Intriguing
to see that the horsemeat scandal isn't exactly a novelty in the UK.
More
important is the surely correct perspective that, compared with the
earth-shattering scandal of 1,2000 unnecessary patient deaths in a
hospital in which no one has yet been sacked from his or her
position, the horsement scandal is a mere trifle:- The
subject which nobody wants to talk about is the National Health
Service. It is just over a week since the publication of the Francis
report into Stafford hospital, where some 1,200 patients died in
appalling circumstances. Had any other institution been involved in a
scandal on this scale, the consequences would have been momentous:
sackings, arrests and prosecutions. Had it involved a private
hospital, that hospital would have been closed down already, and
those in charge publicly shamed and facing jail. . . . Not a single
life has been lost, or even threatened [because
of horsemeat in the food chain].
Indeed, so far as I can discover, no one has even fallen ill as a
result. By comparison with the tragic and terrible events at Stafford
hospital, the so-called horse flesh scandal does not register. It
matters not a jot. It is beneath insignificant. . . Why
has a story about what was effectively the manslaughter by the state
of more than 1,000 people been ignored? . . What we have here, I
believe, is a conspiracy of silence, just as we had a conspiracy of
silence over phone hacking and over MPs’ expenses. None of the
mainstream parties want to admit the blindingly obvious fact that
there is something very wrong with the NHS, as Stafford demonstrates
in the most tragic and horrifying way. Labour can’t or won’t
admit this, because it founded the NHS and claims it as its own.
Likewise the Lib Dems are bound into this consensus. The Tories fear
it would be electoral suicide to do something serious about it. . . .
Nigel Lawson famously remarked that the NHS is the nearest thing we
have these days to a state religion. Nobody can criticise a state
religion. It’s much easier, and far more agreeable, to pretend that
horse meat is the big story. Psychologists would call the events of
the last week “transference”. And if British politicians (of all
parties) carry on changing the subject, the more certain it is that
there will be fresh Staffords to come.
[Peter Oborne: The Telegraph.]
Conversation
with my sister this evening. I'll leave you to guess who's who:-
We'd
better water all the plants, I think.
Which
ones?
Well,
all of them. I've just done the one by the door.
They're
all plastic, you fool.
For
those with the interest, the time and the energy, here's the latest
take on the Spanish economy, from the man hailed by some and hated
by others. But that's economists for you. I would copy and paste
extracts for you but I can't face that in the middle of a Real Marid
match.
And
here's the The Economist's
take on the messages imparted a couple of days ago by an optimistic but
ever-taciturn President Rajoy. The core message is the same - Where
once Spain's problems were acute, now they are chronic.
Finally
. . . Heard on the radio yesterday: Invention is the relentless
driver of capitalism. Or something similar. Seen on the TV today:
An advert for a plug-in product - presumably a stupefactant –
which will “stop your cats from being catty to each other'. Given
the loss of bird-life in my garden, I'd want something stronger than
that.
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