UK’S skewed priorities are destroying our health service
I WORKED in the NHS for 30 years; I am a passionate supporter of it and unfortunately due to factors beyond my control I currently have to rely on it for what is to me urgently required but not readily available treatment. There is no doubt that the gradual decline of the NHS I witnessed during my working life has accelerated and the system is “firefighting” to the detriment of both staff and patients. This situation applies both to the availability of treatment within the hospital sector and at a GP level.
I would have thought that in a relatively wealthy country with an established democratic system of governance the least that the electorate could expect would be that they would be kept fed and healthy. Not so here.
It cannot be beyond the wit of someone with specific knowledge and a pen and paper to calculate how many medical personnel we need to train annually to staff the NHS. We don’t do that as it’s cheaper to rely on some distant country training nurses and doctors in the hope they will want to come to the UK rather than treat patients in the Philippines or India. Conversely, it can’t be impossible to provide our own graduates currently employed in the NHS with a working environment and salaries that make them want to stay here and not emigrate. The NHS is understaffed and under-funded as a matter of choice and the culprit is Westminster. The NHS is the largest employer in the UK and more than half of the annual budget goes on staff wages so in terms of the general economy the more staff the merrier.
So why is the NHS underfunded when medical treatment in the private sector is relatively easy to access? It is as usual a matter of priorities. Last year as the NHS deteriorated the number of UK billionaires increased by 28 to 177 and Westminster paid three times as much in interest payments on the national debt than was spent on all the NHS sectors in Scotland. It’s mind over matter: they don’t mind and we don’t matter.
David J Crawford, Glasgow.
HUMZA Yousaf took to Twitter to say that he will “spend every waking moment working with unions to avoid a strike this winter”. Unfortunately for us, Mr Yousaf is asleep at the wheel of our NHS.
He claims that there is no money to fund a pay rise and wants the UK Government to use its “moral obligation” and help fund pay deals for NHS staff while his boss, the First Minister, is promising £5 million in climate reparations at COP27. Perhaps, instead of trying to convince unions that they shouldn’t strike, he should have a word with Nicola Sturgeon and make clear her priorities are skewed.
Jane Lax, Aberlour.
Tories and Labour offer no hope
IT is obvious to anyone who follows UK news that the poorerperforming NHS in England or Wales is not politicised to anything like the extent it is in Scotland. The BBC reported the latest A&E waiting times in England as the worst-ever at 69.3% but for comparison purposes this falls to 54.8% of patients seen within four hours in type-1 A&E 24-hour emergency departments, which is the closest equivalent to similar A&E departments in Scotland that currently stand at 63.1%. In
Wales the numbers on NHS waiting lists are almost 50% higher than in Scotland.
The average nurse’s salary in Scotland is currently £36,641 compared to £33,384 in England yet the Scottish Government is offering a much better pay award at 7% on average, with more than 11% for the lowest bands, compared to the average 4.75 % in England in Wales.
It takes some nerve for the Tories to attempt to blame the SNP for the Uk-wide strikes particularly when Scotland has a fixed budget and Labour Welsh ministers have also pointed out the limitations of the devolution settlement to deal with rampant UK inflation made worse by Tory policies.
Those who believe in the NHS will not be encouraged by Sir Keir Starmer’s views on foreign workers and no return to freedom of movement or in shadow health minister Wes Streeting, who last week called Jeremy Corbyn “senile”, and wants to move from the 20th century funding model of the NHS while saying a Labour government can’t spend more money on it.
Mary Thomas, Edinburgh.