Mary Harney for EU Commission - No Thank You Very Much

Mmm...popcorn.

What many people don't get about Harney - including a lot of her supporters and admirers, is that she isn't remotely concerned with either financial or health care efficiency: she is about closing down the public sector as near to entirely as she possibly can because of an idealogical conviction that inequality is a good thing and a necessary condition for making as much profit as possible by rich people like herself and her husband - to whom, seemingly, the government have gifted our health service to do with as they please.

Aragon wrote:

What many people don't get about Harney - including a lot of her supporters and admirers, is that she isn't remotely concerned with either financial or health care efficiency: she is about closing down the public sector as near to entirely as she possibly can because of an idealogical conviction that inequality is a good thing and a necessary condition for making as much profit as possible by rich people like herself and her husband - to whom, seemingly, the government have gifted our health service to do with as they please.

And there endth the argument for there are indeed none so blind……… as those who refuse to argue the facts.

Johnny Keogh wrote:

Slim Buddha wrote:

We had "socialists"??????? When? Who? Dick Spring???

Well there were a few in the 70's and 80's.

Ministers for Health, 1947 - present



Listed below are all people who have held the position of Minister for Health or Minister for Health and Children since the establishment of the Department of Health in 1947.
NameTenure

Dr. James Ryan T.D.	January, 1947 - February, 1948
Dr. Noel Browne T.D.	February, 1948 - April, 1951
Mr. John A. Costello T.D.	April, 1951 - June, 1951
Dr. James Ryan T.D.	June, 1951 - June, 1954
Mr. Thomas F. O'Higgins T.D.	June, 1954 - March, 1957
Mr. Sean MacEntee T.D.	March, 1957 - April, 1965
Mr. Donagh O'Malley	T.D. April, 1965 - July, 1966
Mr. Sean Flanagan T.D.	July, 1966 - July, 1969
Mr. Erskine Childers T.D.	July, 1969 - March, 1973
Mr. Brendan Corish T.D.	March, 1973 - July, 1977
Mr. Charles J. Haughey T.D.	July, 1977 - December, 1979
Dr. Michael Woods T.D.	December, 1979 - July, 1981
Mrs. Eileen Desmond T.D.	July, 1981 - March, 1982
Dr. Michael Woods T.D.	March, 1982 - December, 1982
Mr. Barry Desmond T.D.	December, 1982 - January, 1987
Mr John Boland T. D.	January, 1987 - March, 1987
Dr. Rory O'Hanlon T.D.	March, 1987 - November, 1991
Mrs. Mary O'Rourke T.D.	November, 1991 - February, 1992
Dr. John O'Connell T.D.	February, 1992 - January, 1993
Mr. Brendan Howlin T.D.	January, 1993 - November, 1994
Dr. Michael Woods T.D.	November, 1994 - December, 1994
Mr. Michael Noonan T.D.	December, 1994 - June, 1997
Mr. Brian Cowen T.D.	June 1997 - January 2000
Mr. Micheal Martin T.D.	January 2000 - September 2004
Ms. Mary Harney T.D.	September 2004 - present

Even if one accepts that Barry Desmond and Brendan Howlin were/are vaguely "social democratic" in their political thinking (which for me involves a major effort in the suspension of disbelief) nobody on this list is even remotely socialist, with the honourable exception of Noel Browne. And we all know how the forces of reactionary conservatism dealt with him.

While there are a lot of time-servers there whose political philosophy may be best described as unclear, Harney is, among recent office-holders, by far the most ideologically driven. What a pity the ideology is such a pile of failed rubbish. And, as Pax has said, she gets such an easy time from the domestic press as to lead one to suspect that they are colluding in the firesale of the health service to the profiteers who stand to reap massive financial rewards for what will be a deterioration in service. Look to America for a view of the future of health in Ireland. Now THAT is a failed system.

tonys wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

If Mr MacNamara or A. N. Other developer owes 5 million tax, and doesn't pay it, but uses it to build a hospital which he personally owns, we have lost 5 million and he has gained a hospital. After any claw back period he can sell it on or convert it into a hotel.

