... to think that Nigel Farage will be our next PM?

Yes, I agree. The British public is certainly in distress, and we are in a cyclical environment of abuse. It doesn’t matter what party it is in power.

I don’t really know how we can change it though. I often wonder why more decisions aren’t put to public vote, why is it just for a minority of people in the House of Commons - it’s not representative

Well, lets make it a 3 tier system then?

£27k in tuition fees plus living loan, 45k is a min unless parental support - a Doctor with a far longer training period, will rack up more debt, a lot more.

If there is no bottomless pit, then how would we pay for the billions required to pay for HCP tuition fees?

Higher wages, mean - generally speaking - less in work benefits, more taxes paid, happier workforce, better retention.... bribing people to stay, on the other hand, just makes people miserable, counting down the days until they can leave.... then there is the cost to the tax payer.

If i could pull one lever for the NHS, it would be to reduce PT work - a lot of waste with patient handovers and admin for all these extra workers.

I agree with this statement. If nothing changes, there will be civil war in the UK as per professor David Betz..

Also if we imposed minimum terms, then it might plug the shortage (albeit temporarily), until further Doctors can be trained. It’s just an idea. I think the same should go for most other HCP positions. The NHS is spending so much money on their training and for agency workers that we simply cannot afford this skills gap in my opinion.
It could potentially bring down waiting lists as well.

Appreciate this is a drop in the ocean.

I agree - it should be both. I don’t feel I have enough info to be able to propose a minimum term if I’m completely honest, but perhaps at least 2 years? I know doctors who have just come here from another country to complete their training in England and they’ve been open about going back to that country once they have finished. I think that’s wrong and somewhat exploitative of our NHS. Whilst I am aware there is a bit of a recruitment issue, this shouldn’t be happening as we vitally need doctors in this country.

Not all HCPs start with large debts like that though. And it already is a bit of a two tier system as many nurses who trained prior to 2017 (approx) had full funding. Yes, they didn’t always get paid for placement but the NHS isn’t an endless pit of money and they will have a stable job/career for life.

I am a CBT therapist worked in primary care NHS for 3/4 years. If we left suddenly after our training, some providers asked us to pay a proportion of the costs. It was written in the contract. Think it should be the same for GPs and any other HCPs in receipt of funded training.

A Doctor or any other HCP will start in the NHS with debts of around 50k to 100k, my DD owes 45k, would be more now & did 100s of hours of unpaid work during her degree.

Who would pay to give these people free tuition? what about HCPs who have stayed in the NHS, paid back large amounts?

You'd either have to refund these or create a 2 tier system of employees.

I see Jenrick is now talking up a gilts crisis, what a xxxx he really is.

Agree. Any training financed by taxpayers needs a return for taxpayers. Perfectly normal system in any other private sector profession.

How about both?

What min term would you like? they'd still leave after that plus they already pay back a proportion of their training costs.

How about we make the NHS a great place to work instead?

Think it’s ridiculous that we train doctors here, and then they jump ship and move countries after finishing. There should be a minimum term that they have to work in the UK or they pay back the cost of their training.

Do you not rate the OBR forecast?

All because they stopped serving the country and only focused on their own interest. They knew Brexit was going to be toxic for ordinary Brits. Didn't stop them and that's unforgivable. I am still incredibly angry with Cameron. I hope history judges him harshly.

Oh dear...bankruptcy! don't you mean IMF ? lol!

I'll leave you to talk down the UK and its prospects.

Given the latest OBR forecast I suggest it is you that is being complacent.

Actually if I were an NHS doctor I'd be jumping ship now to get first in the queue of all those other UK doctors fleeing to deprived countries like NZ and Canada who are unable to train their own doctors for their vast populations. The hugely generous package they are currently on in the UK can't last after the UK bankruptcy.

They won't move btw. They are on to too good a thing here. And the government is scared of them.

The Dr's going on strike wont be on much more than average earnings - hourly rate.

Its not just Australia, its Europe, NZ, the USA, Canada...

You re being rather complacent... given how much it costs to train and our health system

As I mentioned upthread, there's a limit to how many UK doctors can flee to Australia given the small population. I think the government should reject any more grabbing by them.

Are NHS doctors millionaires? Being the ones that I referred to that are leaving the country due to Labour's tax policies?? I did not realise this! (although you and @Blossomtoes obviously did).

Labour largesse is even greater than I realised!!

Edit. Actually a fair few.NHS doctors I know are millionaires given the benefits they receive for being an NHS doctor. So I suppose your point does ring true.

What health systems?

All the ones usually mentioned are variations on this.

Italy Sweden and Portugal all operate a tax payer funded model as per the UK...

Which countries exactly copies France? or Germany? or Australia?

The claim "ah no one copies the NHS" well every country has its own specific model

Insurance based models, require the individual to top up, in France, its around 70/30 split between taxation and insurance, with a great deal of admin reclaiming amounts paid.

Countries with a better healthcare system than the UK, pay more and integrate more, especially social care, we seem to not want to bring SC into the mix...

This was the view of a parliamentary committee set up to review the funding model.

The committee considered the advantages and disadvantages of the UK moving to an alternative funding model. It said there was “general agreement that this would not be a viable solution for the UK”. It added that the committee was “not persuaded of any link between the way you choose to collect the money to fund a health service and performance”.

The committee’s conclusion on the future funding system of the NHS emphasised that it was how revenue was used that was the important factor, rather than how it was generated. It said:

International evidence shows that a tax-funded, single payer model of paying for healthcare has substantial advantages in terms of universal coverage and overall efficiency. There was no evidence to suggest that alternative systems such as social insurance would deliver a more sustainable health service. Sustainability depends on the level of funding and, crucially, how those funds are used.[22]

This sounds like a lot of things you are assuming but have no evidence for (although surely the idea that nobody sees the NHS as worth copying as an indicator that others believe there are better ways of providing universal healthcare.

Raise taxes that was a risk but Labour had a good majority, tax the super wealthy. Under Labour at this time there was a huge surge in money coming in from abroad, investing here as a way to pay little tax (this is when foreign investment in properties really took hold in London)

It was a poor move from Labour to take the risk to add to Trusts debts it was short sighted.

I am very much a supporter of Blair/Brown but I do absolutely acknowledge mistakes they made

unfortunately governments now all seem to be working on quick fixes. The NHS is broken (yes made worse by the Tories) but we are where we are. The only positive that Labour can spin at the moment is that the NHS is free at the point of service. What is the point in this when the services are so often poor. We deserve better staff working in healthcare deserve better.

The NHS should not be used as a political football and we should not be manipulated into thinking we are lucky because at one time the NHS was a great health service. People are seeing through this as more and more people are receiving poor care. The days of the great NHS are long gone and its about time politicians worked (collectively) towards a health service that

We are not all right wingers that believe the NHS is beyond saving (few of my colleagues believe this now, that very different from 8 years ago when we marched to save the NHS)

Because they’ve never had a healthcare system like ours to lose. No economist or healthcare expert believes that adopting a different funding model would improve the NHS. It would be like trying to fix the engine by re spraying the bodywork.

Why do you think this is true for all global health systems?

All of which involve paying exactly the same amount of tax as we do already BUT having to pay for some sort of social insurance on top, shared between employee and employer.

I'm sure that'll go down well on here......