Whilst I agree that people who have been damaged have quite rightly to have their day.
From Dr Malcolm Kendrick
‘The provision for claims against the NHS increased from £85.2 billion ($108 Bn) to £128.6 billion ($163Bn) n March 2022.’ 1
That’s surely bollocks as it is nearly the whole NHS budget.
Interestingly the BBC has just reported on the latest numbers - which are that only 64.1% of patients are treated within the 62 day target.
However the graphic which goes with this is quite revealing
It is clear that approximately the same number of patients have been seen within 62 days for the last 6 years (except for right in the middle of the pandemic) but that demand went up by approx 28% since 2018 while capacity and budget have not kept pace.
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It did seem huge and why I posted it for comment.
Never forget that Drs get fabulous pensions. So fabulous the chancellor had to uplift the maximum in a pension pot to avoid tax for the reason of retaining Drs to work beyond 50.
And of course consultants frequently work in the private sector and NHS part time.
As does anybody who earns a decent sum.
AIUI this was not because doctors get fabulous pensions per se but that the NHS is one of the very few defined benefits schemes - the “value” of the pot is then taken as 20x the first year’s pension plus any lump sum. It was pretty easy to exceed the lifetime allowance because of the notional pot and some senior doctors were getting ridiculous tax demands because the NHS kept taking their pension contributions but they were over their limits, it was a completely ridiculous situation with marginal tax takes exceeding £1 tax per £1 income in some cases.
Yes, and?
If they are working in the NHS part time they are geting part time salaries. It is a free market after all.
If your argument is that consultants are well enough paid so they should just STFU then I think you are missing the point - which is that doctors (of all grades) do not feel valued by the government and, although many support the NHS, at the end of the day working for an employer who constantly expects 110% but also constantly throws it back in your face and pays you less and less in real terms each year gets pretty wearing after a while.
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But junior doctors get paid roughly the same as cleaners.
No wonder they go on strike.
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I’ve heard the argument that “juniors” become consultants, who are well paid - so the juniors should just STFU as well.
However, mortgages have to be paid out of today’s wages, not tomorrow’s.
Just to give you an idea of how junior doctors are treated, if you look, there are many tales of doctors denied leave to go to their own weddings, or parent’s funerals.
No wonder the Tories want out of the ECHR - no chance of a doctor being able to complain about not being allowed to get married if “the right to family life” has conveniently been edited out of UK law.
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Just getting back HRH for a moment, seems he is on some weekly pioneering treatment. That wouldnt really make sense if it were bowel cancer so maybe blood? Trying to think of things in the area they may have discovered during surgery?
Frankly, I don’t care what sort of Cancer he (or anyone else) has… I just want the diagnosis and treatment to be speedily done… and for everyone to have their best chance at overcoming/recovering …
little brother died in 2018… and I’m still furious with what he went through in UK…
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Me too, I was just expecting it to be common ol bowel cancer as thats near where they were working. The fact he os on a pioneering treatment may take on a more complicated or rare type.
The more they learn about the cancers the better for all. As I have boringly said many times it eclipses covid.
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Indeed, it was costing them money to keep working.
TBH I’d like to see NHS dentists get a better deal. That’s why there are so few since quite some time now…
And the UK dentists got together, took a risk and organised themselves to continue to provide some level of service during covid. Albeit restricting to emergency or semi- emergency cases. French dentists didn’t seem to,. And the feedback on UK GP’s was so many of them just shut their practices and disappeared during covid (though I may be being unfair).
Whereas the UK GP’s did quite a nice deal as to their own remuneration from the NHS a while back, for dentists it just seemed to get harder and harder. With the NHS providing budget that went nowhere near sufficient to provide the dentistry services needed (not the level ideally wanted, just the level actually needed).
At least that’s what it has looked like from the outside.
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A touch of the politics of envy there? To quote a senior politician.
I’m never sure why someone being fairly well paid is meant to be justification for going backwards.
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Could be bladder cancer … which they’re treating with weekly doses of BCG. Takes about two years of 6 weekly bursts but 70% of people survive. I am one of them …
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Well Simon, always good to hear from a survivor
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Hello Simon. A breast cancer survivor, 2002 and now starting treatment for a very form of endocrine cancer in my lungs.
I must have had it for at least fifteen years as it progresses extremely slowly.
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Thanks to boundary changes I am now in his South West Surrey constituency instead of Guildford and am looking forward immensely to voting him out in the (I hope) very near future, though it will need Labour voters to vote tactically and get behind the Lib Dem candidate.
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Wasn’t he a ‘remainer’ ?
Jeremy Hunt? Yes - but he has participated fully in the post-Brexit destruction (as Health Secretary and as Chancellor) where other more principled Tories did not.
He is also a hypocrite - calling for “pay restraint” by public sector workers while simultaneously hiking the rents on the seven flats that he owns in Southampton by more than inflation.