Westministenders: Boris and his friends hand in their homework to be marked.

[RedToothBrush]

The last week has been depressing for a lot of people.

Even if you are happy about the vote in the Commons, there is a worrying lack of backbone in MPs of all shades.

Then there’s what is going on in the USA which I’m going to quietly ignore in this post except to say that cosying up to Trump still could backfire on all who do for numerous reasons.

It seems like its all over in someways, but there is still plenty going on.

The A50 Bill has only passed stage one. The Government’s deliberate publishing of the White Paper after the vote has left a lot of people with egg all over their face.

Plus its just crap. Actually its not crap. It’s a dog dinner of farcical proportions with no content, faulty data and incorrect details that an A-Level Student did the night before their assignment was due, masquerading as an official government document.

Now its amendment time, which is the serious bit. For an amendment to make it, it will need cross party support. After the government failed to produce a White Paper worth the paper it was written on, and insulted the intelligence of the House of Commons, that could get interesting.

For starters the White Paper says that EU citizens are one of our best bargaining chips. Trouble is a lot of Tory and Labour MPs don’t agree.

In short there is a fair old chance of a government defeat next week at some point. The government don’t want any. Especially not this early. I really think it will be very difficult for the government to provide the assurance MPs will want, even if they crack the whip. They have lost the trust of too many. In voting for the first vote, many MPs will feel they have shown their intent to support leaving and now will get busy on trying to hammer down the details.

Highlights include of the White Paper include the idea that we will still be subject to the ECJ except we won’t. This is ridiculous. We will be subject to ECJ rulings but not be subject to ECJ rulings directly. Eh? What? (Not that we didn’t see this coming). There’s Euroatom and the government doing an impression of Homer Simpson. With a by-election in Copeland on the cards. That story has some time to keep running. As Steve Peers points out, the Leprechauns are going to sort out Northern Ireland for us which is a great political strategy to employ.

Its full of lots of other utter bollocks but those particular points are the ones that are potentially the most problematic for the government. If you don’t think the White Paper screams we are going to get eaten alive by the EU and Trump, you need to get off the hallucinogenics pronto.

If that isn’t awe inspiring enough we also have:

The wonderful mental image of Paul Nuttall kipping on a mattress in a house in Stoke disparately pretending to be a Stokie, nervously hoping that letterbox rattling in the wind isn’t C4 letterbox again and that the coppers don’t pay him a visit in the near future. I confess that whilst my imagination has been kept busy with this, I am disappointed in the lack of video clips of him munching on an Oatcake in a Stoke City shirt, sitting on an Armitage Shanks throne, turning his plate over whilst listening to Robbie Williams and with a Titanic by his side. All at the same time. I think he’s missed a few tricks.

AND

Diane Abbott doing quite possibly even more damage to Labour than them merely rolling over and dying over a50 by pulling a sickie. Her ‘Brexit Flu’ damages the party’s image and Corbyn himself even more. If that’s even possible. Some Labour MPs have demanded an apology.

Labour is starting to look like it’s a ship with rats fleeing this week. MPs have defied a three line whip and quite the Shadow Cabinet (Again). Rumours are that over 7000 members have left. A councillor has defected to the Lib Dems. There was a council by election in Rotherham where Lab lost a seat to the LDs in an area where there has never been as many people vote LD. Nor were there as many remain voters as LD voters. The Parliamentary vote for Unite’s new leader has unsurprisingly selected the anti-Corbyn candidate Gerald Coyne over Len McCluskey. The bookies have dropped the odds on Corbyn leaving Labour before a GE from 6/1 to 2/1 overnight. Oh and Red Ed is being rumoured to be returning to the front bench…

Hashi I am sure you'd have something to say if we did blame the NHS

It's something like 0.004% of the total budget i.e. derisory, and in the majority of cases would cost more to collect than the money gained. I can see that there might be a couple of hospitals in major conurbations which did have significant numbers.

Hashi I am sure you'd have something to say if we did blame the NHShmm

Well that makes sense considering I did just point out the NHS's inefficiencies

Among the health tourists, of course, are British expats who come back to the UK for non-emergency medical examinations and treatment, without revealing that they are habitually resident elsewhere.