From Dail Debates
Under the terms of the Finance Act 2001, the co-located hospital must ensure that at least 20% of its bed capacity be made available to the HSE for the treatment of individuals awaiting in-patient or outpatient hospital services as public patients. The fees charged must be not be more than 90% of the fees that would be charged for equivalent treatment provided to a patient with private medical insurance.
The cost of such tax relief will ultimately depend on the level of qualifying capital expenditure and no such expenditure on the proposed co-located hospitals has yet been incurred. For each €100 million of qualifying capital expenditure on these hospitals, the cost of tax relief to investors (assuming a marginal tax rate of 41% for those investors) would amount in gross terms to €41 million spread over 7 years. With the additional activity generated by the construction of the hospitals, the employment generated and the related services provided on which taxes will be paid, additional revenues would accrue to the Exchequer.
A fundamental principle of the co-location policy initiative is that there is no State underwriting in respect of private sector risk.



From the SBP
“The six public hospitals earmarked for co-location will share €20 million a year in ground rent from the private developers who build hospitals on their sites.

The annual rents will range from €500,000 at Sligo General Hospital to €6 million at St James’s Hospital in Dublin.

The rents do not include the share of profits that private hospital owners will give to public hospitals on whose sites they will be located.

Figures included in a presentation made to the board of the Health Service Executive (HSE) last week reveal that the co-location project is expected to deliver a ‘‘net present value’’ of €2.7 billion over the course of 25 years.

Between the rents paid over 25 years, PAYE and PRSI levies, corporation tax and stamp duty, as well as the Vat on supplies and construction costs, the public purse should see a €450 million net profit per hospital site, according to the figures.

The figures also show that it would cost the exchequer more than €5 billion to build and operate the hospitals over 25 years”

There are a lot of ifs and incomplete calculations here. I would add the biggest "if" - if there is any danger of the private sector not being the massive beneficiaries of the arrangement at the expense of the public sector, the private sector operators (being good business people/capitalists) will pull out, leaving a massive deficit in the numbers of beds/faciltities planned for. As I said, a re-run of the Devaney flats catastrophe.

cactus flower wrote:

tonys wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

If Mr MacNamara or A. N. Other developer owes 5 million tax, and doesn't pay it, but uses it to build a hospital which he personally owns, we have lost 5 million and he has gained a hospital. After any claw back period he can sell it on or convert it into a hotel.

From Dail Debates
Under the terms of the Finance Act 2001, the co-located hospital must ensure that at least 20% of its bed capacity be made available to the HSE for the treatment of individuals awaiting in-patient or outpatient hospital services as public patients. The fees charged must be not be more than 90% of the fees that would be charged for equivalent treatment provided to a patient with private medical insurance.
The cost of such tax relief will ultimately depend on the level of qualifying capital expenditure and no such expenditure on the proposed co-located hospitals has yet been incurred. For each €100 million of qualifying capital expenditure on these hospitals, the cost of tax relief to investors (assuming a marginal tax rate of 41% for those investors) would amount in gross terms to €41 million spread over 7 years. With the additional activity generated by the construction of the hospitals, the employment generated and the related services provided on which taxes will be paid, additional revenues would accrue to the Exchequer.
A fundamental principle of the co-location policy initiative is that there is no State underwriting in respect of private sector risk.



From the SBP
“The six public hospitals earmarked for co-location will share €20 million a year in ground rent from the private developers who build hospitals on their sites.

The annual rents will range from €500,000 at Sligo General Hospital to €6 million at St James’s Hospital in Dublin.

The rents do not include the share of profits that private hospital owners will give to public hospitals on whose sites they will be located.

Figures included in a presentation made to the board of the Health Service Executive (HSE) last week reveal that the co-location project is expected to deliver a ‘‘net present value’’ of €2.7 billion over the course of 25 years.

