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jonbwfc
What's a life?
Joined: Thu Apr 23, 2009 7:26 pm Posts: 17040
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Thu Mar 10, 2016 8:40 pm |
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jonbwfc
What's a life?
Joined: Thu Apr 23, 2009 7:26 pm Posts: 17040
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Thu Mar 10, 2016 8:46 pm |
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MrStevenRogers
Spends far too much time on here
Joined: Fri Apr 24, 2009 9:44 pm Posts: 4860
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well done doctors keep the good work up ...
_________________ Hope this helps . . . Steve ...
Nothing known travels faster than light, except bad news ... HP Pavilion 24" AiO. Ryzen7u. 32GB/1TB M2. Windows 11 Home ...
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Fri Mar 11, 2016 9:31 am |
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jonbwfc
What's a life?
Joined: Thu Apr 23, 2009 7:26 pm Posts: 17040
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I see the BBC have pounced on the Hillsborough inquest verdict as a way to completely ignore the doctor's strike...
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Tue Apr 26, 2016 2:06 pm |
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MrStevenRogers
Spends far too much time on here
Joined: Fri Apr 24, 2009 9:44 pm Posts: 4860
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the BBC seem to be ignoring many things as of late ...
_________________ Hope this helps . . . Steve ...
Nothing known travels faster than light, except bad news ... HP Pavilion 24" AiO. Ryzen7u. 32GB/1TB M2. Windows 11 Home ...
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Tue Apr 26, 2016 3:02 pm |
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cloaked_wolf
What's a life?
Joined: Thu Apr 23, 2009 8:46 pm Posts: 10022
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There is a lot of biased reporting in the media about this. Doctors in Scotland and Wales for example aren't striking because the contract doesn't affect them. They're not after more money, just not a worsening of their T&Cs. In fact, more doctors have signed up to contracts in Scotland and Wales this year than preceding years (something like 50% increase).
Jeremy Hunt is trying to drive the contract through irrespective of the outcome. The BMA want to negotiate. Hunt doesn't want to. I've been told that David Cameron has stated he has "full confidence" in Jeremy Hunt, something which I gather forebodes Hunt's resignation. Even if Hunt resigns, he has a job with a private health company thereafter.
Remember, the biggest cost in the NHS is wages. If you can knock down the pay of junior docs, consultants and GPs will follow. Once you've done that to the doctors, you can then force it across the whole of the NHS workforce.
_________________ He fights for the users.
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Tue Apr 26, 2016 3:11 pm |
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jonbwfc
What's a life?
Joined: Thu Apr 23, 2009 7:26 pm Posts: 17040
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Somehow I don't think it will happen very soon. That would be seen as defeat for the government, and Cameron & Co seem very much like the type to burn the house down rather than be evicted. IT may possibly happen in a year or so when the whole thing has been done and dusted and the direct link can be denied. Pretty much the biggest cost in ANY business is staffing, the NHS is not in any way unusual in that. And there are plenty of ways to optimise your staffing costs through good management practice. However the NHS senior management wouldn't know good practice of it put on a morris dancer's uniform and frolicked the roof of their car.
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Tue Apr 26, 2016 4:59 pm |
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cloaked_wolf
What's a life?
Joined: Thu Apr 23, 2009 8:46 pm Posts: 10022
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I think it's telling that there's nothing on the daily wail website about the strike now. There was an article on the BBc website but that's now off the main page too.
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Tue Apr 26, 2016 7:55 pm |
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pcernie
Legend
Joined: Sun Apr 26, 2009 12:30 pm Posts: 45931 Location: Belfast
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For the most part, if you want anything approaching context never mind news, you need to go to the Guardian. Almost no matter what the subject.
_________________Plain English advice on everything money, purchase and service related:
http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/
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Tue Apr 26, 2016 8:05 pm |
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cloaked_wolf
What's a life?
Joined: Thu Apr 23, 2009 8:46 pm Posts: 10022
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_________________ He fights for the users.
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Wed Apr 27, 2016 7:14 am |
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paulzolo
What's a life?
Joined: Thu Apr 23, 2009 6:27 pm Posts: 12251
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I fear this is more than just about doctors and their new contract.I think this is an attempt to set a precedent. If Hunt wins this, in whatever fashion, the argument to other doctors, nurses, teachers, police, and any other form of public servant you can think of is “we did it to the doctors, now it’s your turn”.
Schools are going to be forced into academy status - I expect the academy chains will be quite interested in enforcing new contracts.
I read that the Police and Fire Services will be sharing buildings. How long before those become more “private” and public? Again - new contracts will be welcomed by any private interest that ends up running them.
