Looks like it could soon be 'RIP the NHS'?

Deadline is 14th September. Please put it on facebook.

'By 2021, the NHS in Durham, Darlington and Tees, Hambleton, Richmondshire and Whitby will be £500 million short of the money it needs to balance its books while maintaining the same level of care for patients
The plan involves looking for workforce "efficiencies" - which could mean staffing cuts'

This is what 38 Degrees has found out about my area.
It's ridiculous that we should be in the same area as North Yorkshire. It takes hours to get to Whitby, half an hour to get to Newcastle.

There might be something similar about your area on their website.

The S.O.'s mother paid many thousands of pounds into a private health care scheme; she never had to use it as the NHS provided everything she needed during her latter years. I'm getting so many niggly problems as I age that I dread there being no NHS. I suppose a lot of employers pay for their staff to be in private schemes but where does that leave everyone else? My pension is just enough to live on; no chance of paying for a private medical insurance .

This is not unexpected and preparations were quietly going on under the radar whilst we were distracted by EU referendum (bread & circuses?), and as dj has said was mentioned on other threads. I do not agree with an insurance led scheme as we have, (until recently) had the most cost effective and efficient health service in the world. We have an ageing demographic and a health service costs money, but we are not a poor country. It is purely ideology, not affordability that is causing this funding crisis. As we age our health needs increase and I don't relish the NHS going the way of the largely privatised elderly social care. It may well be as Anniebach says that we can do nothing to stop them, particularly as we do not have a functioning opposition, but we can have a damn good try, lobbying our MP, signing the petition, supporting pressure groups and raising awareness, and yes rioting in the streets if necessary. Granpower anyone?

'NHS England worked to establish a Sustainability and Transformation Fund of £2.1bn for 2016/17, which will rise to £2.9bn in 2017/18 and to £3.4bn in 2020/21.'

webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:lD4rzF8qynYJ:https://www.england.nhs.uk/2016/03/footprint-areas/+&cd=3&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk

Wouldn't it be good if those billions (along with all the other billions which has been spent on reorganisation) could be spent on patient care?

This is madness!

I'm with you, Lazigirl!

@dj

Some of the 'footprint' areas are huge. Cheshire and Merseyside covers a population of 2.4 million. The needs of rural Cheshire are totally different from Liverpool or areas like Speke.

It's been looking like this for years.

Dismantling of the NHS started in 2010 when coalition govt came to power, and this has continued apace since then.

So as you said earlier lazigirl, time to join something to stop it, and riot if necessary.

Before the new NHSE came into being the NHS refused to publish the risk plan. If it had, it probably would not have gone through.
Now there is a risk plan for seven day NHS, which has been published.

www.theguardian.com/healthcare-network/2016/aug/26/jeremy-hunt-can-not-bully-his-plans-for-a-seven-day-nhs-through

However it wasn't the department of health that released the risk assessment; it had to be leaked, to show that the policy will not work.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/aug/23/the-guardian-view-on-the-seven-day-nhs-the-figures-dont-add-up

fullfact.org/health/accident-and-emergency-attendances-and-performance/

This is why the NHSE wants to get rid of targets.
Since September 2014, waiting time targets in A&E have only been met in one month.

www.kingsfund.org.uk/blog/2016/08/nhs-financial-health

Figures from the King's Fund on transformation plans, daphne.
The NHSE is £1.85 billion in debt and the plans this year will cost £1.8 billion.
Looks like a no-brainer to me.
Stop the reorganisation and give the money to the NHS?

Switzerland spends 13% of GDP on its health service.
UK spends 9% and it's decreasing.

When the NHS was split up into various parts, organised through CCGs, we were told it was because competition would be good for the NHS.
These STPs are all based on collaboration. However, as they are so hidden and secretive, we do not know who is collaborating with whom.

Each STP has a single person in charge of it.
Does anyone know who is in charge of theirs?

Somebody called Beverley Flowers (just looked it up).

www.england.nhs.uk/2016/03/leaders-confirmed/

She hasn't asked me what I think about anything.

Heck!

Even Grant Shapps has accused her of not delivering on promises

www.shapps.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Letter-to-East-North-Herts-CCG-CEO-Beverley-Flowers.docx.

Interesting letter - a new hospital and no beds. Saves them closing wards.

Just found out about mine, daphne.
He was asking Osborne for more money - in fact asking him where the promised money had gone, but he's from Hartlepool and Teesside. The year before he had a vote of no confidence in him from the councillors, so he must have been doing the government's job properly then.

The whole thing seems ridiculous. There are so many sub-organisations within the NHS and they don't represent local interests at all. I live on the very furthest tip of North West Essex and most people use a hospital in Cambridgeshire, which is outside the STP's remit. Resources tend to be directed to the areas of greatest population and many services have been centralised away from the local area. West Essex has now been tagged on to Hertfordshire, even though there are no links with services such as social care.

At the last election Cameron made throwaway remarks about £22billion "efficiency savings" while in the next breath he was saying he was finding an extra £8billion. That is a cut of £14billion but sadly none of the other parties took him to task over it. At the same time "demand" has started to rise steadily because of the age profile of the population.
Of course it could be managed a bit better - but when they complain about "bed blocking" which is the major problem, it has been made worse by the combination of cutting LA funding and creating a system that treats home based 'care' as a market with elderly and disabled people having to manage their own budgets etc. No end to the crazy desire (and Blair had it as well) to marketise everything.

I agree absolutely, Jess, which is why an effective opposition is absolutely essential. We need somebody who can pick up on what's going on, challenge the government every step of the way and keep the public informed.

What they are doing is breaking it up so it is no longer an NHS.
The term National has no meaning, as all areas are competing against each other.
The NHA can challenge them providing enough people get behind it. It is organised by health professionals.

Jess, the £22 billion efficiency savings, which really means getting rid of staff, as that is the greatest part of the NHS, was from £30 billion in the first place.

nhap.org/17027-2/

£30 billion mentioned on here, Jess.

What about the Brexit promise to spend millions currently going to the EU on the NHS? Oh yes, they said the day after the vote they hadn't meant it, or even said it.

Thanks for the petition link, signed and shared.

If you like wry smiles, you should read the Friday Surgery on NHAP.

nhap.org/friday-surgery/

Thanks, Iam64.

Brexit and NHS? By the time we brexit, there won't be an NHS. Maybe they knew that...Hunt and Stevens did.

I retired from the NHS 10yrs ago and the break up of it had already begun with parts of the services being privatised, in fact even before that when I had my first THR it was carried out in a private hospital where my NHS hospital were farming out some of their joint replacement surgeries.