Between the rents paid over 25 years, PAYE and PRSI levies, corporation tax and stamp duty, as well as the Vat on supplies and construction costs, the public purse should see a €450 million net profit per hospital site, according to the figures.

The figures also show that it would cost the exchequer more than €5 billion to build and operate the hospitals over 25 years”

There are a lot of ifs and incomplete calculations here. I would add the biggest "if" - if there is any danger of the private sector not being the massive beneficiaries of the arrangement at the expense of the public sector, the private sector operators (being good business people/capitalists) will pull out, leaving a massive deficit in the numbers of beds/faciltities planned for. As I said, a re-run of the Devaney flats catastrophe.

It's worse even than that CF. These public private so-called 'partnerships' are criminally cynical: the money is all in the set up: property acquired at knock-down prices, huge subsidies, grants and tax concessions to get the buildings up - but once the day to day running costs start to kick in and the profit margins fall back or vanish (because the figures don't add up for providing the service itself), the private element pulls out - as you have pointed out. The money is gone, the pre-existing service, however inadaquate it may have been, is further destroyed and the wreckage of a once realtively functioning service is all that is left. The madness of it all is that this outcome is achieved at massive expense to the taxpayer. This is in no way about efficiency, it's about destroying the very idea of a public sector. Once destroyed it is nigh on impossible to get it back again.

A further and very serious objection to the co-location scheme is that undermines National heath care strategy. I mentioned before that the National Cancer Strategy is to provide a reduced number of centres in which first rate care can be received. The main rationale for a small number of centres is that it has been proven that patients treated by doctors who see only a small number of cases of a particular condition have a much lower average life expectancy.
Their level of expertise simply can't develop without proper levels of experience.

There is also of course the issue of duplication of buildings, equipment and facilities next door to each other, most of which one way or the other will be paid for out of the public purse.

A large number of Consultants have come out and expressed very serious reservations about the functioning of co-location.

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/senior-doctors-in-revolt-against--colocation-plan-1366623.html

The expectation is a heavy loss of consultants to the private sector, in which standards of back up facilities will be poorer than the public sector, both sides losing out.

http://www.independent.ie/unsorted/features/healthcare-the-new-drug-for-investors-121985.html

The idea that this was not intended to be another gravy train for developers and wealthy businessment friends of government won't stand up.

Ronald Quinlan wrote under the heading "Healthcare the New Drug for Investors"

Quote :

WHEN the Blackrock Clinic first opened its doors in 1984, there were serious reservations about the viability of an exclusive private hospital in recession-ridden Ireland.
Twenty-three years later, however, its founders - the two orthopaedic surgeon brothers Jimmy and Joseph Sheehan - could be forgiven for being smug as their model of medical care is replicated across the country.

Not that the mushrooming of exclusive US-style private hospitals and clinics here has anything to do with the Sheehan brothers' prescience in establishing the Blackrock Clinic in the dark days of the Eighties.

A win-win combination of a generous 40 per cent tax break for investors and a lack of any licencing requirement for hospital owners might have more to do with the phenomenon of millionaire entrepreneurs getting involved in Ireland's healthcareprovision.

Now, names one would more usually associate with the stock market, the racing industry or the construction of ultra-modern apartment schemes make up the shareholders funding the rollout of private hospitals and clinics across the country.

Dermot Desmond, John Magnier, Sean Mulryan and Larry Goodman are just some of the better known names who have all recognised the potential profits to be made from the private healthcare sector.

The interest of private hospital developers is aided in no small part by the provisions of the Finance Acts 2001 and 2002 which allow the owners of private medical facilities to claw back 40 cent of every euro they invest in the construction of a development.

It is expected that more than €750m in tax-driven private equity will come into the Irish private healthcare sector in the next five years, with new hospitals, clinics, nursing homes and daycare centres being funded by wealthy investors.

Quote :

Not that money is at the root of every investor's reason for getting involved in private healthcare provision.

In the case of Jimmy Sheehan, for example, his conservative Catholicism and his desire to reflect it in his own hospitals sets him aside from many of his fellow investors, some of whom would be considered primarily as worshipping Mammon.

