Today’s newspapers do not make pleasant reading for anybody.
Between revelations of child abuse being ignored in Oxford and the horrifying report into poor care and an ensuing cover-up at a hospital in Cumbria, it showed that too often large taxpayer-funded bureaucracies still do not have the level of accountability and scrutiny that those they serve deserve.
In the NHS in particular, we still remain hamstrung by a childish debate. It is impossible to talk about the real reform the Health Service needs in today’s political climate, with point-scoring and ideology put ahead of the people who should be at the heart of the Service – patients themselves. Rather than focussing on the need for changes, politicians are falling over themselves to pump more money into a service that is failing to deliver what taxpayers deserve.
Today’s leading article in The Times called for far greater accountability at the heart of government (£). We heartily agree.