Labour can't be trusted with the NHS

Voters in the North East are learning painfully that Labour is best when it's, er, Tory. Having failed dismally to manage any sort of economic resurgence in the old Northern heartlands, Labour actually managed to widen the gap between rich and poor in the UK, had more young people out of work than any other post-war government, destroyed working-class communities with reckless immigration and so criminally maladministered the nation's finances that the great-grandchildren of all voters will still be paying for it. But it's with the NHS that Labour betrayed its own voter base most grievously. 

After throwing a tsunami of cash at an organisation unable to make good use of it Labour managed to double GPs' salaries to over £100k but cut their work to M -F 9 - 5, managed to pay NHS executives salaries and bonuses many times the Prime Minister's own salary, and fostered a culture of carelessness and irresponsibility that was ultimately responsible for over 13,000 needless pointless deaths in just 14 hospitals from poor care, medical errors and inadequate management. As the Telegraph points out, for Andrew Burnham, one of the Labour politicians responsible, to defend indignantly his own reputation whilst 13,000 families have lost so much more is behaviour of the most revolting self-interest. But what would you expect from a professional politician?

As with the banking and financial debacle, people should be in prison for what happened in the NHS under Labour - perhaps including Andrew Burnham. Why aren't they?

Plod kills another innocent

As yet another innocent person's corpse lies in a mortuary fridge tonight as the result of a high speed police chase, the time has come to call a halt to this carnage. Every week another person is killed or seriously maimed by 'red mist' gormless idiots at the wheels of police vehicles.

Let's be clear about this. Chasing a car without a tax disk at high speed, or a moped rider not wearing a helmet, isn't worth the risk to public safety. It gives the idiot plod at the wheel a satisfying and addictive adrenaline rush, but that's about all.

Heather Mills, loathe her or hate her, lost her leg to a speeding police vehicle. No-one deserves that. Just google deaths in police chases site:uk and pages of innocent lives cut short by this moronic power-trip come up.

Being a plod isn't a licence to have fun at the cost of pain, death and the ruin of innocent lives. Here in London too many of these idiots on 'blues and twos' rushing to the Mcdonalds drive-in or just because they're bored in a traffic queue deserve dismissal. It's time to say STOP to this criminal and anti-social behaviour.

Update
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The suggestion has been made elsewhere that permission to use lights and siren or to drive at speed in pursuit or response should be given by the control room, and not left to the vehicle's driver to decide. I wholly agree with this. Any accident caused by a vehicle using blues and twos without consent would then automatically result in the driver's prosecution. A simple measure that could be implemented immediately.

Losers

Ian Blair was reported to be as white as a sheet yesterday when Boris took him aside for a private chat. He was also reported to have been terrified of being filmed clapping the new mayor too enthusiastically in case his Downing Street boss picked it up. Ten years of Zanu Labour and this is what it's come to - an apparatchik police chief scared of his own shadow who has hooked his star to the waning red dwarf of the Great Wanking Fist.

It's the Alice in Wonderland Polly Toynbee world of Labour values that puts the prosecution of litterers and yellow-line parkers above the preservation of the lives of our city's kids, one of whom is murdered every fortnight. Boris' priorities are exactly the right ones. As yet another 15 year old lad lies in the mortuary fridge with knife-rent vitals our common humanity demands that we apply all our resources to slow and halt this evil scourge.

Boris can do whatever he can with the Met, but it will not be enough. Civitas have reported in depth on the proximate reasons for this carnage of the kids; some 57% of black kids are growing up without their biological fathers. Gordon, please listen to me. The State is not an adequate father substitute. Rousseau was wrong. Boys need fathers. Children need families. Single parenthood is not a valid lifestyle choice - it's an open door to deliquency, violence, poverty, idleness, squalor and death.

It will need more than Boris' grip on Ian Blair's scruff to change this course. But it will be a damn good start.

More on MAIB and dodgy dossiers ...

Back in July last year the MAIB published their annual report for 2005 which contained some alarmist statistics purporting to justify the introduction of alcohol limits for leisure boats. Hugh Robertson MP (con, Faversham and Mid Kent) asked the following written question:

Hugh Robertson: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport whether the Government have any plans to introduce a maximum blood alcohol limit for (a) recreational mariners and (b) those in charge of a boat. [83515]

Dr. Ladyman: Following a consultation in 2004 and more recent evidence given to us, including two Marine Accident Investigation Branch recommendations, we are now working with interested parties to see what appropriate measures should be taken to implement the relevant provisions of the Railways and Transport Safety Act 2003.

Hugh Robertson: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what assessment the Government have made of the results of the 2004 consultation into a maximum blood alcohol limit for recreational mariners. [83516]

Dr. Ladyman: We are currently reassessing all the views in the light of the Marine Accident Investigation Branch recommendations delivered earlier this year and will make an announcement once that exercise is complete.

Hugh Robertson: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what assessment the Marine Accident Investigation Board has made of the number of people (a) killed and (b) injured in (i) recreational and (ii) non-recreational marine craft in each of the past five years; and in how many of these cases alcohol was identified as a contributory factor. [83517]

Dr. Ladyman: The Merchant Shipping (Accident Reporting and Investigation) Regulations 2005 only place a requirement to report accidents involving recreational craft if they are being commercially operated. However, the Chief Inspector of Marine Accidents may investigate accidents involving privately-owned craft if they are brought to his attention.

Details of all accidents reported to the Marine Accident Investigation Branch are contained on its database. Statistics for deaths and injuries for both recreational and non-recreational craft for the past five years are shown in the following table:

Recreational craft (non-commercial)		All other vessels
	Deaths	Injuries	Deaths	Injuries
2001	3	2	23	651
2002	8	4	27	647
2003	12	10	22	673
2004	3	25	22	647
2005	24	35	22	551

The second table contains numbers of deaths and injuries where alcohol was positively identified as a contributory factor:

	Recreational craft (non-commercial)		All other vessels
	Deaths	Injuries	Deaths	Injuries
2001	2	—	2	12
2002	—	—	—	14
2003	1	—	1	18
2004	—	3	—	14
2005	5	3	5	17

Hmm. So over the entire 5 year period, an average of 1.6 deaths a year had alcohol as a contributory factor. That's about the same number of deaths as are caused by people accidently stabbing a table fork up their nose.

I'd love to see the RIA (Regulatory Impact Assessment) for this; a cost to the taxpayer of possibly several hundred millions a year to save perhaps a single life. The economics of madness. But then Stephen Ladyboy is a fully paid-up member of the Blair Fantasy Club.