Son of Mathonwy wrote:
The NHS may be public sector but this government handed most additional Covid-19 work to the private sector, whether they have any relevant expertise or not.
Granted there are examples of this. However, luckily, the private sector did step in with great success to bail out the public sector, whether it was the PPE supply chain in the U.K. (along with the army) or the testing capacity in Germany - something PHE failed to do and is one of the reasons we’ve been playing catch up for so long. It is the case that the private sector stepped into numerous vacuums they had no experience in but these were also in areas where the public sector had no experience and, crucially, no capacity to perform.
As always, a mixture of private and public sector is best.
The make up of that mixture has been problematic. The appropriate private sector resources more or less have to be compelled to act appropriately. The US has the Defence Production Act (which the government declined to use), and I'm sure the UK has something similar and I no not if it was used, but from where I'm standing it looks as though you got a gaggle of the wrong private sector geeks together for the job.
Not sure you can blame it on ‘private sector’ geeks. There were plenty of geeks from both sectors. From what I’ve read, it sounds a lot like the wrong ones, with their egos, in the wrong places.
Lack of a (effective) children’s advocate anywhere - SAGE or cabinet - possibly coming back to haunt a generation, for example.
No, I'm blaming the government for bringing in the wrong geeks. A painful case in point over here was Jared Kushner recruiting a group of recently graduated tech and business cheese dicks to coordinate PPE and medical supply sourcing. They basically started sucking each others dicks and recommended dodgy suppliers based on who they knew through their own insular little network. The Kush pushed their recommendations through. This resulted in a farcical loss of control of the situation and the fleecing of millions of dollars of federal and state tax revenues.
morepork wrote:I think the myth of market forces working for the public good has been blown apart. Both the US and UK have had a hands-off mantra in government for a while, and it has just been comical watching both sets of fuckheads try to spin the virus away with empty management speak. In the US the complete lack of a public health system has shown exactly how good for the public the private sector is in the health care field. I am a bit shocked at how inept the UK has been in this, but as I familiarise myself with the players in the tragicomedy it is perhaps not so surprising. Shame it is not possible to vaccinate against toxic ideology. When the climate starts seriously fucking with food and water supply, I hope idiots like these are long gone.
Reading an article today where a bloke leaves a US hospital after a substantial period on a ventilator tombs presented with a $1.2 million bill. Thankfully his insurance pick up 95% so that’s a only
about $60k that this 70 year old needs to find.
morepork wrote:I think the myth of market forces working for the public good has been blown apart. Both the US and UK have had a hands-off mantra in government for a while, and it has just been comical watching both sets of fuckheads try to spin the virus away with empty management speak. In the US the complete lack of a public health system has shown exactly how good for the public the private sector is in the health care field. I am a bit shocked at how inept the UK has been in this, but as I familiarise myself with the players in the tragicomedy it is perhaps not so surprising. Shame it is not possible to vaccinate against toxic ideology. When the climate starts seriously fucking with food and water supply, I hope idiots like these are long gone.
Reading an article today where a bloke leaves a US hospital after a substantial period on a ventilator tombs presented with a $1.2 million bill. Thankfully his insurance pick up 95% so that’s a only
about $60k that this 70 year old needs to find.
Like I said, private health has fallen on it's arse during this...
morepork wrote:No, I'm blaming the government for bringing in the wrong geeks. A painful case in point over here was Jared Kushner recruiting a group of recently graduated tech and business cheese dicks to coordinate PPE and medical supply sourcing. They basically started sucking each others dicks and recommended dodgy suppliers based on who they knew through their own insular little network. The Kush pushed their recommendations through. This resulted in a farcical loss of control of the situation and the fleecing of millions of dollars of federal and state tax revenues.
Not going to argue with that but this all started as private sector bad v public sector good. That’s certainly not the case in the UK’s response. Both have been both good and bad.
If anything, the most detrimental piece of ‘dick sucking’ in the U.K. was probably PHE refusal to use private sector labs for testing. That’s not to say private sector companies didn’t feck up as well but that it’s not just public sector = good and private sector = bad.
morepork wrote:No, I'm blaming the government for bringing in the wrong geeks. A painful case in point over here was Jared Kushner recruiting a group of recently graduated tech and business cheese dicks to coordinate PPE and medical supply sourcing. They basically started sucking each others dicks and recommended dodgy suppliers based on who they knew through their own insular little network. The Kush pushed their recommendations through. This resulted in a farcical loss of control of the situation and the fleecing of millions of dollars of federal and state tax revenues.
