dom.blog

The (unelected) House of Lords today blocked a bill to allow terminally ill patients the right to be helped to die if they wished. I suspect that most readers of this blog, when weighing up the arguments, come to the conlusion that assisted dying should be offered as a humane and dignified alternative to those patients who want it. I say this because according to Dignity in Dying, a campaign group, over 80% of people agree.

So why has the House of Lords opposed it? Well, there are serious safeguards that would have to be put in place. No one should ever feel a ‘burden’ to the system and the decision to end your own life should never be taken likely. But these are things that everyone is agreed on, supporters and opposition alike. The real challenge comes from the usual culprits – purveyors of persceptive morality.

Don’t forget that there are still 26 bishops in the House of Lords. Today’s events demonstrate why they should be stripped, post haste, from unelected office. These are the same people who opposed contraception, and then opposed abortion, and now they are opposing dignified death out of dogma and the ultimate power complex – the belief that people’s lives should be mortgaged to ‘god’, against their own wishes.

“We are not autonomous beings” said the Bishop of London. So there you have it. We have Lords so you can be serfs.

The People’s Petition

This is something I feel strongly about. Medical research is at the cornerstone of our progress and development as a society. Throughout history many millions have died from diseases we can now cure thanks to medicine developed using animal research. However, some people are against the use of animals in laboratories and carry out sometimes violent, intimidating and illegal attacks to try and impose their will on others.

If you believe, like I do, that we should stand up to those who attempt to bully and coerce us into stopping this kind of research – then please sign this petition. If you’re undecided about the use of animals in medical research, consider:

• We are not talking about research into cosmetics or beauty products. Licences in this country are only granted to important medical and scientific research projects.
• Abuse can and will occur with animal testing, as with any other field. But this should not be a reason to discontinue it.
• If you eat meat, ask yourself why you don’t object to animals being killed (strictly unnecessarily) for food but not for life-saving medicines.
• If you are a vegetarian or vegan, consider if this is a personal choice or something you would impose on everyone if you had the chance. Would you ban the eating of meat? Should we therefore ban animal testing?

Think about it. If you agree, please sign up. At the time of writing, you will be joining about six and a half thousand others who agree with you.

A letter from 900 NHS doctors to the Prime Minister today makes the case for ending the ‘free at the point of delivery’ mantra that has been with the Health Service since its inception.

“Rationing of services and bigger financial deficits were the inevitable result of preserving the status quo, they said.” (The Guardian)

What we see here is the continual failure to understand ‘rationing’. There is always rationing of services, in any system, and always will be. Unless, of course, we discover Socialist Utopia World* (TM) with unlimited resources, then clearly there will always be rationing!

In the NHS, services are not rationed by price but by time (‘waiting lists’) and a limit to how far the service will go (i.e. the NHS will prioritise younger patients with a greater chance of survival, and pay for the drugs with the highest success rate.) In other systems, price simply becomes another form of rationing – along with more bureaucracy, more waste and greater inequality.

To increase your ‘rations’, you have to increase supply. Hence more money going into the NHS, reform of its structure to make it more effective, etc etc. (Argue about how well this has been done till dawn if you want to.) Of course demand is also rising – an ageing population, greater demand for ever more expensive health services and so on. I think the obvious conclusion is that the NHS will always have a limit to what it provides – but just like any other system on the planet.

The public agree. “Two-thirds said the NHS in its present form was unlikely ever to meet public demands, however much was spent on it.” But there is no magic replacement system, and the NHS is the fairest and most equitable way of delivering healthcare – free at the point of delivery, regardless of the ability to pay. So perhaps those 900 NHS doctors should get back to work, on their increased pay packets.

Oh and there is one piece of good news – “Three-quarters of the sample said politicians should be removed from day-to-day management of the health service.”

*(Socialist Utopia World does sounds like a great name for a theme park. In the leaflet: How do I get to Socialist Utopia World? Keep turning left.)

Yes I am alive, but aside from that all I wanted to point out was the Observer leader I noticed today on the subject of our beloved Health Service:

It should be incorporated as an independent, state-funded body, with its own management and a charter explicitly stating its responsibilities to provide care free to all at the point of use. This is the model of the BBC, a national institution loved, respected and willingly funded by the licence-fee payer.

Wow! That sounds a lot like exactly what I said last year!

Why don’t we break the entire NHS off from government to form an independent body – state funded but not state controlled?

I’m right! I so know I am! This is so going in my manifesto…