Patients v Ideology
I came across the following article in the Guardian recently written by a chap called Richard Vize who - unless there are other people with that unusual name - used to hold down a senior position with the Local Government Chronicle (LGS).
The connection being that I used to deal with Richard Vize and the LGS regularly - in the days when I used to act as Unison's Head of Local Government in Scotland - and I took up writing occasionally for the magazine once my trade union days were over.
In my opinion, Richard has his head screwed on the right way and politically speaking he can see the wood through the trees - so I was struck by this article on the NHS in which he says that the Conservatives are essentially winning the policy fight with Labour - by talking about patients instead of ideology.
I didn't catch much of either party conference, though I think I will now read the speeches made by both Jeremy Hunt and Andy Burnham - but in the wake of a scandal like Mid Staffs Hospital (where up to 1200 patients died unnecessarily) I have to say it doesn't surprise me - because what happened to people and their families in Mid Staffs had nothing to do with party politics.
In fact it took a community-based campaign, led by the families of neglected patients to bring the scandal to light - while those inside the system (senior doctors, nurses, professional bodies and the trade unions) - seemed pre-occupied with other things and their own priorities.
So, just for the record, I no more believe that David Cameron and Nick Clegg are out to 'destroy the NHS' as some would have it - than I believe the Coalition Government is on a mission to start World War III.
And to suggest otherwise simply detracts from tackling the real challenges facing the NHS - for example the country's GP service has been run by self-employed doctors for decades and as far as I know no one, including me, has lost a moment's sleep over their employment status.
Conservatives are winning the war of words on the NHS
At this autumn's party conferences, health secretary Jeremy Hunt's speech was aimed squarely at the voters while Labour's Andy Burnham wrote his for the party faithful
By Richard Vize
In his speech, Jeremy Hunt aimed to destroy Labour's reputation as the champion of good healthcare.
Photograph: Neil Hall/PA
At their conferences the political parties laid out their campaigns on theNHS for the 2015 election. Labour talked about ideology; the Tories talked about patients.
Shadow health secretary Andy Burnham had written his speech for the party faithful. Health secretary Jeremy Hunt aimed his squarely at the voters.
Hunt's mission was clear: to destroy Labour's reputation as the champion of good healthcare, to position the Tories as standing up for patients against the system, and to highlight touchstone policies which connect with what people want from the NHS for their families.
Hunt levelled a grave charge at Labour: that it oversaw a systematic cover-up of NHS failures. He talked about dead babies, blood-splattered wards and unfed elderly patients. He accused Labour ministers of refusing 81 requests for a public inquiry into Mid Staffs.
His announcement that the Care Quality Commission is to be given statutory independence "rather like the Bank of England", as a bulwark against future cover-ups, is a choice example of Hunt's political manoeuvrings. The change makes virtually no difference to the NHS but plays to the public's misguided belief that regulation leads to good services, and provides a powerful message about championing the rights of patients.
Hunt described the role of the new chief inspector of hospitals, Prof Sir Mike Richards, in language everyone can understand. For the first time everyone will know: "How good is my local hospital? Is it safe? Does it have enough staff? Does it put patients first?"
The touchstone policies were the Cancer Drugs Fund, which he claimed has helped 34,000 people so far, and the pilot scheme prime minister David Cameron announced on Tuesday to allow a small number of GP surgeries to open 12 hours a day, seven days a week. Funding for the scheme is a trifling £50m compared with a GP budget of £8.5bn, but it bought a lot of favourable conference-week headlines.
Burnham's speech was almost exclusively focused on his ideological obsession with privatisation. "They are softening it up to sell it off … Major contracts for NHS work won by Tory donors … Who gave this prime minister permission to sell the NHS to his friends?" and much more besides.
There was a pugilistic tone to his appeal to party activists, asking them to take the fight to the doorstep about battered and bruised staff. Hardly a vision for the future of healthcare.
In one telling line, Burnham let slip his frustration with the way the Conservatives have managed to wriggle out of being held to account for the multiple failures of their health reforms. The government is behaving "as if the biggest reorganisation in history never happened". Indeed it is, and that says something about Labour's effectiveness as an opposition.
