'Just what is your political stance?' I expect people are wondering. For many years I have replied, 'I am not left wing'. That is the significance of the title of this Blog. I am unhappy to describe myself as rightwing.
I fear any political idealism - somehow there always seems to be bloodshed at the end of it. That people should have ideals is a totally different matter. Mine happen to be evangelical.
I think that since I first started to show an interest in politics, I have recognised how what the left promises always seems to end up in disaster. If for one example, we take the Health Service, there we have an excellent idea, well implemented but with sclerotic systems which have been unable to adjust to change, the result being that it has become the largest employer in Europe and yet is one of the poorest systems at delivering effective healthcare. Money has been poured in without thought. Enormously wasteful bureaucracy and wild theories have been employed when a total root and branch change is required.
Why do we not learn from the French who have objectively the most efficient healthcare provision in the world?
Working people pay for their care and are able to claim between 70% and 92% back. The old and weak pay nothing. Many serious and longterm conditions are totally free.They can approach any hospital, public or private, and they have all the advantages of being a private patient at a fraction of the price. The shortfall, if any, is very cheap to insure at a fraction of what BUPA membership costs here. People actually leave the UK to enjoy French-quality health care.
Hospitals then compete and in order to do so must, if necessary, sack managers and bureaucrats to ensure that nurses and doctors are the prime moving force.
When my aged aunt had to raid her life savings in Cheshire to get a hip operation as the waiting list was about two years and for some reason she did not want to be bed-ridden, it cost her £8000. In France it would probably have been done in a fortnight for nothing. Had she been younger and working, it would have cost just £800.
The Health Service has become a socialist 'sacred cow'. They refuse to improve or change it and try to paper over the cracks with ever more taxpayers' money. The Conservatives are too scared to touch it as the socialist mantra of "The Tories want to abolish The Health Service" has been believed by too many voters whose political opinions are formed by The Guardian and The Mirror.
Christians must not be naive. Too many advocate higher taxes to "fund healthcare properly". There is probably more than enough there to do a proper job at the moment but adding money to this system is like the expense of putting a brand new engine into a rusting, ancient Ford Anglia. Good money after bad. [And I should know!]
LINK: http://www.frontpagemag.com/articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=7165
