| Austerity 2.0 OR Things can only get worse? 10:40 - Jun 16 with 1622 views | DJR |
Given the current state of treatment and care in Aintree Hospital in Liverpool, where my wife is currently based to visit her poorly, elderly mother, I dread to think what it will be like in five years. And health is not an area pencilled in for £17 billion of cuts.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/article/2024/jun/15/labour-and-tories-would-
Labour and Tories would ‘both leave NHS worse off than under austerity’
Analysis by leading experts the Nuffield Trust reveals that main parties’ manifestos would squeeze health spending
Labour and the Conservatives would both leave the NHS with lower spending increases than during the years of Tory austerity, according to an independent analysis of their manifestos by a leading health thinktank.
The assessment by the respected Nuffield Trust of the costed NHS policies of both parties, announced in their manifestos last week, says the level of funding increases would leave them struggling to pay existing staff costs, let alone the bill for massive planned increases in doctors, nurses and other staff in the long-term workforce plan agreed last year.
The Nuffield Trust said that “the manifestos imply increases [in annual funding for the NHS] between 2024-25 and 2028-29 of 1.5% each year for the Liberal Democrats, 0.9% for the Conservatives and 1.1% for Labour.
“Both Conservative and Labour proposals would represent a lower level of funding increase than the period of ‘austerity’ between 2010-11 and 2014-15.
“This would be an unprecedented slowdown in NHS finances and it is inconceivable that it would accompany the dramatic recovery all are promising. This slowdown follows three years of particularly constrained finances.”
The trust added that the planned funding increases “would make the next few years the tightest period of funding in NHS history”.
Sally Gainsbury, senior policy analyst at the Nuffield Trust and a leading authority on NHS funding, said: “They will struggle to be able to pay the existing staff, let alone the additional staff set out in the workforce plan. It’s completely unrealistic.”
EDIT: The fact that real term increases in NHS spending, at a time of a rapidly growing population, were far below the average from 1945 to 2010 is why the NHS is in the state it is.
[Post edited 16 Jun 2024 14:11]
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| Austerity 2.0 OR Things can only get better? on 13:11 - Jun 16 with 1477 views | BlueBadger |
Non-NHS spending cuts have arguably had an even greater impact.
Cuts to social care, local council services, befits, etc, etc all contribute to making people sicker, more vulnerable and less able to function healthily.
Austerity is a false economy. |  |
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| Austerity 2.0 OR Things can only get worse? on 17:08 - Jun 16 with 1303 views | Leaky |
Is it NHS funding or the way it is spent. In my aging years my use of the NHS services has increased. I have noticed that the increase in admin staff has over taken front line staff.
IE too many chiefs not enough Indians |  | | |
| Austerity 2.0 OR Things can only get worse? on 17:12 - Jun 16 with 1280 views | Nthsuffolkblue |
| Austerity 2.0 OR Things can only get worse? on 17:08 - Jun 16 by Leaky |
Is it NHS funding or the way it is spent. In my aging years my use of the NHS services has increased. I have noticed that the increase in admin staff has over taken front line staff.
IE too many chiefs not enough Indians |
That seems very anecdotal.
There is a lot more evidence that increasing privatisation of services has led to increased costs for reduced service which should be unsurprising when you consider that private companies need to make a profit which will be their main motivation. |  |
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| Austerity 2.0 OR Things can only get worse? on 17:22 - Jun 16 with 1247 views | ArmaghBlue |
It will only get worse, regardless of who is in power. |  | | |
| Austerity 2.0 OR Things can only get worse? on 17:44 - Jun 16 with 1230 views | Nthsuffolkblue |
| Austerity 2.0 OR Things can only get worse? on 17:22 - Jun 16 by ArmaghBlue |
It will only get worse, regardless of who is in power. |
So the choice is the degree.
If it is only going to get worse, choose a party that will at least invest and pay for it with fairer taxation or carry on with a party whose raison d'etre is to cut taxation and cut investment and then argue we can't afford it (who also happens to have increased taxation and spent it corruptly at the same time). | |
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| Austerity 2.0 OR Things can only get worse? on 19:26 - Jun 16 with 1172 views | LegendofthePhoenix |
| Austerity 2.0 OR Things can only get worse? on 17:08 - Jun 16 by Leaky |
Is it NHS funding or the way it is spent. In my aging years my use of the NHS services has increased. I have noticed that the increase in admin staff has over taken front line staff.
IE too many chiefs not enough Indians |
That is the narrative that the right wing media wants you to believe.
As someone who works in the NHS, I can say that the under-funding has been happening for decades, and there is too much central control. NHS England and all the Integrated Care Boards are a total waste of time and money. They try to control the funding and impose so many rules and controls that front-line NHS organisations are suffocated. We are working in buildings that should have been replaced decades ago, with equipment that should have been replaced years ago.
We suffer constant failures of power outages, IT and network failure, buildings that leak every time it rains, vermin infestations, lack of heating in winter, insufficient and insecure space to keep anything. So every time the infrastructure or equipment fails, patients have to be rescheduled, so yes you need admin staff to do that. It's incredibly inefficient yet instead of being able to prioritise the clinical care, we have to provide data on our performance. We recently had to go through 10 iterations of a business case to get a scanner replaced that was 18 years old (that should have been replaced at 10 years). Not because the business case was inadequate - because there was no money and finance just needed to keep delaying and delaying into a subsequent financial year. How inefficient is that?
You give inadequate capital funding for year after year, you create impossible situations where vital equipment for cancer treatment, diagnostics, critical care etc are all competing against each other and major schemes never get off the ground. More cancellations, more delays, more inefficiency.
The backlog of funding is now vast. I have no idea how long it will take to fund all the infrastructure and equipment that is needed. But technology has been advancing relentlessly, there are millions more people in the UK now than in previous generations, and the proportion of elderly people who need increasing care has grown hugely. So don't blame it on "too many admin staff", that is a feeble excuse to mask the long standing under funding. |  |
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| Austerity 2.0 OR Things can only get worse? on 19:41 - Jun 16 with 1146 views | gtsb1966 |
Everyone wants the moon on a stick but they're not prepared to pay for it. The health service is unaffordable, the benefits system is unaffordable and the migrant situation is unaffordable. |  | | |
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