By Leah Gunn Barrett
English Labour’s shadow health spokesperson, Wes Streeting, said spending more on health comes at the expense of “other worthy causes” and that “under Labour you can have a well-funded NHS or you can lift kids out of poverty, but you can’t have both.”[1]
That’s a false choice. It implies that governments are limited in what they can spend to help their people. Taxpayers don’t fund the NHS, the government does. It CAN turn on the taps because it owns a central bank. As John Maynard Keynes said, “anything we can actually do, we can afford.”[2]
Second, not prioritising a nation’s health is foolish. For every pound a government spends on healthcare, £4 of economic activity is generated. Healthy people can work, employ others, buy goods and services and pay taxes.[3] It’s called the health multiplier. An unhealthy population can’t work, so unemployment and child poverty increase.
Third, Labour is partly responsible for the NHS crisis. Tony Blair expanded private finance initiatives (PFIs), an unnecessary and costly way to fund new hospitals. PFIs deliver risk-free returns for private investors but drain money from the NHS, pile up long-term debt, forcing the NHS to sell assets and close hospitals. Labour introduced private medical services to the NHS which increased costs and brought in Payment by Results, that helped private companies cherry-pick the easiest, most profitable treatments.[4] And it allowed NHS Trusts to become Foundation Trusts, arms-length businesses outside government control, that further entrenched commercial interests into the system.
Fourth, follow the money. English Labour politicians are increasingly funded by private health companies, which explains their enthusiasm for selling off the NHS. Ian Murray is the only MP in Scotland to have accepted private insurance money.[5]
To save its NHS, Scotland must end this failing union.
Leah Gunn Barrett
[2] https://gimms.org.uk/2023/04/13/keynes-wisdom-still-stands/
[3] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3849102/
[4] https://www.yournhsneedsyou.com/timeline/
[5]https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/viewer?mid=1_vYkm4Yb_3r1SCl76qvgdR6zwqqB4u4&femb=1&ll=51.80511000560987%2C-5.127287991769077&z=6
Talking-up Scotland 
OR…you could abolish the House of Lords and end homelessness or poverty?
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The gesture and facial expression call to mind Benito Mussolini making a speech.
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You can’t lift children out of poverty, or anyone for that matter, if they are not healthy which is only possible if they have access to a functioning and free health service.
Health and economic health go hand in hand. They are not either or options.
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Wes Streeting is a man who knows the value of money – particularly the Healthy donations he receives from private Health Care companies .
Don’t expect him to betray his principles – they have been paid for already !
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YET AGAIN LABOUR ARE FRIGGIN USELESS
NOT FIT TO RUN A FRUIT STALL
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Poverty can be eradicated. and a well funded NHS can be achieved. The NHS funding has been £150Billion a year since 2015. Austerity. NHS funding has not increased. £270Billion was spent over two years on funding Covid. £Billions wasted on non regulated contracts. Mone etc. £100 a month was cut from universal benefits.
The Tories are spending £1090Billion a year. They are not funding essential services. Wasting £Billion on HS2, Hickley Point, Trident, illegal wars, redundant weaponry. Losing £Billions on Brexit.
Labour are as bad supporting Brexit and illegal wars, tax evasion.
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That is true of Scotland in the Union, the blocking grant imposed by the UK Government ensures that the Scottish Government has to follow Tory/Lib Dem and probably very soon Labour’s austerity measures on the Scotland’s NHS or children who can hear nuclear convoys passing in the night and watch Rishi Sunak giving interviews beside the private jet that takes him on his fleeting visits to Scotland and global tours.
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I’m a follower of the economist, Richard Murphy, not that I understand all the points he makes by any means, but he has continually debunked Labour policies as sheer bunkum. As Leah correctly points out, the Government owns the Bank of England, and can use Quantitaive Easing any time it chooses.
That the same organisation seems determined to send us all to financial hell in a handcart by maintaining extortionate interest rates, a decision supported by the Labour Party, so don’t expect any change of heart if it becomes the next English Government.
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“…but you can’t have both.”
I’d opine that under Labour you wouldn’t have either.
Not only do they appear hell bent on privatising the NHS, their leader Sir Kid Starver is strangely averse to helping hungry children.
A vote for Labour is a vote for a return to the days of health care for only the few, and of children who die of hunger – if polio, TB or sundry other dread diseases don’t get them first.
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