Does Cameron's "Big Society"....

[RMCW]

...remind anyone else of "The Fourth Sector" from that episode of "The thick of it"??????????

The Coalition has rolled back the civil liberty infringements of the control freaks.

Agree smallwhitecat. They had a consensus. Thatcher broke the consensus. But they now have a consensus again, despite Labour's theatrics.

hitchens still professes to be a marxist but that could be coz he's terminally ill and has seen the error of his iraq war supporting ways.

rightwing IS about freedom. freedom of an egocentric, myopic type tho that tends to shaft the majority while keeping an elite way too rich. this is illogical in the end as can't be sustained in the long term.

SWC - I work in hospitals. There are NO volunteers on the wards. The discussion further up the thread was about clinical work. Not about a volunteer wheeling a shelf of books around the wards. Keep up with the discussion or don't be so plain nasty.

Volunteers serve Teas and Coffees in hospital waiting rooms yes, they don't as yet actually work on wards. Isn't part of the problem with hospitals the divisision between medical and social care. A generation ago nurses provided much of the latter and a bit of the former. Today they all have degrees, are much more medically savvy and expect (quite rightly) to use their qualifications while no one is doing the personal care stuff. Sorry, I digress

I didn't know Hitchens was terminally ill. Sad to hear that. Has he got cancer?

Amother - one of the hospitals I worked in they had just started to implement the supervision by a nurse of the handing out of meals by catering staff. Because some patients were receiving food when they were pre-op and should have been nil by mouth, or were on water restriction etc. I can't see the common sense of some volunteer going round the ward with tea and coffee happening. I'm sure on some wards it could happen, e.g. post-natal, but I haven't seen it yet.

Also, if it's a job that needs doing, why should it not be paid? It's not just a nice extra like having your Daily Mail delivered to your bedside. (Maybe 'nice' isn't correct in the context of the DM.)

I would have thought Labour would have banned the Daily Mail from hospital wards to stop the truth getting out.

I agree, this volunteering is a downgrading of the professionalism required to do important jobs. It will lead to a worse service for many people.

Cristina, why do you think we get some of these hospital scandals that we read about today in the paper?

Claig - the truth about doctors being paid millions and wards being staffed by forreners?

Because scandal sells. Not so much the whole Andrew wakefield thing, that wasn't quite as widely reported, although you'd have thought it had the right ingredients.

The truth about all matters of state.

Are you saying that it isn't a scandal that old people have been dying due to not being fed and due to dehydration? I don't think these things are reported enough.

hitchens has cancer, yes. and don't confound yer trotskyism with yer marxism.

cristina love the name. is that an homage to nick cave? sorry, gone a bit off topic.

GeorgeO - yes, it's from a Nick Cave song :)

SWC - I don't answer for 'most of those on the left'. It's not sneery to say that volunteers can dish out the Daily Mail but not medication. You can't cut services and rely on others' goodwill and charity to make up the shortfall. It's not the Victorian era.

claig - that is scandalous about the experience of some old people in hospitals. The solution though isn't to send in a bunch of volunteers.

Yes, I agree with you, a bunch of volunteers is like putting a bandaid on a broken leg. We all deserve better than that.

Old people being mistreated on hospital wards? IMO this is nothing new. When I worked with the elderly years ago as a social worker, the elderly weren't treated well then. Some of the geri wards smelled of -piss, wee. Some elderly ladies not given nightdresses and having open gowns to wear (showing all of the back of them to the 'gentlemen' on the mixed wards!) sometimes the bar on the bed was not put up and an old person would fall out of bed, injuring themselves etc. This treatment of the elderly has been going on for years.

Sadly.

Daily Mail doing a sterling job of bringing this scandal out in the open. (to the public).

SWC - I don't know about your area of interest in autism. I could equally say that faith in charities and small private companies can be naive and misplaced. See the Andrew Wakefield scandal. BTW it's your tone that you need to see to...

smallwhitecat don't bandy about terms such as "persecution complex" when it was actually you who initiated the defensive vibe. but as an evident free marketeer and/or right winger you've prob quite alot to be defensive about.

just thought i'd leap to your defence cristina seeing as your a fellow nick cave fan! (just joshing)

Thanks, GeorgeO. I haven't been to a NC concert in too long.