Burnham's speech contained some humour, albeit unintentionally. Just moments after accusing the government of taking "the first steps towards an American health care system – English hospitals now asking for credit cards before they give care", he asked: "What kind of people scare patients unnecessarily?"
The shadow health secretary was talking the language of the Labour puritan: summoning up the spirit of Bevan and 1945, making obscure references to competition law and talking about street campaigning.
With all the ideological hectoring about who owns the means of production, patients barely got a mention. Burnham's big idea – "whole person care", uniting the NHS with social care – was introduced in the closing minutes almost as an afterthought.
It seems barely conceivable that, six months after the introduction of health reforms which were so badly botched that the secretary of state was sacked, the Conservatives are winning the war of words on the NHS.
Labour needs to stop talking to its grassroots about ideology and start talking to patients and the public about a vision for quality care.
This article is published by Guardian Professional. Join the Healthcare Professionals Network to receive regular emails and exclusive offers.
At their conferences the political parties laid out their campaigns on theNHS for the 2015 election. Labour talked about ideology; the Tories talked about patients.
Shadow health secretary Andy Burnham had written his speech for the party faithful. Health secretary Jeremy Hunt aimed his squarely at the voters.
Hunt's mission was clear: to destroy Labour's reputation as the champion of good healthcare, to position the Tories as standing up for patients against the system, and to highlight touchstone policies which connect with what people want from the NHS for their families.
Hunt levelled a grave charge at Labour: that it oversaw a systematic cover-up of NHS failures. He talked about dead babies, blood-splattered wards and unfed elderly patients. He accused Labour ministers of refusing 81 requests for a public inquiry into Mid Staffs.
His announcement that the Care Quality Commission is to be given statutory independence "rather like the Bank of England", as a bulwark against future cover-ups, is a choice example of Hunt's political manoeuvrings. The change makes virtually no difference to the NHS but plays to the public's misguided belief that regulation leads to good services, and provides a powerful message about championing the rights of patients.
Hunt described the role of the new chief inspector of hospitals, Prof Sir Mike Richards, in language everyone can understand. For the first time everyone will know: "How good is my local hospital? Is it safe? Does it have enough staff? Does it put patients first?"
The touchstone policies were the Cancer Drugs Fund, which he claimed has helped 34,000 people so far, and the pilot scheme prime minister David Cameron announced on Tuesday to allow a small number of GP surgeries to open 12 hours a day, seven days a week. Funding for the scheme is a trifling £50m compared with a GP budget of £8.5bn, but it bought a lot of favourable conference-week headlines.
Burnham's speech was almost exclusively focused on his ideological obsession with privatisation. "They are softening it up to sell it off … Major contracts for NHS work won by Tory donors … Who gave this prime minister permission to sell the NHS to his friends?" and much more besides.
There was a pugilistic tone to his appeal to party activists, asking them to take the fight to the doorstep about battered and bruised staff. Hardly a vision for the future of healthcare.
In one telling line, Burnham let slip his frustration with the way the Conservatives have managed to wriggle out of being held to account for the multiple failures of their health reforms. The government is behaving "as if the biggest reorganisation in history never happened". Indeed it is, and that says something about Labour's effectiveness as an opposition.
Burnham's speech contained some humour, albeit unintentionally. Just moments after accusing the government of taking "the first steps towards an American health care system – English hospitals now asking for credit cards before they give care", he asked: "What kind of people scare patients unnecessarily?"
The shadow health secretary was talking the language of the Labour puritan: summoning up the spirit of Bevan and 1945, making obscure references to competition law and talking about street campaigning.
With all the ideological hectoring about who owns the means of production, patients barely got a mention. Burnham's big idea – "whole person care", uniting the NHS with social care – was introduced in the closing minutes almost as an afterthought.
It seems barely conceivable that, six months after the introduction of health reforms which were so badly botched that the secretary of state was sacked, the Conservatives are winning the war of words on the NHS.
Labour needs to stop talking to its grassroots about ideology and start talking to patients and the public about a vision for quality care.
This article is published by Guardian Professional. Join the Healthcare Professionals Network to receive regular emails and exclusive offers.
