There was an article on PM on Radio 4 tonight about how an anonymous survey of MPs had found that they thought they should have a pay rise of - wait for it - 32%!! Amazingly, nearly every MP the programme contacted for an interview to discuss this story was too busy to talk (whereas they normally inflict their views on us at every opportunity).
However, one MP did agree to talk. This guy, a Tory MP as it happens, (although I'm sure plenty of Labour MPs were also in favour of a pay rise) actually had me spluttering and shouting at the radio with the assertion that many MPs were becoming increasingly "poor" and that it was terrible that they might not have been able to afford the presents their children wanted this Christmas.
Let's just point this out here: MPs earn in excess of £64,000 p.a. which, of course, excludes the generous package of expenses that covers virtually all of their day-to-day costs. "Poor"?
He then went on to explain that many MPs are qualified doctors and they could be earning a lot more by practicing medicine (well get back to treating patients or give back the costs of your medical training!) or had left industry to enter Parliament. Fine, I have no doubt they could have been making a whole heap more as straight out capitalists, but no-one made them become an MP. Using their own free will, they chose that particular path and, presumably, also bothered to check what salary came with the job, so they knew what to expect.
The kicker came for me when he said that at £64,000, an MP's salary was no better than the headmaster or headmistress of a junior school. If that is the case, I know which one deserves that level of pay AND should get the pay rise (and it's not the one who goes to "work" in the House of Commons!).
Somebody needs to give this guy a talk on just exactly what "public service" means.
Thursday, 10 January 2013
Wednesday, 9 January 2013
R.I.P.
Today, the Guardian carried an obituary of The Welfare State. As the Coalition continued their blunderbuss assault on the weak, the marginalised, the disabled and anyone else who is "not one of us" with their capping benefit rises at 1%, the Guardian's piece saw it as just about the last nail in Welfare's coffin. It may not quite be all over for Beveridge's brilliant design, but it is looking like a very, very precarious 'support' for those who require assistance in their time of need. More and more will begin to fall through the cracks in the fractured provision that is arising from the work of the wrecking crew currently in power.
It is lazy to accept that the George Osborne and Daily Mail view - a group of feckless, work-shy spongers and ne'er-do-wells - represents the 'norm' amongst benefit recipients. As with any grouping, it is far from homogenous and for every 'scrounger' that the DM unearths or Osborne vilifies, there are ten, fifty, a hundred people who want to work but are unable to find a job in the current market. As you may have noticed, we are in a (double- or treble-dip) recession.
The Welfare system probably had people who realised the potential for exploiting it for their own ends right from day one. However, the majority of people at that time could remember the hardships of slum housing, of having to spend the food money in order to pay for a visit by the doctor or having the barest of financial support when they were out of work. They were grateful for the support provided by the new system and chose not to abuse what it had to offer because they understood that to swindle it was, in effect, to steal from their neighbours, families in exactly the same position as themselves.
The things that are really dying as the Welfare State staggers, suffering death by a thousand cuts, are community, a sense of belonging, the knowledge that those of us in work should support those who are temporarily without a job, the humility to put society's welfare ahead of our individual need because we believe that a strong society benefits all, not just the few. Margaret Thatcher famously once said that there was no such thing as 'society'. She was wrong when she said that, but her heirs are hell-bent on ensuring that it comes to pass. As we cut the ties between each other and turn in on ourselves and look solely to tend to our own needs, so we play into the hands of those in power: divide and rule.
As we move away from a Welfare State and embrace a US-style everyone-for-theselves approach to life, we will be waving goodbye to so much more than the command economy anachronism the Daily Mail sees. We will be laying to rest something that once helped bind us together. It is ironic that the Mail constantly runs pieces whose subtexts lament the passing of Olde England whilst all the time hammering away at the very institutions that once defined us as 'great'. R.I.P. indeed.
