http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-26014387

Lol at Ireland. I mean to give you an idea of what passes for normal

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/ga ... 55870.html

Don't get me wrong, I've a lot of time for the Guards... but who made a deal for Uzis?!

Corruption is rife in the UK if you know where to look. It might be "There is an 18 month waiting list for this operation on the NHS, but come to me private and I will perform it on Tuesday." Or "If you want that planning permission granted you will need to do this". Most of our corruption is much higher up at party political level and all the parties are guilty to some extent. Though most people never come across it themselves. If you run an export business you will be expected to pay facilitation fees or some other middle man fee to get the deal approved or even looked at. The more money that is involved will mean that there will be someone looking to get a pay off somewhere along the way. Spain has its problem Mayors. Many are in jail for corruption, even continuing to run the council from jail.

The waiting list example isnt corruption

I have no problem with a waiting list, but the fact that you can jump the queue because you pay something to the same surgeon and go private is. In fact it also creates incentives to push out the waiting lists. If the same surgeon was available then following week why shouldn't he do an NHS operation the following week.

And the NHS is rife with surgeons who work cash in hand on Tuesdays is it?

It looks like you engineered that example to imply extortion. The reality is that surgeons often work part time for other employers who aren't the NHS, but that isn't corruption. And patients who wish to get purchase treatments can do so, but not by handing a brown envelope full of unmarked low denomination bills to their NHS consultant.

Corruption isn't "rife if you know where to look" it's rife if you are determined to see it in everyday non corrupt transactions though.

Corruption is everywhere, but if you think it's bad in Europe, try going to Africa.

As pointed out, NHS consultants can do what they want in their spare time. Some choose to run private clinics. That's their choice. IIRC they can legitimately say "the waiting list is 18 weeks long. If you wish to be treated sooner, go private." It would only be corruption if a patient needed to bribe the NHS consultant to jump the NHS queue.

I can accept that. It does create huge conflicts of interest if the same consultant is the one that will do the private work.

It only really creates a conflict if there was no waiting list and the consultant was looking to increase his pay by making people go private - but with waiting lists I bet this is not an issue

Not really. If patients go privately -> no NHS referral so doesn't count against GP; patient not on waiting list so shorter; patient gets seen more quickly. So it does save time and money for the NHS - because the patient's paying for it. Patient benefits, private insurance company (if involved) benefits (through premiums), private hospital benefits (paid for from insurance or direct from patient), and consultant makes a few extra bucks (can be up to double the earnings from NHS depending on specialty).