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Am I missing the point about tuition fees?
- Thread starter Lord Bracknell
- Start date
Lord Bracknell
On fire
- Thread starter
- #122
I'm sorry, but it is TOTALLY UNTRUE that, before 1947, "most people" only saw a doctor when they were "desperate".
Cite please. In poor areas, there were charity hospitals and doctors working via the benevolence of the wealthy. Otherwise, many people just simply couldn't afford to go to a doctor.
Lord Bracknell
On fire
- Thread starter
- #124
You are completely ignoring the role of municipalities in the delivery of health care. Municipal services were not exclusively dependant on the the notion of charity and the benevolence of the wealthy.
You want citations?
John Stewart, Becky Taylor and Martin Powell: ‘Central and Local Government and the Provision of Municipal Medicine, 1919-39’, English Historical Review, CXXII, 496, 2007
John Stewart, Alysa Levene and Martin Powell: ‘The Development of Municipal Hospital Care in English County Boroughs in the 1930s’, Medical History, 50, 1, 2006
Thank you. If I have time, I'll look into these interesting-sounding sources.
In the meantime, a doctor charged 5 shillings in the 1920s/30s. A widow's pension was then, for example, 10 shillings. The minimum wage for agricultural workers was £1/11s, or £1.55. A doctor's visit took up a huge portion of lower-paid people's income at that time, so a doctor's visit was not taken lightly.
However, the way you put it implies the NHS was not actually needed if municipalities were already taking care of things.
Lord Bracknell
On fire
- Thread starter
- #126
One of the major aims of the NATIONAL Health Service was to remove the health inequalities that arose from varying levels of LOCAL health care provision.
This will become a major issue in the next few years, once the Tory plan to replace Primary Care Trusts with local Consortia of General Practitioners kicks in. It's going to be a post code lottery, the like of which we haven't seen since post codes were invented (or since 1947).
Still, you'll get what you want ... overpaid health administrators replaced by doctors who will spend their time on administration, rather than providing medical treatment.
queens park pete
Prog off!
LB- never mind citations- have a chat with my dad and look at the botch job "the quack from the sick club" did with a stomach op when he was about 4- 1939.
His mum and dad were terrified at the thought of any medical fees. (AS were my mum's parents). It wasn't until the NHS was foisted on a significant number of unhappy doctors as part of the post war settlement with the working classes that normal folk could "afford" to be ill.
Shame that the post war contract appears to have been torn up by the con dems, see every post on students, cuts etc.
His mum and dad were terrified at the thought of any medical fees. (AS were my mum's parents). It wasn't until the NHS was foisted on a significant number of unhappy doctors as part of the post war settlement with the working classes that normal folk could "afford" to be ill.
Shame that the post war contract appears to have been torn up by the con dems, see every post on students, cuts etc.
Lord Bracknell
On fire
- Thread starter
- #128
I look forward to the arguments within the LibDem party about the Tory plan to dismantle the NHS. It'll be all about the alleged benefits of "localising" decision making - which, with their usual blinkered eyes, LibDem activists seem to think is universally a good thing. Meanwhile, the benefits of a national health service will be allowed to evaporate.
Absolute scaremongering rubbish. No political party would dare dismantle the NHS. However, every political party does realise it needs to be restructured or re-organised to be more cost-effective.
No, hopefully we'll just get fewer administrators by getting rid of those who are only administrating each other. Are you one of them?
Hopefully?
You clearly have no idea how these management types protect themselves and will cut front line services at the drop of a hat.
Of the £6,500 that is currently given by government for tuition at present in HE, only £600 of that goes on teaching, the remainder is swallowed up by VC's, their entourages and administration.
Lord Bracknell
On fire
- Thread starter
- #132
No. But I do manage an organisation that receives funding from the Primary Care Trust to provide a valuable care service to older people and people with disabilities in Brighton and Hove. When the Brighton & Hove PCT is abolished, we will have to negotiate funding with THREE independent local Consortia of GPs in the city, each one of which might choose to prioritise our service differently. If we don't succeed in all three sets of negotiations, then the chances are that the whole service will collapse and the existing benefits will be completely lost.
Alternatively, an existing city-wide service might become one that is only available to residents of one part of the city (East Brighton, for example).
Actually, I made this very point earlier in this thread. (Or was it on another forum?)
beorhthelm
A. Virgo, Football Genius
- Jul 21, 2003
- 36,031
i find this point of view most odd. do you believe that "middle class parents" are so cash rich that they can sub thousands of pounds a year for their childrens university education? its seems a fundemental misguided idea that those better off than you have lots of money to spare, ignoring that people pretty much spend what they earn to, matching expediture and lifestyle to their income. You're quite right, not every kid is going to be paying the fees. In fact its precisely the middle classes who will be most affected by this, they will have the ingrained apperations and expectations without the spare resources to do anything other than take the loans. meanwhile the poor will be subbed by the state/universities/other students. what's grossly unfair, is that a very-bright student who happens to have come from a middle-class household will be paying/loaning full wack, while an average student from a poorer houshold will get to go for less or free. parental income should have nothing to do with funding, it should be based on ability. but thats seems far too complex a debate for most, easier to knock the tories instead and ignoring the Liberal tax and Labour indecision to loans/tax missed the point entirly. none of these solutions are correct.
genuine enquiry, why they would leave it until they are desperate, if not because financial concerns would override small ailments and minor injuries?
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Genuine question. Why three independent local consortia? Or why would the existing city-wide service possibly be only available to one part of the city?
Lord Bracknell
On fire
- Thread starter
- #137
Genuine answer: I don't know why three. But three "locality based consortia of GPs" it will be. I guess if it was just one city-wide organisation, this would fail to deliver Cameron's promise to "abolish Primary Care Trusts".
It appears you haven't thought through what the outcomes are likely to be of the Tory changes. Local GPs will prioritise those services that bring in the most money and expend the least. How are hospitals going to be able to plan future strategies when the GPs that they service will have different priorities.
It will also create administrators out of doctors which seems the wrong direction to be going in. The NHS isn't perfect but its far better than the tory alternative.
As for your assertion that no party would want to dismantly the NHS. What you should have said is that no party would publicly admit to wanting to dismantle the NHS. Unfortunatley, we are probably too far down the route of profit centres and marketplaces within the organisation to ever go back. Thanks to the conservatives.
Hunting 784561
New member
- Jul 8, 2003
- 3,651
I like this thread.
Dave the OAP
Well-known member
am I the only one who finds HOVAGIRL's arguments mildly erotic.....