Edit: Spookily, this piece in the Guardian says pretty much what I have been fumbling to say in the above http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jan/08/welfare-problem-real-scroungers-greedy
It is lazy to accept that the George Osborne and Daily Mail view - a group of feckless, work-shy spongers and ne'er-do-wells - represents the 'norm' amongst benefit recipients. As with any grouping, it is far from homogenous and for every 'scrounger' that the DM unearths or Osborne vilifies, there are ten, fifty, a hundred people who want to work but are unable to find a job in the current market. As you may have noticed, we are in a (double- or treble-dip) recession.
The Welfare system probably had people who realised the potential for exploiting it for their own ends right from day one. However, the majority of people at that time could remember the hardships of slum housing, of having to spend the food money in order to pay for a visit by the doctor or having the barest of financial support when they were out of work. They were grateful for the support provided by the new system and chose not to abuse what it had to offer because they understood that to swindle it was, in effect, to steal from their neighbours, families in exactly the same position as themselves.
The things that are really dying as the Welfare State staggers, suffering death by a thousand cuts, are community, a sense of belonging, the knowledge that those of us in work should support those who are temporarily without a job, the humility to put society's welfare ahead of our individual need because we believe that a strong society benefits all, not just the few. Margaret Thatcher famously once said that there was no such thing as 'society'. She was wrong when she said that, but her heirs are hell-bent on ensuring that it comes to pass. As we cut the ties between each other and turn in on ourselves and look solely to tend to our own needs, so we play into the hands of those in power: divide and rule.
As we move away from a Welfare State and embrace a US-style everyone-for-theselves approach to life, we will be waving goodbye to so much more than the command economy anachronism the Daily Mail sees. We will be laying to rest something that once helped bind us together. It is ironic that the Mail constantly runs pieces whose subtexts lament the passing of Olde England whilst all the time hammering away at the very institutions that once defined us as 'great'. R.I.P. indeed.
Edit: Spookily, this piece in the Guardian says pretty much what I have been fumbling to say in the above http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jan/08/welfare-problem-real-scroungers-greedy
Monday, 7 January 2013
Comparing apples and pears
A week or so back, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) waded in with some figures to support the Coalition's recently-announced war on scroungers and skivers as George Osborne termed them or, more neutrally, people in receipt of benefits. The headline figures were that benefits, rising in line with inflation had, over five years, gone up by 20% whereas private sector salaries had gone up by an average of only 12% over the same period.
Leaving aside the fact that the average pay rise for public sector workers wasn't mentioned anywhere (a big fat 0% for two years now), what appears to be an outrageous imbalance against the "hard-working middle classes", actually appears a bit differently if you stop to think about it. A 20% increase vs. a 12% increase is only as vastly unfair as the Government would have us believe if it is applied to the same starting figure. However, if you take a very small figure and increase it by 20% it remains a pretty small figure. By comparison, taking a relatively large figure and adding 12% to it leaves the gap between the small figure and the large figure pretty much untouched.
Taking a single person on a salary of £34,000 p.a, that equates to around £28,800 take home or £553 per week. That 12% rise equates to around £59 per week. In comparison, a single jobseeker aged over 25 gets £71 per week, so their 20% increase equates to £12 per week. Now, I'm not going to say that the additional £59 pounds per week for the employed person is undeserved or mere bunce: many people in these times of austerity are living close to the edge financially. But that additional £12 per week makes a massive difference when you starting point is so low to begin with.
I'm not about to get into the "undeserving" vs. the "deserving" unemployed person argument here, but I just thought it should be pointed out that when one is looking to compare apples with something, it is probably best to find some other apples, otherwise your comparison is meaningless. However, I suspect that a level statistical playing field was the last thing on the minds of the DWP when they concocted that comparison. What was that quote about "lies, damned lies and statistics"?
Leaving aside the fact that the average pay rise for public sector workers wasn't mentioned anywhere (a big fat 0% for two years now), what appears to be an outrageous imbalance against the "hard-working middle classes", actually appears a bit differently if you stop to think about it. A 20% increase vs. a 12% increase is only as vastly unfair as the Government would have us believe if it is applied to the same starting figure. However, if you take a very small figure and increase it by 20% it remains a pretty small figure. By comparison, taking a relatively large figure and adding 12% to it leaves the gap between the small figure and the large figure pretty much untouched.
