Posts Tagged competition
Reform at the mercy of government
Posted by James Gubb in Health on 04/09/2008
In an article for The Fraser Institute, we argue the lessons for Canada from the NHS reform programme are less that competition in health care has failed, but rather that market-based health care reforms in the UK have been crippled by the government’s unwillingness to stop directing the service from the centre. The reform programme as a whole has been ‘a botched job driven by political imperative, constant reconfiguration, and central diktat’.
The performance monster
Posted by James Gubb in Health on 12/06/2008
The press is littered today with references to a new report on system reform in the NHS produced jointly by the Audit Commission and the Healthcare Commission – two well respected watchdogs. It concludes ‘the [competitive] reforms [in the NHS] have not yet delivered the desired change’, adding that ‘there is no evidence from our fieldwork that choice policy has so far… led to an improvement in the quality of service offered’.
ISTCs: additional evidence so far
Posted by James Gubb in Health on 24/04/2008
Writing in the British Medical Journal in February 2008, Allyson Pollock and Sylvia Godden lambasted the quality of care provided in independent sector treatment centres (ISTCs). They are right to raise concerns over data quality and collection, but a report released this week by the LSHTM and the Royal College of Surgeons allay many of the fears they proclaim.
Competition: the solution to the NHS’s problems?
Posted by James Gubb in Health on 19/03/2008
Disagreement is still evident over the exact role of competition in healthcare, but a consensus is emerging that the ‘type’ of competition being pursued in the NHS is too narrowly focused and must facilitate greater service integration and clinical leadership.
That was the finding of a high-profile seminar organised by Civitas last month, which debated one of the key drivers of system reform in the NHS: competition.
One big contradiction
Posted by James Gubb in Health on 10/01/2008
Reading John Carvel’s interview with Alan Johnson in Society Guardian this week, one could be forgiven for supporting this government on the NHS. He does seem, at least on the superficial level, to get it. It’s funny how every recent Secretary of State for Health has gone into the job with a very ‘nicey-nicey’ approach to the NHS and then, six months to a year or so down the line, realise it’s not going to reform itself and that Blair didn’t introduce competition just for kicks.
Show me the money!
Posted by James Gubb in Health on 22/11/2007
Despite Alan Johnson’s protestations in the FT that the newspaper is ‘wrong to suggest the government is reversing the NHS reforms’, few are that inclined to believe him. As Blair’s former health advisor, Julian Le Grand, has said: the government no longer seems to believe in, or at least wants to pay for, the idea of using competition to drive up standards in the NHS, following its decision to slash the second wave of the ISTC programme last week. But then along comes what might possibly more than a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel.