Ten key NHS privatisation stories the BBC barely reported on

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The picture above shows the BBC Health Website at exactly 6.12pm today. If you click on the screen dump it will expand so that you can examine it more closely.

You can see that the current upheaval in the NHS plays very little part in the ?main coverage?. If you hoke around some regional parts of their site you get the occasional NHS story but by and large things go unreported.

Below I list 10 stories that I think the BBC should have reported.

1. The admission from Jeremy Hunt that he intervened to accelerate the Virgin Care acquisition of NHS Surrey?s Community Health also went unreported by the BBC. Given the public interest attached to Hunt intervening on behalf of Newscorp, one would imagine that him lobbying on behalf of Virgin Care was a matter of public interest (here).

1. The Care Quality Commission have failed 16 private hospitals in the last year and the BBC have not reported one. If we are allowed to combat the myth that private is good public is bad, then it is crucial that these failings are reported. The news that patients of a Virgin hospital were left lying in their own urine has a strong public interest attached to it (here).

1. The single greatest beneficiary of Tory outsourcing in the last 6 months have been a firm called Interserve, and their donor is a Tory Lord and former advisor to 2 Prime Ministers. The BBC should question the scale of Interserve?s £1bn contracts in 6 months (here).

1. In addition, most of the newspapers today carried a story that £20bn of the NHS is set to be sold off, a figure which I have been reporting for a month or so. The BBC didn?t even see fit to mention it (here).

1. In addition, the BBC fail to mention that John Nash the Trustee and reserved Consultant in Care UK donated £251,000 to the Tory Party. It is up to the BBC to question whether this has led to the under-reporting of 9 CQC Health Inspection failures in the last year (here).

1. In July, top Tory and Health Select Committee chairperson, predicted that some NHS services would no longer be free at the point of use. There is a strong public interest in the BBC reporting this story (here).

1. Last week, KPMG were sent in to review the finances of a Primary Care Trust in North Yorkshire. The BBC did not even report it even though this could affect 800,000 patients (here).

1. Last week the Office of National Statistics showed that 42,000 NHS jobs have been axed in 2 years and yet the BBC rarely mention NHS job losses (here). This is surely a matter for public interest.

1. The 3 A & E protest marches at the weekend are very poorly covered by the BBC. One Ealing march was briefly reported by the BBC as having been attended by hundreds and it came accompanied with a poor photograph. Even the Daily Mail saw fit to give more accurate reportage of the protest (here).

10. Half of England?s Ambulance Stations are being shut down in 2012. That puts in danger the golden hour especially since A & Es are shutting also. It is a shame on the BBC that they have failed to report this (here).

liberalconspiracy.org/2012/09/17/ten-key-nhs-privatisation-stories-the-bbc-barely-reported-on/

I can only applaud your highly informative post and I don't think the majority of people realise that come April 2013 there will no longer be an NHS. There will an HS but of course as we know whole hospitals are being sold off to "any willing providor" Talks were going on as early as Dec 2010 ( a few months about this shower of shite were elected) with international companies who were interested in the plan to privatise the NHS. How Cameron had the audacity to claim that there would be no "top to bottom" reorganisation of the NHS in his pre election claims I do not know.

I think this is an evil govt that is intent of privatising all public services and won't rest until that is done. Even if they are a one term parliament, the privatising of public services will not be able to be reversed. Shame on the Labout party for not shouting from the rooftops about what is happening in our country - Ed Milliband is too nice (he's like the 6th form swot) and hasn't got the fire in his belly for the top job. Sorry I am going off at a tangent as your post is about the BBC's reluctance to highlight the privatisation of the NHS and other matters that you have outlined in your post. I don't know why this is. I do know that there is a big difference between BBC News and Chanel 4 News, the latter being the far better channel for reporting on some of the issues you have raised. Also as a long time reader of the Guardian and the Observer, you do get very informative information and much critical comment on the govt's agenda to wage war on the poor.

It seems another thing they're not reporting on is how many MP's are going to make money from the privatisation of the NHS and that they voted for the reforms. Aren't they supposed to declare a conflict of interests?
socialinvestigations.blogspot.fr/2012/02/nhs-privatisation-compilation-of.html

This is an old post of mine from another thread a couple of months ago but i think its also relevant to this discussion.

carernotasaintMon 30-Jul-12 15:31:21

If the BBC one is biased in favour of the Gov. i wont be surprised. Look at the way Newsnight stitched up that single mum. Ive completely lost any respect for that programme as a result.
In the same week as the NatWest/RBS disaster exploded there was NOT one question asked about it on Question Time NOT ONE. But they still found 15 mins to moan about people on benefits. No questions pertaining to the Nat West disaster on the following weeks show either.
Earlier this year John Humphreys did a very biased show about benefit claimants on BBC2.
Then a few months later he did a Panorama programme in Greece about how awful it was that people over there were having to rely on charities and food banks.
Now i know Greece have a bigger crisis than us but people are having to use food banks over here john you fuckwit!
And idiots like him simply REFUSE to see that demonizing low income people the way he does will make it even worse over here.
I have NO FAITH in the BBC at all when they deal with issues like this. They tow the Government line. Too frightened of losing the TV licence.

Newsnight have gained some credibility back since then after doing a report on FGM and the way they covered the report of the Hillsborough Independent Panel last week.
But mostly i do watch Channel 4 news as they seem to be reporting on the relevant issues as said above.
Channel 4 news coverage of the Hillsborough Independent Panel news was excellent too.