinatractor]

Surely one can be of the opinion that PFI wasn't a great 'initiative' AND the Conservatives are happily driving specific aspects of the country into the gutter?

What country would purposefully drive needed aspects of the general operations into the gutter? The only reason I can fathom is further privatisation of hospitals - although the evidence clearly shows this will not benefit the poor, unemployed (of which people can be temporarily unemployed then have sudden severe illness strike), elderly and vulnerable - hello USA, how are you?

In the Telegraph article posted, the image caption is:
"Twice as many people were kept waiting for more than six weeks for crucial cancer tests last year than before the Coalition took office, according to government figures."

This is symptomatic of the Conservatives' drive towards increased efficiency and reduced costs. As anybody who runs a busy household knows there is only so far you can pair back the monetary outgoings slightly before a myriad of issues have a domino effect across the entire household. Councils have been cut back to such an extent that basic services aren't being approached anymore - things that benefit the economy: Paths are no longer gritted (so consumer spending goes down drastically during winters with bad weather), clean public tourist buildings (many covered with rampant moss).

But those pale in comparison to the approach to schools, healthcare, elderly care, plus numerous other basic necessities of a country; but income inequality is now researched to such an extent that it is clearly the worst it has been for a modern country in a modern UK. Rather than ensure a fairer share of the pie, aggressive tax avoidance has permitted the rich to get an order of magnitude beyond what would normally be thought of as acceptable. I see zero attempt by the Conservatives to tackle this, even though the measurement shows that late 2009 to late 2017 has been crazy in the terms of mass accumulation of wealth by the elites.

The number of households in relative poverty in England is in the millions - in a supposedly 'developed' country. No, there are not simply millions of households with a bunch of lazy adults - many presumably parents - who can't be assed working; they are likely on zero hours contracts here and there, sporadic work, which we all know has been the encouraged status for employers since 2009.

The USA isn't a shining example for all to copy. There's a good reason European countries aren't lining up to copy the pro-corporate anti-'man in the street' rhetoric of the USA: appalling income inequality and terrible quality public services. Both positions taken in this thread are actually correct; but the solution is not to punch yourself in the face repeatedly just to attain some arbitrary deficit target. No modern 'high tech' developed country goes backwards 50 or 60 years just to reduce a deficit quite so drastically.