Not going to argue with that but this all started as private sector bad v public sector good. That’s certainly not the case in the UK’s response. Both have been both good and bad.
If anything, the most detrimental piece of ‘dick sucking’ in the U.K. was probably PHE refusal to use private sector labs for testing. That’s not to say private sector companies didn’t feck up as well but that it’s not just public sector = good and private sector = bad.
ding-ding, round 2 in China..
Probably a different virus strain (maybe the nastier Euro version), with possible link to imported meat or salmon.
Herd approach appears to be more rounding people up and bussing them to selected Hotels..
Testing already in overdrive - we might therefore see a spike with steep curves on both sides.
morepork wrote:No, I'm blaming the government for bringing in the wrong geeks. A painful case in point over here was Jared Kushner recruiting a group of recently graduated tech and business cheese dicks to coordinate PPE and medical supply sourcing. They basically started sucking each others dicks and recommended dodgy suppliers based on who they knew through their own insular little network. The Kush pushed their recommendations through. This resulted in a farcical loss of control of the situation and the fleecing of millions of dollars of federal and state tax revenues.
Not going to argue with that but this all started as private sector bad v public sector good. That’s certainly not the case in the UK’s response. Both have been both good and bad.
If anything, the most detrimental piece of ‘dick sucking’ in the U.K. was probably PHE refusal to use private sector labs for testing. That’s not to say private sector companies didn’t feck up as well but that it’s not just public sector = good and private sector = bad.
Indeed. A sensible health care system uses both.
Though, maybe leaving a public sector organisation to develop an app wasn’t the best plan ever.
Mellsblue wrote:
Not going to argue with that but this all started as private sector bad v public sector good. That’s certainly not the case in the UK’s response. Both have been both good and bad.
If anything, the most detrimental piece of ‘dick sucking’ in the U.K. was probably PHE refusal to use private sector labs for testing. That’s not to say private sector companies didn’t feck up as well but that it’s not just public sector = good and private sector = bad.
Indeed. A sensible health care system uses both.
Though, maybe leaving a public sector organisation to develop an app wasn’t the best plan ever.
Because the work outsourced to private companies is all going so well?
Perhaps both private and public sector have their pros and cons, that they will inevitably do some things well and some things poorly, and that randomly pointing at good or bad examples doesn’t mean that sector is fatally flawed. Remember when the failed private sector attempt to create a central NHS IT system was proof that all private sector involvement was a huge waste of money and doomed to be late and/or a failure. Well, it’s seems the public sector is also found wanting on a large scale IT project. Perhaps there will be examples of both good and bad from both sectors, wherever you look? I’ve worked in both sectors and had both public and private healthcare and, from my experience, this is true.
Because the work outsourced to private companies is all going so well?
Perhaps both private and public sector have their pros and cons, that they will inevitably do some things well and some things poorly, and that randomly pointing at good or bad examples doesn’t mean that sector is fatally flawed. Remember when the failed private sector attempt to create a central NHS IT system was proof that all private sector involvement was a huge waste of money and doomed to be late and/or a failure. Well, it’s seems the public sector is also found wanting on a large scale IT project. Perhaps there will be examples of both good and bad from both sectors, wherever you look? I’ve worked in both sectors and had both public and private healthcare and, from my experience, this is true.
Under normal circumstances, when a private sector organisation fails to deliver consistently, the organisation disappears and is replaced by another. When a public sector organisation fails to deliver consistently, a few scapegoats are sacrificed and normal jogging continues.
NHSX are sh*t. I sit on the local health and social care IT forum (FML), and they couldn't organise....well anything. I'm afraid IT in the NHS is just a dripping roast for private work and public sector workers alike. Why they couldn't just piggy back on someone elses work outside the UK is anyone's guesss.
Digby wrote:
Because the work outsourced to private companies is all going so well?
Perhaps both private and public sector have their pros and cons, that they will inevitably do some things well and some things poorly, and that randomly pointing at good or bad examples doesn’t mean that sector is fatally flawed. Remember when the failed private sector attempt to create a central NHS IT system was proof that all private sector involvement was a huge waste of money and doomed to be late and/or a failure. Well, it’s seems the public sector is also found wanting on a large scale IT project. Perhaps there will be examples of both good and bad from both sectors, wherever you look? I’ve worked in both sectors and had both public and private healthcare and, from my experience, this is true.
Under normal circumstances, when a private sector organisation fails to deliver consistently, the organisation disappears and is replaced by another. When a public sector organisation fails to deliver consistently, a few scapegoats are sacrificed and normal jogging continues.