But that's not to say that Mr Sheehan's Catholic outlook has prevented him from taking advantage of the tax reliefs given by the State in recent years.

Indeed, the very first private hospital to benefit from the lucrative tax incentives provided by the Finance Acts was Mr Sheehan's €100m Galway Clinic, which opened for business in 2004.

The Galway facility is owned by Mr Sheehan and his brother, Joe, with additional financing coming from multimillionaire beef baron Larry Goodman, who holds a 40 per cent stake in the project.

And Mr Goodman's business relationship with the Sheehans deepened even further last year, when he and developer John Flynn joined the brothers in a consortium which bought out Bupa Hospital's 56 per cent shareholding in the Blackrock Clinic.

The Blackrock Clinic's owners now operate under the name Blackrock Medical Partners Ltd.

According to the latest accounts filed for Blackrock Medical Partners, the company pulled in over €4m in profit in 2004, out of a turnover of €74.14m.

Another of the Sheehans' companies - Blackrock Hospital Ltd and its subsidiaries, which includes the clinic - had profits before tax of €8.6m on a €62m turnover in 2004.

The latest project being undertaken by Mr Sheehan - the €110m Hermitage Clinic at Fonthill near Lucan, Co Dublin - sees several other big names from beyond the world of medicine join the list of hospital investors.

The site for the proposed 101-bed hospital was provided by developer Sean Mulryan of Ballymore Homes, while developer John Flynn, consultant George Duffy, and Larry Goodman all provided money for the West Dublin facility, which when operational will have up to 75 consultants operating out of 39 suites.

The Hermitage is set to have the capacity to perform up to 16,000 procedures annually on a day-patient and in-patient basis.

Another name not normally associated with medical care who has chosen to invest in private hospitals is Michael Cullen.

Mr Cullen recently made the move from car sales to join cardiothoracic surgeon Professor Mark Redmond and developer Paddy Shovlin to open the €176m Beacon Hospital in Sandyford in South County Dublin.

Mr Cullen is best known for his association with his family's firm, Des Cullen Car Sales, but his association with the Beacon could yet make him figure even larger in the public consciousness.

The Beacon - which only opened its doors last November - is set to expand even further with a €45m campus extension now on the cards.

Apart from a former car salesman, one of the country's top hoteliers has also joined the list of those investing in private hospital care.

Tom Kane's Adare Manor in Limerick is currently poised to become the location for a new 100-bed hospital and retirement village after planning permission was granted for the development last October.

Adare Partners LP - a consortium 80 per cent-ownedby Mr Kane's family - willdevelop the 31,000sqm private facility, which is dueto open for business next year.

Financial backing for the project comes from a number of wealthy investors, including financier Dermot Desmond.

It is understood that Mr Kane also held discussions with Barchester Healthcare, the retirement care village company backed by Mr Desmond, JP McManus and John Magnier.

Barchester, which is chaired by former Kerry Group chief executive Denis Brosnan, has itself also been seeking Irish locations for a chain of "care villages" centred on nursing homes.

Other people making a name for themselves in private hospital development are Carlow couple Jim Madden and his wife, Mary.

Mr Madden is a dentist by profession, while his wife is a property developer. The two are the directors of Dublin-headquartered Euro Care International Ltd.

Euro Care owns and operates the 40-bed Whitfield Clinic in Waterford, while the tendering process for its proposed €60m Carlow Health Park has just been completed.

A spokesman for the company said this week that they expect ground to be brokenin Carlow this spring, with work being completed by the middle of 2008 on the 26.5 acre site.

Another well-known businessman who is dipping his toes into the private hospital sector is Fergus Hoban.

Mr Hoban first hit the headlines in a big way after he sold the Unicare chain of pharmacies he had developed to German pharmaceutical giant Gehe (now Celesio) for a massive €127.6m in 2002.

Now at the helm of Touchstone Healthcare, Hoban is developing a €500m nationwide chain of Primary Care Centres (PCC).

