Tories are asset stripping the country

[Letshaveablackcelebration22]

I don’t remember things ever being as bad as they are now in the U.K. and I am 50 this year. The NHS is collapsing/ has collapsed (depending where you live), we have the most expensive energy costs of any country in Europe, public transport is shit, housing is dreadful & unaffordable for many, we have the most expensive water in the world etc etc.

The tories made a fortune through their dodgy dealings in covid- many work on the sly for private companies lobbying while in power. The want the NHS to fail so it’s easier to privatise (exactly what they did with trains, water, power companies etc). The country is being pillaged for the wealthy & is in a right state.

We should be on the streets but people are struggling so much at the moment, it’s hard to have the energy to do it.

Is a general strike the answer?

I always love the posters who deny the privatisation plans for the NHS 🙄. It’s been happening for years and of course it’s a prize. It’s not what it is now that’s the prize, it’s what it’s worth to them and their mates in the future. The American makes certain people astoundingly wealthy and the Tories want that here. There’s millions to be made and they’ll be the ones making it.

American system

Yep. It’s been constant for years.

@GoingtotheWinchester yes and it’s always sold as the private sector can solve all the problems when it’s just about making millions for the few- as seen in the post office, water, power, transport and everything else they have sold off. It’s grim. It’s all about demonising the public sector too. They’d sell their own granny if they could

But its been in crisis many, many times. I know, I was alive for it. I remember. The word "unprecedented crisis" is an almost annual cry.

More and more money is thrown at it and nothing improves.

This isn't a Party Political issue. The NHS has become a wasteful and incompetent behemoth. Money won't fix it.

It needs to be completely rebuilt from the founding principle up. I personally favour a German model.

Loving the idea of a general strike.

It's an absolute dog's dinner out there, I can't understand the complacency. We're being told to bend over and we're all just asking how far 🙄

This is one of the most offensive and ill-informed posts I've ever read on MN. And that's saying something!

The Tories are killing the NHS while pretending to invest more in it than anyone else, and while John Redwood and other people try to pretend it's not a funding crisis but an NHS management crisis. Bollocks. You can't run the NHS on hot air and dust.

@BMW6 but it’s deliberate. It’s by design. Same with the education system- they would love schools to become ‘academies’ accross the board- again privatise them. Our primary can barely keep running as funding is so bad.

The NHS and Healthcare budget represents over 40% of all government spending. Not to mention the additional £12billion awarded to clear backlog, which is on top of the planned increase in funding. There is an independent pay review body that the government adheres to. At the current rate of funding NHS/Healthcare will be 50% of all public spending!. So in effect you’ll have an NHS with a government attached.

And if " let people die" was what Tories were going to allow before privatising it then surely they missed the golden moment at the height of the Pandemic?

Also if it would be such an unpopular move then they'd be voting themselves out of power for generations?

Your premise makes no sense.

@BMW6 well they did let people die in the pandemic. A LOT of people. Jesus.

I agree with you op

If the tables were turned and labour had got the country into its current state people would be frothing at the mouth and rioting. For some reason Tories are always forgiven, I expect it's a lot to do with how the media reports on them.

It's staggering how far the country has fallen under 12 years of Tory leadership but people still seem blind to it.

Actually you make no sense. You know the privatisation process has already begun, right? It's not a secret. Various health services have already gone out to private tender. It's happening.

These posts are so transparent it’s laughable 🤣

Of course they are. The same thing happened with the privatisation of railways, water services, airports etc. We were all told everything would be better. In fact we pay a lot more for worse services and all the profits go to overseas companies. The same would happen on a massive scale if we have privatised healthcare.

In fact @BMW6 i think we had one of the highest death rates in the world during the pandemic. Boris’s policies and Hancock’s incompetence caused tens of thousands of unesscessary deaths. Their dodgy PPE contracts to their mates caused unsafe working practices for many hospital staff. Again, more asset stripping.

We're not far off a general strike - nurses and ambulance workers, transport, postal workers, teachers in Scotland with teachers in England having been balloted for strike action. The trouble is, you need collective action through Unions to organise a general strike and most private sector workers are not members of Unions.

The government's answer of course is to try to make striking illegal, like some sort of dictatorship.

@EileenAdler which posts? The Tory apologist ones or the rest?

In answer to the OP: couldn’t agree more. Thatcher began the process in the 1980s. We are now seeing and living with the consequences.

Jonathan Coe wrote a satirical novel about it called What a Carve Up! in the 90s sometime.

We shouldn't really be surprised. Capitalism is all about private ownership and not state run services. Just a shame it doesn't work.

I have 3 nurse friends, none can strike because although they work in nhs hospitals, the actual employer is a private company. Loads of bits if the nhs are private. Not so long ago when i rang my health visitor i got 'hello, virgin healthcare health visiting' on the phone. They no longer have that contract, but the health visiting service is still a contract..

This is high. We need to look at population health as part of changes made.

I know posters want to keep increasing funding so it’s higher and higher but the burden will just grow. Some of these posts are just tax more and nothing else.

Not true. 19% not 40+%
fullfact.org/economy/health-public-spending-forty-percent/

The OBR says the annual govt spending for 2022-23 will be 1182 billion. The NHS budget is about 150 billion.

I don't get it either, we should be kicking up a fuss, walking the streets, but it's it that there's just so much to fight against? Is it too big of a problem to know what the solution is?

I would back some kind of fight against it but wouldn't know where to start