Taking a single person on a salary of £34,000 p.a, that equates to around £28,800 take home or £553 per week. That 12% rise equates to around £59 per week. In comparison, a single jobseeker aged over 25 gets £71 per week, so their 20% increase equates to £12 per week. Now, I'm not going to say that the additional £59 pounds per week for the employed person is undeserved or mere bunce: many people in these times of austerity are living close to the edge financially. But that additional £12 per week makes a massive difference when you starting point is so low to begin with.
I'm not about to get into the "undeserving" vs. the "deserving" unemployed person argument here, but I just thought it should be pointed out that when one is looking to compare apples with something, it is probably best to find some other apples, otherwise your comparison is meaningless. However, I suspect that a level statistical playing field was the last thing on the minds of the DWP when they concocted that comparison. What was that quote about "lies, damned lies and statistics"?
Thursday, 2 August 2012
Depressed
Well, the asteroid, so long in the coming, is finally bearing down upon us. Whether it passes by and causes little damage, wrecks much but, capriciously, leaves random things standing in its wake or obliterates all - I will soon know.
I'm not talking about the latest celestial body (one of a seemingly longish list) that is heading Earthwards (but will eventually pass by at a 'close' distance of a few million miles). No, I'm referring to the new structures that will replace the PCTs (my employer) in April 2013. Today, the broad structures were announced and, contained within the consultation document, a table gave an overview of the likely number of posts, split by grade, that will make up the establishment of the two organisations that are my most likely landing point.
There is not enough detail at this point to be able to say if I will get to slot straight into a new role (the asteroid passes by), be able to at least compete for a post at the same grade I am currently on (not too much damage) or if I will be offered a post significantly more junior to my current position (wipeout!). Even so, I'm feeling less than confident that I have a face that fits in the New NHS. In fact, I'm more than a little depressed about the way things are shaping up.
I'm feeling like the proverbial rabbit, caught in the headlights and frozen to the spot. How does one 'proactively manage' the asteroid that is about to smash everything?
I'm not talking about the latest celestial body (one of a seemingly longish list) that is heading Earthwards (but will eventually pass by at a 'close' distance of a few million miles). No, I'm referring to the new structures that will replace the PCTs (my employer) in April 2013. Today, the broad structures were announced and, contained within the consultation document, a table gave an overview of the likely number of posts, split by grade, that will make up the establishment of the two organisations that are my most likely landing point.
There is not enough detail at this point to be able to say if I will get to slot straight into a new role (the asteroid passes by), be able to at least compete for a post at the same grade I am currently on (not too much damage) or if I will be offered a post significantly more junior to my current position (wipeout!). Even so, I'm feeling less than confident that I have a face that fits in the New NHS. In fact, I'm more than a little depressed about the way things are shaping up.
I'm feeling like the proverbial rabbit, caught in the headlights and frozen to the spot. How does one 'proactively manage' the asteroid that is about to smash everything?
Wednesday, 11 July 2012
My life, my choice!
After a session of playing internet hopscotch (you start on one article and, after a few clicks, you find yourself on a topic far removed from your starting point), I found myself on the website of the Globe and Mail, a Canadian news source. This is the article I landed at: "Legalized Euthanasia Only a Breath Away".
The constant reference to "assisted suicide/euthanasia" annoyed me: the benign-sounding "euthanasia" (hell, that sounds really soporific!) vs. the rather more loaded term "assisted suicide" (visions of Mrs Doyle whispering in your ear as you stand on the cliff's edge "Go on, go on, go on, go on...."). Leaving aside the terminology, let's consider the idea of a 'good death' and free choice.
'Euthanasia' has its roots (as a word, at least) in Greek and means "good death". The Hippocratic Oath (attributed to the Greek physician, Hippocrates), contains the warning that treatment should "do no harm" to the patient, The modern version of Hippocrates oath by Dr Louis Lasagna, contains the line "Above all, I must not play at God". These two quotes neatly tie together the dichotomy in 'modern' medicine: the Christian tradition in Western medicine that reveres suffering as 'saintly' (c.f. Jesus suffering on the cross) and, therefore, something to be accepted gratefully and the need of doctors to attempt to 'cure' even when all hope is gone.
