Is Rishi Sunak refusing to face the flaws his government has caused in the NHS?
Rishi Sunak has refused to say whether he has a National Health Service GP – and now people are asking the obvious: if he doesn’t, then how can he identify with the problems facing the crisis-riven service?
Ironically, Sunak’s father was an NHS GP, but the caginess of his answer seems to indicate that he has chosen a different path.
This would make sense in a Tory-run UK where the NHS is being run down with an intention to sell it off piecemeal to private health profiteers; that would explain Sunak’s insistence that he will not pay nurses or ambulance paramedics equal wages (in real terms) to those they received in 2010 – it creates a lower wage bill for incoming private firms.
It has just been reported that a quarter of adults go to Accident & Emergency (A&E) departments at hospitals because they can’t get an appointment with their GP, due to understaffing and backlogs caused by Tory cuts.
Is Sunak too good to wait in A&E for service, like the rest of us?
The question was debated on ITV’s Good Morning Britain, when NHS doctor Emeka Okorocha clashed with broadcaster Emily Carver.
Dr Okorocha said it is practical for a prime minister, with a country to run, to visit A&E and experience it – including the hours-long delays. “If the people at the top had to go through these struggles, maybe there would be the incentive to make some change.”
He agreed that the PM’s personal healthcare was his own business – but if he had any humanity about him, any ability to identify with the rest of the UK’s population, then experiencing what they have to endure should trigger the desire for change.
Ms Carver said it seemed Sunak constantly had to explain his life choices due to his personal wealth, and this was not fair – but also that it would have been better for him if he had explained the situation, rather than try to hide it.
She said the argument that one should have used the NHS GP service in order discuss the NHS winter crisis was a “fatuous” – silly and pointless – argument. “I think there are people in this country who don’t want anyone to have anything better than they do,” she said.
But what’s wrong with that, as regards healthcare? Shouldn’t we all get the best?
Here’s the discussion:
What do you think?
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