EDITOR'S COMMENT: Our GPs are determined to keep the NHS in the family

Published: September 8, 2011

THE battle lines over the future of the NHS are laid out this week.

But it is difficult not to smell defeatism among the opponents of the NHS Reform Bill.

To them, it spells the end of the NHS as we know it.

Privatisation will consume it, they cry.

The Prime Minister says the NHS will become more efficient. 

And it will be made safer by – effectively – being put in the hands of GPs who will take it away from the clasp of bureaucrats, says David Cameron.

Rhetoric?

Time will tell, of course, But by then will the Prime Minister still be around?

In the past two or three decades how many political leaders have taken to the hills while the reforms they promoted ended in failure.

The pros and cons largely turn on whether GP consortia have the know-how to steer the NHS – and if they don’t, won’t they turn to private concerns to do it for them? Thus, we may face privatisation by the back door.

Here in Camden the GPs, who are forming a Commissioning Group, appear to be determined to keep the NHS public and in the family, as it were.

Our understanding is that they are confident they will be able to manage things without outside private help.

Critics who fear privatisation may regard them as local saviours of the NHS.

Fight for the High Street

ONCE again a battle is shaping up to save a local shop from the seemingly unstoppable march of chain stores and franchises.

This time it has flared up in Hampstead High Street where a health shop that has successfully been in business for 26 years is now being threatened by those enemies of all small businesses: high rents and business rates.

It’s an old High Street battle – and the victors, unfortunately, are the big boys.

Who else can afford rents of up to £70,000 a year?

Quite rightly the Heath and Hampstead Society are spearheading a campaign to keep the shop open.

Vocal opponents of Big Government – often found among Tories and Lib-Dems – talk a great deal about the need to support little businesses.

But over the decades, the same old story emerges – tax support and other benefits wing their way to big business, while the little man or woman has to struggle to survive – and often doesn’t succeed.