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@docrussjackson

13 Dec

@Keir_Starmer

#Thread

So @Keir_Starmer's promise to do everything necessary to save OUR #NHS got me thinking about Blairite Alan Milburn, Secretary of State for Health from 1999 to 2003, charged with "modernising" OUR NHS & driving through Private Finance Initiative (PFI) deals on hospitals.

In 2002 Milburn introduced #NHS foundation trusts, "described at the time as a sort of halfway house between the public & private sectors".

The government increased expenditure on the NHS, although the public was sceptical over claims of improved performance.

Following his resignation as Secretary of State for Health Milburn took a £30,000/yr post as an advisor to Bridgepoint Capital, a venture capital firm which financed private health-care firms moving into the #NHS, including Alliance Medical, Match Group, Medica & Robinia Care.

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@docrussjackson

13 Dec

The UK government once again faces accusations of passing responsibility to individual employers – trusting them to consult workers & act compassionately.

This is classic #neoliberalism, individualising responsibility & risking public health & safety.

theconversation.com/jobs-crisis-th…

It is the latest incarnation of a UK government jobs policy that fetishises laissez-faire economics, perpetual consumerism & profit maximisation. For 40 years, The winners-take-all rule by the market-world elite has dominated for forty years.

https://twitter.com/docrussjackson/status/1359445197113950208?s=20

Neoliberalism has eroded the social world of collective social institutions such as public services & trade unions, while greatly increasing casualised low-paid jobs under a disposable flexible labour-market model.

https://twitter.com/docrussjackson/status/1359445197113950208?s=20

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@docrussjackson

13 Dec

@BBCRosAtkins

A broadcast news presenter getting praise from right across the political spectrum is extremely rare.

@BBCRosAtkins' reports do what ALL news should: “explain the background & context to current events in a scrupulously impartial, accessible way”.

theguardian.com/media/2021/dec…

James O'Brien: "Unspun reality"

Piers Morgan: “Ros once again brilliantly illustrating that the best journalism is often the simplest: just damn people with cool, calm, collected & utterly irrefutable facts.”

Andrew Neil: “Forensic, measured, factual, brilliant."

@BBCRosAtkins

Atkins' explainers were created to make live TV also work as a digital on-demand product:

“If you look at what he’s (@BBCRosAtkins) done, it’s stripped down ‘this is what happened’ in three minutes flat – there’s no florid tedious language, there’s no self indulgence to it.”

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@docrussjackson

13 Dec

Hard-right free-market obsessed libertarian cranks stick together - like dogshit on a jackboot.

*Yet another* predictable divisive reactionary hard-right libertarian crank outfit is being (re)launched - this one with predictable divisive reactionary hard-right libertarian crank Steve Baker at the helm, who spouts predictable divisive reactionary hard-right libertarian crap.

The hypocrisy at the heart of Steve Baker's disingenuous, delusional & dangerous ideology is breathtaking.

He talks about the 'hell' of sensible COVID precautions, while totally ignoring the genuinely authoritarian & antidemocratic policies & laws introduced by the Tory Govt.

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@docrussjackson

12 Dec

You know how the entire world looked on open-mouthed in horror & bewilderment that American people actually voted to allow a corrupt, damaged lying clown to do & say things that would raise eyebrows in an established authoritarian fascist state?

That's how the world sees us now.

The draconian, divisive, anti-British & antidemocratic measures in the Police, Crime, Sentencing & Courts Bill will result in peaceful protestors being treated like terrorists.

bylinetimes.com/2021/12/07/ter…

Today, we see familiar features of fascism, such as racism & xenophobia, but also the blurring of boundaries between right & left, a taste for charismatic leaders, populist nationalism, the rhetoric of rejection of elites & contempt for the rule of law.

opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-…

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