The PCCs are formulated in line with the Government's primary care strategy, and typically bring together GPs, dentists, physiotherapists, and other medical practitioners under one roof to provide a one-stop shop for both public and private patients.

Touchstone's first PCC opened in Mulhuddart in west Dublin in October 2005.

Besides the development of stand-alone facilities, a number of Ireland's private hospital developers are also examining the potential of the Government's plans for the co-location of private and public hospitals on publicly-owned lands.

The Beacon Group, for instance, is known to be looking at private ventures on sites adjoining Limerick Regional Hospital and Cork University Hospital.

Altogether, there are 10 public hospital sites currently under consideration for co-location by the HSE.

These are: St James's Hospital, Beaumont Hospital, Connolly Hospital and Tallaght Hospital in Dublin; and in Galway, Cork, Limerick, Waterford, Sligo and Letterkenny.

It is expected that the HSE will announce the details of the first co-located private hospital at the end of March.

Political opposition to the Government's proposed co-location of private and public hospitals on publicly-owned land has been intense.

Apart from the criticisms levelled at the generous tax breaks afforded to investors, objections have also been raised in relation to the precise role of the private hospitals once they are built onpublic lands.

Fears have been expressed that the private facilities will simply cherry-pick the tasks they will perform, leaving the "dirty work" of A&E and other less lucrative tasks to the public hospitals next door.

However, the HSE has moved to downplay that fear, stating that the tendering process for co-location stipulates that a proposed private hospital must provide complementary services to the public hospital on whose grounds it is built.

The Government, for its part, has defended its co-location plan, claiming that it will free up to 1,000 of the 2,500 beds in the public hospital system currently set aside for private patients. There are 13,000 beds in the public system in total.

Tax incentives for consultation rooms too:

Quote :

(Eilish O'Regan Health Correspondent - Independent)
PRIVATE suites at a plush new Dublin medical centre are being snapped up by hospital consultants . . . at €1m a go.
Such has been the rush that the 39 suites in the €110m Hermitage Medical Clinic in Lucan, west Dublin, are hugely oversubscribed.

Most of the consultants will already be on public salaries of around €120,000 a year, but some of those in the high-earning specialities could also be on private income of around €700,000 a year. The suites cost an average of around €1m each, and 36 of the 39 are already sold, the Irish Medical News reported.

It means the remainder will have to be distributed on a strategic basis, according to the backers. These are led by orthopaedic consultant, Dr James Sheehan, who has already been one of the main movers behind the Blackrock Clinic and the Galway Clinic. Servicing a debt of €1m would cost in the region of €5,500 a month, and some consultants may share the facilities with other specialists in order to spread the cost.

Most of the consultants there will already be on public salaries of around €120,000; but as more people are now privately insured, demand for private care has increased. Although no official statistics are available, it has been speculated that some consultants in the high-earning specialities could earn around €700,000 a year.

The facility will also be aiming to get business from public hospitals, although there has been disappointment that this has not met with the level of expectation at the Galway Clinic. The remainder of the suites will be allocated on the basis of how the particular specialities fit into the overall mix of services provided by the centre, which is aiming to maximise diversity.

The 101-bed hospital will provide medical, surgical and advanced radiotherapy care to patients. It will also be able to offer a variety of scans - including highly advanced technology in the areas of cancer, neurosurgery, cardiology and general medicine. In the past, Dr Sheehan has criticised the delay in building new private hospitals. It has been nearly 20 years since the Blackrock Clinic and the Mater Private in Dublin were established.

But the rise in deluxe private facilities is symptomatic of a changing Ireland and the increasing demand by the public for facilities that don't just treat illness. The latest addition has been the Beacon Dermatology Clinic in south Dublin, which offers cosmetic procedures as well as non-surgical facelifts, treatments to get rid of cellulite and anti-wrinkle treatments.

Mr Sheehan has previously blamed the VHI for trying to keep a lid on new private developments in order to keep its costs down.

