To ask how you feel about the NHS?

[AnotherEffingOrangeRevel]

"A new mandate to NHS England is due to be published following the completion of the Spending Review, to take effect from April 2016."

We have ONLY TILL THE 24TH NOVEMBER to comment on this mandate (link below).

www.gov.uk/government/consultations/setting-the-mandate-to-nhs-england-for-2016-to-2017

It's not well publicised (surprise surprise), as the article below points out:

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/19/nhs-mandate-england-consulation-deadline

If you want to have your say, get in there now. Don't let them sneak it past us!

Damnit, I should have called this thread "AIBU to add a little gin to DS's porridge?" or "AIBU to breastfeed my dog?", shouldn't I?

Thanks op.

I've downloaded it.

Thanks for your response gleam. Glad you've downloaded the mandate.

Now, AIBU to breastfeed my dog?

:-) I think your afterthought was an excellent idea, I stole it. Hope you don't mind

Bump bump bump

Ok, well have just opened the mandate and checked out the form - will need to digest it properly before I can formulate a sensible response. The form's a bit bollocks though isn't it? I'm not sure it's the best way of collecting people's actual thoughts

Is it possible to breastfeed a dog? Wouldn't their muzzles not form a proper seal for suction - and wouldn't their teeth really really hurt?

Dogs feed puppies so yanbu if your dog is a puppy. Though human milk probably not nutritionally great for dogs :)

No gin? I'm not eating it.

It is definitely possible to breastfeed a goat, I've seen photos, so quite likely possible to breastfeed a dog.

What am I missing?? It doesn't really say anything, does it? And what about all the staffing levels and working hours? That doesn't feature....

Confused.com

bump

[This seems to be the longer thread, so I'm reposting from the other one. ]

Er, is it just me, or is that document so vague as to be almost meaningless?

It just seems to say: "We're gonna do Vagueness that we're gonna do. That's all right with you, yah?"

I could be wrong, but it feels like a PR exercise.

The sort where three years down the line they introduce something nasty and then say, "Oh but you can't complain about Slaughter of the New Born: it's covered by "make efficient use of resources" in §5.2(iii), and you didn't object to that when you had the chance.

Or am I just a hoary old cynic?

I agree with you, Pausing, so I must be a hoary old cynic too.

I agree too. Nothing much to hold on to; stupid questionnaire; idiotic dishonest exercise basically. But I sort of think it's important to see the machinations and manipulations of the beast. And then when we are later told there were no objections to X, Y or Z, we know better what they're basing their shite it on.

There are some things which are NOT said which are more important than the things that are, IMO.

Good article, with examples of some of the likely Slaughters of the New Borns: "Don't want the government to let the NHS die? Here's one crucial thing you can do right now"

I'm going to answer your title question: I feel weepingly sad that it's done for. We had a chance to save it, and it was by not voting the Tories in at the last election. It won't survive another full term of them in its current form. Hopefully there's a chance we won't go full-on American in terms of what we end up with, but the NHS as we know it now no longer has a chance.

wanders off to piss on any bonfires that are still going

Sorry, that's rather a gross image: I should think of another.

It's just a well-used phrase in this house re attempts to pass bills of the ilk "Fishery Regulation and Miscellaneous Provisions (Slaughter of the New Borns)"

Thanks pausing. Looks interesting.

Gin on cereal is overrated. Baileys is better. HTH

I've replied.

Consultation Questions

1. Do you agree with our aims for the mandate to NHS England?

No. There is no commitment to sufficient funding through the fairest and most efficient system (which the evidence shows, is public funding through progressive taxation). There is too much talk of patient self-care & management. Patients are not health professionals, and a sick person is not best placed to meet his or her own needs.

2. Is there anything else we should be considering in producing the mandate to NHS England?

We should be considering how to provide best-in-class, end-to-end healthcare for every member of English society, free at the point of delivery. We should be evaluating the likely cost of this care and taking the necessary steps to raise sufficient funds for it.

3. What views do you have on our overarching objective of improving outcomes and reducing health inequalities, including by using new measures of comparative quality for local CCG populations to complement the national outcomes measures in the NHS Outcomes Framework?

The overarching objective of the NHS should always be to improve outcomes and reduce health inequalities. There is no evidence that the envisaged measures of comparative quality will achieve this. Let's have less benchmarking and more health service.

4. What views do you have on our priorities for the health and care system?

Our priorities seem overwhelmingly to be:
Stop providing best-in-class healthcare to every citizen;
Make public healthcare profitable;
Adopt benchmarking procedures designed to conceal loss of quality in our public healthcare.
These priorities contradict the core ethos and intent of the NHS. They are contemptible.

5. What views do you have on how we set objectives for NHS England to reflect their contribution to achieving our priorities?

It doesn't matter how we set meaningless objectives in pursuit of contemptible priorities. We need a rethink, this time with the concerns of health professionals and patients to the fore.

Bumping for now and will read the links over the weekend.
Thank you another

I have asked MN if it would be possible to add this to the thread of the day.

I've just worked my way through this dilge after a long day at the coal face NHS frontline.

Now, I am in Scotland so the mandate for NHS England does not affect me directly - yet.
I sincerely hope that the strong working class ethic in public services in Scotland will keep the NHS afloat, because that document is just so vague it is insulting.
"Slaughter to the Newborns" indeed….

Garlick that's spot on. Think I'll just copy those, if that's ok!