Posts Tagged tories
Nudge, nudge, Daddy Cameron’s coming
Posted by James Gubb in Civil Liberty, Health on 14/01/2010
You can tell the Tories are being advised by Richard Thaler, the famed ‘nudge’ economist. It’s now, apparently, part of their life and blood. Public health, after the latest health policy announcement yesterday, may just as well be called ‘nudge’ health. Here’s the idea. Point one. Cash for public health initiatives will be separately identified (not necessarily a bad thing in itself). Point two, local directors of public health, who will be joint appointments between the NHS and local authorities, will be ‘paid by results for achieving goals such as reducing teenage pregnancy, infant mortality, childhood obesity and alcohol-related hospital admissions’.
How about a bonfire on the inconsistencies?
Posted by James Gubb in Health on 20/07/2009
Here’s a good question: where are the Tories going on health policy? Do they even know? It doesn’t seem so. First, the macro stuff. Is health spending to increase in real terms as pledged, or has – as today’s response to the King’s Fund and IFS’s projections for the NHS tends to suggest – reality finally struck? Is NHS pay to ‘not depend on how much money the government has’, or is there to be an acknowledgement that the NHS cannot be immune to the effects of the dire fiscal situation? Read the rest of this entry »
Tories = Labour
Posted by James Gubb in Health on 28/02/2008
The Times today reveals the Conservatives are equally, if not more, committed to throwing yet more money at the NHS than Labour. The Shadow Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley has boldly so he thinks, and completely foolhardily so many of the public will think, pledged to increase spending on it by £28 billion per year to around 11 per cent of GDP.