However, another 10 more private hospital projects are either open or in the pipeline including the Beacon Hospital in Sandyford and the Hermitage Clinic.
Other developments around the country have also been linked strongly to the tax incentives introduced in the 2001 Finance Act.

Salaries of around 100,000 euros are the norm for Consultants in Europe.

Government policy is aimed at further enrichment of already very rich people (no point in going for any of this unless you are a big tax payer) at the expense of making a hames of the health services. As it's turned out the economic slump may disrupt these some of these plans, and bring about a crisis in terms of bed shortages. Either way, its a disastrous way to do business.

cactus flower wrote:

http://www.independent.ie/unsorted/features/healthcare-the-new-drug-for-investors-121985.html

The idea that this was not intended to be another gravy train for developers and wealthy businessment friends of government

There is nothing in that article to substantiate your claim. It is hardly surprising that when the Government looks to the private sector to spend millions in order to save the public purse, it’s wealthy individuals who step forward with the necessary.

tonys wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

http://www.independent.ie/unsorted/features/healthcare-the-new-drug-for-investors-121985.html

The idea that this was not intended to be another gravy train for developers and wealthy businessment friends of government

There is nothing in that article to substantiate your claim. It is hardly surprising that when the Government looks to the private sector to spend millions in order to save the public purse, it’s wealthy individuals who step forward with the necessary.

But Tony, don't you get it? The private sector does not spend millions! The government gives them everything they need and, once they have had that, they pull out and/or renege on promises made.

tonys wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

http://www.independent.ie/unsorted/features/healthcare-the-new-drug-for-investors-121985.html

The idea that this was not intended to be another gravy train for developers and wealthy businessment friends of government

There is nothing in that article to substantiate your claim. It is hardly surprising that when the Government looks to the private sector to spend millions in order to save the public purse, it’s wealthy individuals who step forward with the necessary.

Bless their little cotton socks

tonys wrote:

Aragon wrote:

tonys wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

http://www.independent.ie/unsorted/features/healthcare-the-new-drug-for-investors-121985.html

The idea that this was not intended to be another gravy train for developers and wealthy businessment friends of government

There is nothing in that article to substantiate your claim. It is hardly surprising that when the Government looks to the private sector to spend millions in order to save the public purse, it’s wealthy individuals who step forward with the necessary.

But Tony, don't you get it? The private sector does not spend millions! The government gives them everything they need and, once they have had that, they pull out and/or renege on promises made.

That’s just nonsense Aragon, I don’t care if it’s Stalin’s red hordes that build the hospitals & run them for free by threatening the consultants with a gulag holiday, so long as it works & gives us what we want. I just want the services we need, as soon as possible and at the least cost to the taxpayer, I don’t have any ideological hang ups about how that happens, that’s yours & CF’s job.

Aragon - please identify one person and what they "got" from the Government? If there is so much free loot why does it look like these projects won't go ahead?

Aragon is underestimating the eagerness of the public sector in the last couple of years to extract every last cent feasible out of the development/construction sector. Profits were imagined to be unlimited and the sector viewed as a milch cow in terms of taxation, as we all know. Profits were indeed very high, so these schemes (like the housing PPPs) were entered into jointly by private developers and public authorities on the assumption that the gravy train was going to keep on rolling. Think the M50 tollbridge times some.

Everyone got too greedy. None of this takes from the fact that Co-location and other forms of state aided private medicine are a gift to the rich at the expense of the poor. Also, all the evidence is that private medicine is far, far more costly to provide than public.

cactus flower wrote:

Everyone got too greedy. None of this takes from the fact that Co-location and other forms of state aided private medicine are a gift to the rich at the expense of the poor. Also, all the evidence is that private medicine is far, far more costly to provide than public.

Who has been gifted what?

Zhou_Enlai wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

Everyone got too greedy. None of this takes from the fact that Co-location and other forms of state aided private medicine are a gift to the rich at the expense of the poor. Also, all the evidence is that private medicine is far, far more costly to provide than public.

Who has been gifted what?