Is there not a point when a good doctor should say, "I can do no more for you", to not prolong the pretence that the physician can act as God and hand down a cure? Once it is acknowledged that a patient cannot be 'cured', it should be down to all 'care' staff to ensure that a patient enjoys a 'good death', with high quality palliative care as one option. Another option, however, should be to allow me, the owner of the body I walk around in, to determine where and when I leave this mortal coil. The main nursing handbook from the 60s acknowledged that not all diseases and conditions are curable and one of the outcomes of a treatment may be death. In such a case, it advised the focus of caring activities should be to help the patient achieve a good death.
I get frustrated when those who advocate the status quo - i.e. that control over the end of our lives should remain with the state - say that allowing us, the poor, misguided people, to have this control would immediately lead to abuse by relatives wishing to hasten the death of a rich aunt or get rid of that 'difficult' grandparent! I am sure it is not beyond the whit of us humans that we might be able to develop some controls, checks and balances to ensure this kind of abuse does not happen. But this argument is invariably a smokescreen that deflects away from all those perfectly 'sane', normal, shoppers in, say, the Trafford Centre who can exercise 'free will' throughout their lives (buy this, don't buy that. buy LOTS of that etc.) but are not allowed to choose to die at a time and place of their choosing if the condition they have means that 'choice' will soon become a slightly compromised concept.
A paragraph from the article:
People who support legalizing assisted suicide/euthanasia simply assume that individual autonomy is the value that takes priority. But research shows that the most likely reasons people want assisted suicide/euthanasia are fear of being abandoned – dying alone and unloved – and of being a burden on others. Surely our response to such fears shouldn’t be to help them to kill themselves or to give them a lethal injection.
"Research". Good term! Makes things sound solid, authoritative and....but, wait a minute: what 'research'? Where was it published? Who peer reviewed it? If you are going to state that research supports your case, then be prepared to include a link to it. Otherwise, be like me and just write your opinion down, but don't claim special dispensation: they are just your views.
I wholeheartedly agree that there is a fear of impending abandonment, of neglect, as I get older. That is not the factor that will send me off to Dignitas and it should not be the reason that we introduce any loosening on the the laws around assisted suicide. We need to develop better elder/dementia care, so that patients are not consigned to 'granny farms' to sit in a lounge for 12 hours a day but instead are engaged in work and play and human interaction, just as they were for the first 70 or 80 years of their lives. Having control over one's time of death is NOT about getting rid of older people. In fact, with high quality, interesting and enjoyable elder care, maybe people might actually want to go on living rather than potentially choosing to opt out of a lingering 'existence' in an unfriendly environment.
I am simply baffled that, in world where 'choice' is lauded and placed so centrally in the mission statement of every organisation, from Tesco to UK plc, we should be denied 'choice' in one of the most important points in our life's journey. Just as 'free choice' in so many other settings is little more than a chimera, so politicians blathering on about 'empowerment' and 'personal control' will mean little if this final choice is not given to adults.
The constant reference to "assisted suicide/euthanasia" annoyed me: the benign-sounding "euthanasia" (hell, that sounds really soporific!) vs. the rather more loaded term "assisted suicide" (visions of Mrs Doyle whispering in your ear as you stand on the cliff's edge "Go on, go on, go on, go on...."). Leaving aside the terminology, let's consider the idea of a 'good death' and free choice.
'Euthanasia' has its roots (as a word, at least) in Greek and means "good death". The Hippocratic Oath (attributed to the Greek physician, Hippocrates), contains the warning that treatment should "do no harm" to the patient, The modern version of Hippocrates oath by Dr Louis Lasagna, contains the line "Above all, I must not play at God". These two quotes neatly tie together the dichotomy in 'modern' medicine: the Christian tradition in Western medicine that reveres suffering as 'saintly' (c.f. Jesus suffering on the cross) and, therefore, something to be accepted gratefully and the need of doctors to attempt to 'cure' even when all hope is gone.
