My elder son has been in the NHS for twenty-five years. He’s witnessed the decline. The NHS is so much on its knees it is a pale shadow of what it should be. No wonder they are all striking. They are understaffed, overworked and underpaid.
Underfunding
Underfunding is at the heart of the problem. Despite lies and promises the money has never been put in. The Brexit lie of £350 million a week was a joke and a poke in the eye for hard-working staff. Johnson simply lied. There was no huge Brexit dividend. Indeed, the whole Brexit fiasco has hit the NHS hardest of all. Not only did they not put proper funding in, they also drove all the staff away and cut off a key source of overseas staff that were propping the system up.
The truth is that the government has not put in the percentage of GDP necessary to provide an excellent health service.
Johnson stood on the steps of Downing Street and said he was raising taxes to solve the ‘Care’ situation once and for all. He didn’t. He just raised taxes for them to give away to their chums.
Cuts
Thirteen years of continual cuts have reduced the service to the bone. Equipment and buildings are outdated and decaying.
Wage Cuts.
All the staff from Doctors and Nurses to cleaners, porters and ambulance drivers have suffered thirteen years of cuts. Their wages are now so low that they can’t attract staff in, are drastically understaffed. Then there’s the quality of the staff they do attract. Then there’s the burn-out on the dedicated staff who stay.
It’s tragic.
Now we don’t get cheap labour from the EU because of Brexit the cracks are really showing.
Why would staff work in the NHS when they can earn more in Tescos? Why would doctors and nurses work in Britain when they can double their salary by moving to Australia?
We’re in a crisis of the Tories making that has suddenly come to light because of the Cost of Living Crisis (another crisis created by Tory policies – rather than have proper windfall taxes on power, oil and banks ludicrous profits they prefer the workers to pay!).
All staff are now burned out, overworked and fed up.
One minute we’re all banging pans for them; the next minute they are being taken to court and vilified.
Creeping Privatisation
Not many people realise that GP services are no longer in the NHS. Then there’s Dentists. All the time people are being shunted into private services and have to pay because waiting lists are too long. You get the same surgeon and the same hospital but you jump the queue. How can that be right?
More and more American firms are sneaking in the back door offering services at a price.
The fear is that the Tories really want the NHS to fail so they can sell it off to the American pharmaceuticals. This is what they have done to Gas, Electricity, British Rail, Postal Services and Water. Now they are owned by foreigners, the profits go abroad, the service is poor, the workers are overworked and underpaid and we pay through the nose. Short-term gain and long-term loss. Selling Britain by the penny!
It’s so stupid! The profits used to come back to the British people! It’s what the Tories did with council housing – sold it off for a song and created a housing crisis further down the line. They cause the crisis and blame others.