Bored from what understand, the cost of enforcing in whatever scheme is just not worth it. The cost of health tourism is miniscule. That's the point.

The cost is estimated as £2 billion which includes emergency care. The government have a target of wanting to recover £500million. Currently they are estimated to be hitting £350million - so £150million a year short.

To register with a GP you have to give certain information. If they are in hospital you are generally referred on from the GP. So there is already something of a network in place to enforce this through this process.

To enforce in emergency situations you would ultimately have to take time away from doctors and nurses in hospitals because of the nature of how it is happening. Its not something you could use admin staff to do, because of how patients are treated and where the costs are being incurred. Otherwise you would be jeopardising the very idea that healthcare is free at the point of service. It could slow down admissions or mean that certain groups are unfairly discriminated as they are wrongly judged as potential health tourists more often than other groups.

Equally, you would produce an effect where people who are very sick and are admitted in an emergency situation do stupid things which endangers their lives (and ultimately ends up costing the NHS more in terms of time, not just money in readmissions). People who might well be eligible but are still concerned about the system in someway through ignorance or even ill health.

You need to put this into context. We are effectively talking about £150million across the country in a year to hit the government's target (they will have set this target, believing that the rest of the money would be extremely difficult if not impossible to recover and have already effectively written this amount off).

A few months ago, we were talking about £350 million a week buses.

This is the bottom deck of a bus out of the fleet of 52 that were talked about.

That puts the amount into a little bit of context.

Its a tiny, tiny, tiny amount of money in the NHS budget.

The economic argument is daft. Its a false economy to try and enforce this. It runs the danger of damaging the relationship between doctors and patients - which in turn has unintended associated costs.

(Example: patient who is eligible for care has a strong accent. Previous experience of being required to provide proof is a pain or they feel targeted or harassed so they avoid going to the doctor early. They then only see the doctor when they are sicker - and their care costs more as a direct result. I highly recommend Margaret McCartney's new book 'The State of Medicine' which talks about how politics damage health care and cost the NHS money for more examples of similar issues).

It does not ultimately end up benefiting the NHS and the public as a whole. It only benefits the governments approval ratings. The same government who are cutting care per head and then blaming immigrants for this as health tourists. it is little more than a cover story for them privatising for their own self interest and pockets (have a look at how many Tory MPs have personal investments in private health care).

As with every 'fake news' story, follow the money.

As a principle the idea that we should make people who don't pay for the NHS and are not eligible to pay for their care it does sound like a good idea. I do not disagree with this.

In practice the reality of enforcing this costs more time, money, resources and damage to patients relationships with health care than make it worth while to pursue.

Its a populist policy which does not give thought to the implementation and just thrives on the hate it produces. And lets politicians make a killing personally.

Figures above were the ones just quoted on BBC news btw.

www.politicshome.com/news/uk/political-parties/uk-independence-party/nigel-farage/news/83070/nigel-farage-and-wife-living
Nigel Farage and wife 'living separate lives' despite his recent claim they were still together

Re: another story. The BBC and other sources are quoting Farage's wife as saying they have been leading separate lives for some years.

I wonder what her situation will be post Brexit.

www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/06/uks-government-hires-advertising-giant-as-it-fights-far-right-threat
UK government hires M&C Saatchi to fight far-right threat
Advertising campaigns come amid news of secret Whitehall unit monitoring links between UK and European extremists
So TM, after fanning the flames of xenophobia since her infamous conference "citizens of nowhere" speech, has now realized that there is a problem. Solution: Hire expensive advertising firm ,of course!

boredofbrexit Mon 06-Feb-17 13:11:10
Depends how Health tourism is defined though. And perhaps the intention is going forward, when we are no longer part of the EU if no reciprocal rights can be agreed?

So you are suggesting it is right that EU nationals who have lived here for 30 years should suddenly loose their healthcare on the basis of their nationality alone?

It sounds like it.

I wonder what her situation will be post Brexit as precarious as it is now, being married to a Brit makes no difference. I wonder if she has been a SAHM, she could be in trouble then...

According to various sources Kirsten was at one time working for UKIP MEPs including Nige and getting a salary from the European Parliament. She isn't on the current list of assistants on the EP website, although she certainly was in December 2014.