Is there not a point when a good doctor should say, "I can do no more for you", to not prolong the pretence that the physician can act as God and hand down a cure? Once it is acknowledged that a patient cannot be 'cured', it should be down to all 'care' staff to ensure that a patient enjoys a 'good death', with high quality palliative care as one option. Another option, however, should be to allow me, the owner of the body I walk around in, to determine where and when I leave this mortal coil. The main nursing handbook from the 60s acknowledged that not all diseases and conditions are curable and one of the outcomes of a treatment may be death. In such a case, it advised the focus of caring activities should be to help the patient achieve a good death.
I get frustrated when those who advocate the status quo - i.e. that control over the end of our lives should remain with the state - say that allowing us, the poor, misguided people, to have this control would immediately lead to abuse by relatives wishing to hasten the death of a rich aunt or get rid of that 'difficult' grandparent! I am sure it is not beyond the whit of us humans that we might be able to develop some controls, checks and balances to ensure this kind of abuse does not happen. But this argument is invariably a smokescreen that deflects away from all those perfectly 'sane', normal, shoppers in, say, the Trafford Centre who can exercise 'free will' throughout their lives (buy this, don't buy that. buy LOTS of that etc.) but are not allowed to choose to die at a time and place of their choosing if the condition they have means that 'choice' will soon become a slightly compromised concept.
A paragraph from the article:
People who support legalizing assisted suicide/euthanasia simply assume that individual autonomy is the value that takes priority. But research shows that the most likely reasons people want assisted suicide/euthanasia are fear of being abandoned – dying alone and unloved – and of being a burden on others. Surely our response to such fears shouldn’t be to help them to kill themselves or to give them a lethal injection.
"Research". Good term! Makes things sound solid, authoritative and....but, wait a minute: what 'research'? Where was it published? Who peer reviewed it? If you are going to state that research supports your case, then be prepared to include a link to it. Otherwise, be like me and just write your opinion down, but don't claim special dispensation: they are just your views.
I wholeheartedly agree that there is a fear of impending abandonment, of neglect, as I get older. That is not the factor that will send me off to Dignitas and it should not be the reason that we introduce any loosening on the the laws around assisted suicide. We need to develop better elder/dementia care, so that patients are not consigned to 'granny farms' to sit in a lounge for 12 hours a day but instead are engaged in work and play and human interaction, just as they were for the first 70 or 80 years of their lives. Having control over one's time of death is NOT about getting rid of older people. In fact, with high quality, interesting and enjoyable elder care, maybe people might actually want to go on living rather than potentially choosing to opt out of a lingering 'existence' in an unfriendly environment.
I am simply baffled that, in world where 'choice' is lauded and placed so centrally in the mission statement of every organisation, from Tesco to UK plc, we should be denied 'choice' in one of the most important points in our life's journey. Just as 'free choice' in so many other settings is little more than a chimera, so politicians blathering on about 'empowerment' and 'personal control' will mean little if this final choice is not given to adults.
Wednesday, 22 February 2012
An extraordinary coincidence?
Somewhere in the house, I have an odd coin/medal. The obverse side features a bust of Samuel Plimsoll (he of the Plimsoll Line) and the inscription 'House of Commons 22 July 1875 London S Plimsoll' whilst the reverse shows a ship in distress with the legend "Coffin Ship". The coin/medal apparently commemorates the passing of the Merchant Shipping Act in 1875 following Plimsoll's campaign to draw attention to the number of seafarers losing their lives on overloaded and unsafe ships ('coffin ships'). I found the coin/medal in the gutter many years ago and it has lived in a box ever since.
For some reason, the memory of this coin popped into my head tonight and I decided to look if anyone was selling a similar coin on eBay. I found one (vastly inferior in terms of condition) that had recently been sold for £3.99 (hold the retirement party - that's not the fortune I was hoping for). However, that prompted a further thought: the Dead Man's Penny.
The Dead Man's Penny (DMP for the sake of my typing fingers - both of them) was a circular brass plaque, around 12cm in diameter that was issued presented to the family of a soldier who fell in the Great War (1914 - 18). The front depicts a lion and Britannia holding a laurel wreath. A simple oblong space contains the name of the deceased and no rank is indicated in order to demonstrate the equality of the sacrifice made.