Mellsblue wrote:
Not going to argue with that but this all started as private sector bad v public sector good. That’s certainly not the case in the UK’s response. Both have been both good and bad.
If anything, the most detrimental piece of ‘dick sucking’ in the U.K. was probably PHE refusal to use private sector labs for testing. That’s not to say private sector companies didn’t feck up as well but that it’s not just public sector = good and private sector = bad.
Indeed. A sensible health care system uses both.
Though, maybe leaving a public sector organisation to develop an app wasn’t the best plan ever.
Digby wrote:
Because the work outsourced to private companies is all going so well?
Perhaps both private and public sector have their pros and cons, that they will inevitably do some things well and some things poorly, and that randomly pointing at good or bad examples doesn’t mean that sector is fatally flawed. Remember when the failed private sector attempt to create a central NHS IT system was proof that all private sector involvement was a huge waste of money and doomed to be late and/or a failure. Well, it’s seems the public sector is also found wanting on a large scale IT project. Perhaps there will be examples of both good and bad from both sectors, wherever you look? I’ve worked in both sectors and had both public and private healthcare and, from my experience, this is true.
Under normal circumstances, when a private sector organisation fails to deliver consistently, the organisation disappears and is replaced by another. When a public sector organisation fails to deliver consistently, a few scapegoats are sacrificed and normal jogging continues.
Completely agree. I currently work in the public sector and I regularly see examples of this, with the wrong scapegoats on numerous occasions; however, I've also seen examples of outsourcing going spectacularly wrong. Horses for courses......
Banquo wrote:NHSX are sh*t. I sit on the local health and social care IT forum (FML), and they couldn't organise....well anything. I'm afraid IT in the NHS is just a dripping roast for private work and public sector workers alike. Why they couldn't just piggy back on someone elses work outside the UK is anyone's guesss.
Agreed, this reinvention of the wheel* when time was short was ridiculous.
Banquo wrote:NHSX are sh*t. I sit on the local health and social care IT forum (FML), and they couldn't organise....well anything. I'm afraid IT in the NHS is just a dripping roast for private work and public sector workers alike. Why they couldn't just piggy back on someone elses work outside the UK is anyone's guesss.
Agreed, this reinvention of the wheel* when time was short was ridiculous.
*I think ours may be octagonal.
Yep- I'm afraid 'not invented here' is a recurring phrase in this crisis.
The big acute trusts started doing this over a year ago, procurement rules were changed to enable it. We went through a very comedic 'new process' about this time last year.
Mellsblue wrote:
Perhaps both private and public sector have their pros and cons, that they will inevitably do some things well and some things poorly, and that randomly pointing at good or bad examples doesn’t mean that sector is fatally flawed. Remember when the failed private sector attempt to create a central NHS IT system was proof that all private sector involvement was a huge waste of money and doomed to be late and/or a failure. Well, it’s seems the public sector is also found wanting on a large scale IT project. Perhaps there will be examples of both good and bad from both sectors, wherever you look? I’ve worked in both sectors and had both public and private healthcare and, from my experience, this is true.
Under normal circumstances, when a private sector organisation fails to deliver consistently, the organisation disappears and is replaced by another. When a public sector organisation fails to deliver consistently, a few scapegoats are sacrificed and normal jogging continues.
Completely agree. I currently work in the public sector and I regularly see examples of this, with the wrong scapegoats on numerous occasions; however, I've also seen examples of outsourcing going spectacularly wrong. Horses for courses......
Doing a good job isn't always related to whether a company makes money. Just look at Serco
Banquo wrote:NHSX are sh*t. I sit on the local health and social care IT forum (FML), and they couldn't organise....well anything. I'm afraid IT in the NHS is just a dripping roast for private work and public sector workers alike. Why they couldn't just piggy back on someone elses work outside the UK is anyone's guesss.
My uncle used to work in IT for the NHS. Let's just say that, as a teenager, I knew more about IT than he did.
Banquo wrote:NHSX are sh*t. I sit on the local health and social care IT forum (FML), and they couldn't organise....well anything. I'm afraid IT in the NHS is just a dripping roast for private work and public sector workers alike. Why they couldn't just piggy back on someone elses work outside the UK is anyone's guesss.
My uncle used to work in IT for the NHS. Let's just say that, as a teenager, I knew more about IT than he did.
A pretty sad state of affairs.
You need highly technically skilled folks, with brilliant change management skills. That's that then.