Tax "incentives" are a gift. Furthermore, there is not an open market, and the owners of these hospitals are proposed to be sent a steady stream of "public" customers. M50 Toll.

Zhou_Enlai wrote:

tonys wrote:

Aragon wrote:

tonys wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

http://www.independent.ie/unsorted/features/healthcare-the-new-drug-for-investors-121985.html

The idea that this was not intended to be another gravy train for developers and wealthy businessment friends of government

There is nothing in that article to substantiate your claim. It is hardly surprising that when the Government looks to the private sector to spend millions in order to save the public purse, it’s wealthy individuals who step forward with the necessary.

But Tony, don't you get it? The private sector does not spend millions! The government gives them everything they need and, once they have had that, they pull out and/or renege on promises made.

That’s just nonsense Aragon, I don’t care if it’s Stalin’s red hordes that build the hospitals & run them for free by threatening the consultants with a gulag holiday, so long as it works & gives us what we want. I just want the services we need, as soon as possible and at the least cost to the taxpayer, I don’t have any ideological hang ups about how that happens, that’s yours & CF’s job.

Aragon - please identify one person and what they "got" from the Government? If there is so much free loot why does it look like these projects won't go ahead?

If they are not going ahead it will be because even Harney will be having the jitters about continuing this gravy train policy in all the current dire circumstances. People are starting to ask 'where is the value for money in all of this'? She cannot answer that question positively.

Suggest you look at Michael Moore's 'Sicko' - even in Cuba they have a vastly superior health service than we do here - or indeed than in the United States. Despite massive privations as a consequence of the vicious US embargo on Cuba, its health service is still performing better.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_Cuba

Aragon wrote:

Zhou_Enlai wrote:

tonys wrote:

Aragon wrote:

tonys wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

http://www.independent.ie/unsorted/features/healthcare-the-new-drug-for-investors-121985.html

The idea that this was not intended to be another gravy train for developers and wealthy businessment friends of government

There is nothing in that article to substantiate your claim. It is hardly surprising that when the Government looks to the private sector to spend millions in order to save the public purse, it’s wealthy individuals who step forward with the necessary.

But Tony, don't you get it? The private sector does not spend millions! The government gives them everything they need and, once they have had that, they pull out and/or renege on promises made.

That’s just nonsense Aragon, I don’t care if it’s Stalin’s red hordes that build the hospitals & run them for free by threatening the consultants with a gulag holiday, so long as it works & gives us what we want. I just want the services we need, as soon as possible and at the least cost to the taxpayer, I don’t have any ideological hang ups about how that happens, that’s yours & CF’s job.

Aragon - please identify one person and what they "got" from the Government? If there is so much free loot why does it look like these projects won't go ahead?

If they are not going ahead it will be because even Harney will be having the jitters about continuing this gravy train policy in all the current dire circumstances. People are starting to ask 'where is the value for money in all of this'? She cannot answer that question positively.

Suggest you look at Michael Moore's 'Sicko' - even in Cuba they have a vastly superior health service than we do here - or indeed than in the United States. Despite massive privations as a consequence of the vicious US embargo on Cuba, its health service is still performing better.

]
Anyone can run a health service with doctors @ a Dollar a day, even Cuba.
Com'on now Aragon, you've got to be able to do better than Michael Moore & Fidel.

Just remind me tonys, what is the motivation for private investment in the health sector?

tonys wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

Just remind me tonys, what is the motivation for private investment in the health sector?

To make money

And I’ll remind you how privately run business does that as well,

By providing a (better) service people want, where they want it and at a better price than its competitors.

If it doesn’t do the above, it doesn’t make any money & goes out of business

Like the M50 Toll?

tonys wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

Just remind me tonys, what is the motivation for private investment in the health sector?

To make money

And I’ll remind you how privately run business does that as well,

By providing a (better) service people want, where they want it and at a better price than its competitors.

There's a dozen more words you could put in there alongside 'better' - cheaper, faster etc. Some of those might not or should not apply to healthcare.