It also sends a strong message to the private sector that contracts can be changed and imposed on a whim.
Junior Doctors may well have been seen as an easy target for this. I hope that they have the resolve to continue their dispute. I think they’re fighting for more than themselves in this.
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Wed Apr 27, 2016 8:47 am |
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davrosG5
I haven't seen my friends in so long
Joined: Fri Apr 24, 2009 6:37 am Posts: 6954 Location: Peebo
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I think I may have said before that this dispute is the current governments version of the miners strike. They've even started falling into some of the same rhetoric about 'who runs the country - government or a union'. Any climb down on the governments side will, as they see it, embolden other health service employees and unions to stand up for themselves and demand enough money to recruit enough staff to deliver the service the NHS is meant to rather than delivering £22bn of magical 'efficiency' savings that clearly don't exist. Cameron and Hunt have backed themselves into a corner. The problem is they think they'll be able to win against the junior doctors if enough people die on strike days - their mates in the press will crucify the doctors to turn the public against them. Whether that particular calculation is likely to pan out is open for debate of course and opposition parties need to be getting behind the doctors and pushing, hard, to ensure that any blame lands squarely at the governments door.
_________________ When they put teeth in your mouth, they spoiled a perfectly good bum. -Billy Connolly (to a heckler)
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Wed Apr 27, 2016 9:12 am |
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paulzolo
What's a life?
Joined: Thu Apr 23, 2009 6:27 pm Posts: 12251
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Yes - I’ve seen the miners’ strike analogy many times, and while we’re not seeing running battles in the streets with the police, the aim is clearly to break the BMA. Thing is, doctors are generally a clever lot, and the consultants covering the strike will probably mean that there will be fewer problems than expected. To me, it beggars belief that doctors - who will be making life or death decisions on any number of times during a day - is allowed to work the hours they already do, pulling shifts that would be illegal if they were an HGV driver.
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Wed Apr 27, 2016 10:10 am |
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jonbwfc
What's a life?
Joined: Thu Apr 23, 2009 7:26 pm Posts: 17040
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According to NHS England, they could not find a single case where a patient who was admitted later died as a result of junior doctors not being present. Obviously because they dumped all the elective stuff and put everything into emergency & life critical care. I did smile at how much that must have irked Lynton Crosby. The other factor of course is that Thatcher prepared for the miner's strike - she got the relevant managers to stockpile coal at power stations just before the strikes happened and made other preparations - the strike effectively happened to her schedule and on her terms, so she always had the advantage. You can admire what she achieved or not but in terms of political intelligence you have to marvel at it. The current lot, sadly for them, have barely a brain cell to rub together. You can't stockpile people on the verge of death to roll out and say 'Look! look what the strikers did!' You can't close hospitals and blame it on the strikers if there are vastly experienced and skilled consultants saying 'yeah, we'll make sure everybody is OK, just put off everyone who can manage without for a little longer'. And instead of pickets full of largely poorly educated, burly, gnarled men who look like they'd be up for a bit of a ruck, they've got picket lines full of smart, eloquent and often (given those are the ones who get picked by the media to talk to) quite attractive young women and men whom the public would not stand for being charged by police horses. There isn't even an Arthur Scargill character for the press to villify and turn into a bogeyman. They've decided their "miner's strike" is going to be a strike where they've made no preparations, have no tactical or strategic advantages and where the public is emphatically not on their side. They may 'win' in the end though simple stubbornness and attrition but it's an act of political idiocy by any reasonable measure, which in the long term they are almost certain to regret. Yes, well, it all makes sense unless you actually believe Jeremy Hunt.
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Wed Apr 27, 2016 3:56 pm |
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cloaked_wolf
What's a life?
Joined: Thu Apr 23, 2009 8:46 pm Posts: 10022
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Certainly I foresee that the entire NHS workforce will be affected. Hadn't thought about the impact on the entire public sector. Very disturbing to think about. The junior docs who were on strike were covered (and supported) by the consultants, staff grades and associate specialists (ie senior doctors). If anything, patients were getting care delivered by consultants directly. Fewer patients should die as a result. I like to think it's Jeremy Twunt. What's more interesting is the reporting of stats from NHS England. They're deliberately manipulating the stats against the junior docs. sourceFurther, around 80% of junior docs are signed up to the BMA. The remaining 20% aren't. I'd be interested to know how many non-BMA members were working and how many weren't. Were those recovering after a nightshift counted as being on strike or not?
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Wed Apr 27, 2016 5:54 pm |
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