My mother has two of these at home that came from the house of my late aunt and uncle. I can still remember the two DMPs standing propped up on the sill of the landing window in their house. As a child I was fascinated by them and the link to relatives long dead in a conflict concluded 40 years before I was born.
Again, I idly looked to see if anyone was selling a DMP on eBay and again, there was one example for sale: four bids and currently just over £46. The name on the plaque was 'Frederick Copeland' and in the description, the seller admitted he knew nothing about the soldier the plaque commemorated. On a whim I typed "Frederick Copeland+fell in WW1" into Google and the top result returned was a page from a site listing all war memorials that include the names of fallen members of the Yorkshire Regiment. Apparently, on the War Memorial at Billingham, a Private Frederick Copeland is listed, a member of the 7th Batallion, the Yorkshire Regiment, who died at Ypres in 1915. The date on which he died was 19th September - my birthday!
Now I realise that, statistically, in any list of dates, there will always be one that has particular significance for the reader. There's a perfectly good explanation involving a mathematical proof etc etc. But from a random chain of enquiries to arrive at the name of a soldier who died on 19th September? That feels spooky....
For some reason, the memory of this coin popped into my head tonight and I decided to look if anyone was selling a similar coin on eBay. I found one (vastly inferior in terms of condition) that had recently been sold for £3.99 (hold the retirement party - that's not the fortune I was hoping for). However, that prompted a further thought: the Dead Man's Penny.
The Dead Man's Penny (DMP for the sake of my typing fingers - both of them) was a circular brass plaque, around 12cm in diameter that was issued presented to the family of a soldier who fell in the Great War (1914 - 18). The front depicts a lion and Britannia holding a laurel wreath. A simple oblong space contains the name of the deceased and no rank is indicated in order to demonstrate the equality of the sacrifice made.
My mother has two of these at home that came from the house of my late aunt and uncle. I can still remember the two DMPs standing propped up on the sill of the landing window in their house. As a child I was fascinated by them and the link to relatives long dead in a conflict concluded 40 years before I was born.
Again, I idly looked to see if anyone was selling a DMP on eBay and again, there was one example for sale: four bids and currently just over £46. The name on the plaque was 'Frederick Copeland' and in the description, the seller admitted he knew nothing about the soldier the plaque commemorated. On a whim I typed "Frederick Copeland+fell in WW1" into Google and the top result returned was a page from a site listing all war memorials that include the names of fallen members of the Yorkshire Regiment. Apparently, on the War Memorial at Billingham, a Private Frederick Copeland is listed, a member of the 7th Batallion, the Yorkshire Regiment, who died at Ypres in 1915. The date on which he died was 19th September - my birthday!
Now I realise that, statistically, in any list of dates, there will always be one that has particular significance for the reader. There's a perfectly good explanation involving a mathematical proof etc etc. But from a random chain of enquiries to arrive at the name of a soldier who died on 19th September? That feels spooky....
Monday, 20 February 2012
Health Warning
Tory MP Mark Simmonds was recently caught failing to declare his interest in private health provider Circle when he spoke in favour of the health service 'reforms' in a debate in the Commons. He is employed as a 'strategic adviser' to the company for which he is paid £50K a year.
Now, either Mr Simmonds forgot because he is so vastly wealthy that a mere trifle of £50K failed to register as significant enough to mention or he 'forgot' in the same way that the Tories 'forgot' to put massive top-down NHS reorganisation into their manifesto - a selective forgetting that makes me believe that privatisation - and the greater involvement of Mr Simmonds mates at Circle - is the real agenda for 'reform'.
Now, either Mr Simmonds forgot because he is so vastly wealthy that a mere trifle of £50K failed to register as significant enough to mention or he 'forgot' in the same way that the Tories 'forgot' to put massive top-down NHS reorganisation into their manifesto - a selective forgetting that makes me believe that privatisation - and the greater involvement of Mr Simmonds mates at Circle - is the real agenda for 'reform'.
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