It would be good to see a list of those Tory MPs who have investments in private health care. For those of us active in party politics, it would be very useful ammunition for any forthcoming elections.

Look!! Look!!
Don't look at the collapse of social care and less funding and the closures of a and e depts- look at health tourism!!!
That's the real problem!!

We're gonna need a bigger scapegoat.

Also re NHS and health tourism.

If in the private sector you offer business / service on credit then you accept the risk and danger that a certain percentage of customers will not pay up. It is part and parcel of that business. Even with legal means you can not recover all amounts owning so have to write this off. This is something you should expect in running a business.

In order to have healthcare free at point of service you have to accept this. Even for routine surgery it is wrong to be asking people for payment up front if you believe in the principle of free at the point of service otherwise it runs the risk of being discriminatory or risking the health of a patient. Whilst life might not be at risk, should people who can't pay up front be forced to 'go back to where they come from' (which they may not be able to afford easily) or travel long distances whilst having a health problem that has been diagnosed and needs attention?

Imagine if that condition is a cancer of some description for example.

Would you be happy about it, if it was your elderly father in Spain who was told to pay up front or go back to the UK for treatment?

This policy is morally bankrupt.

My mum was sent home after having a heart attack a couple of weeks ago - no beds on coronary care
I don't blame health tourism for that
Go to any a and e and you will see the same story...90% of patients over 70 and with complex health issues...some have dementia so need 1:1 care
There was a poor man when mum was in who was being treated on a 1:1 psych hold - his wailing was pitiful to hear
Add to that the people who go because they fancy a day out (yes this actually happens with older lonely people!) and it's utter chaos
Which - the cynic in me would posit - is the exact way the tories want it to be so they can clog it off to their rich cronies
Jesus
How can people be SO apathetic about this!!?

flog
Bloody auto correct!

Peregrina it might be worth contacting the Mirror, the Grauniad and Unite to see whether they have up-to-date research on MPs and links to private health care companies. They have all published such research in the past, but I can't find anything more recent than early 2015, which was before the last GE, of course.

For those who may say what's the answer I would suggest the following;

Reverse the cuts in social care budgets
Reverse the decision on nursing nurseries
More funding!!
Make EU NHS workers exempt from any brexit deals

We are an ever ageing population and are more and more living with very complex health needs.
I'm my mothers case she hasn't really needed he NHS until the last 4 years and she is 71

Oh!!
Hang on!!
I forgot about the £350 million a week the NHS will be getting after brexit!!!
Silly me.....

So TM, after fanning the flames of xenophobia since her infamous conference "citizens of nowhere" speech, has now realized that there is a problem. Solution: Hire expensive advertising firm ,of course!

"Look I'm doing something! I have taken action."

"The fact that I could have had a word with my close mates Paul and Rupert who make a profit out of peddling this shit, and I could have refrained from using certain words and phrases in speeches and white papers myself is beside the point."

"I wouldn't want them to loose money. I am creating business by giving money to generate jobs in the advertising sector."

Says Not Theresa May.

White right wing killers who target politicians are lone mentally unstable individuals who exist in a vacuum. Muslim terrorists have been radicalised by reading radical propaganda on the internet and are highly impressionable. Unlike the white nutters who are just sick.

blogs.lse.ac.uk/brexit/2017/01/31/the-brexit-referendum-was-a-violation-of-human-rights/

Good point well made RTB(although you have a little loose/lose typo, sorry)

bored are you saying that those people who are working in the uk, paying taxes and sometimes have done so for years, shouldn't get free treatment on the NHS? Even though they are paying for a product, to be covered health wise?

Or are you saying that those who have a partner that is working but aren't working themselves (e.g. SAHP, a Person who is ill etc..) shouldn't get free NHS because they aren't British. But somehow those same people who are British can. Isn't that duscrimination by citizenship, which really is the same than discrimimatuon by race? Or exactely what Trumps did re visa and has been seen as totally bonkers and inhumane?

Or do you mean something else altogether?

Cecile even with my crappy maths, that looks like about 5.5 million votes that disappeared. Same problem in America