Saturday 23 April 2016

The relief column?

In many British films about Victorian daring do often the heroes are seen fighting a brave battle to hold their position and just as it seems all is lost the sounds of bugles or the sight of a relief column causes all their cares to disappear and after killing a few more baddies there are lots of smiles and manly greetings and all is once again well with the Empire. 
No doubt NHS England safe in their bunkers fortified by retardation will be thinking that this little announcement will be having the same effect on GPs in their practices this week as reported by the news channels. Will GPs and their staff be embracing the relief column? We think not for look at the detail.
 Funding. At first sight this would seem like a huge increase in money going into general practice but it is little more than a return to what was paid 5 years ago which in fact will be less than that due to the ravages of inflation and remember medical inflation is greater than general inflation so the beleaguered garrison is not even as well armed or manned as it was at the start of the siege. 
Workforce. Clearly the extra men in the relief column will bolster the garrison and its defences except this is a paper army and is more like a work of fiction given recent comments. Still the local tribes that are NHS England switch their allegiances and promises as often as the wind direction changes in a coastal temperate climate and it cannot count for they tell health select committees the exact opposite. 
And the deployment of auxiliary troops will always make up for a lack of veteran fully trained legionaries but comrades did you notice the word co-funded in front of the word auxiliaries? In other words the beleaguered garrison will have to pay for the auxiliaries we believe over a 3 year period of subsidy before bearing the full cost themselves. And if the auxiliaries were to be found wanting then the garrison would also have to pay to decommission them too. 
Workload. So the relief column will tackle all the areas in this paragraph but they will not tackle the main offensive thrust on the garrison which is the daily charge on it by screaming tribespeople en masse who want instant satisfaction at all costs (but not to them) or else, who take no prisoners and care not about inflicting causalities. In case NHS England don’t get this we mean patients and their increasing demands for trivia to be seen NOW.
Infrastructure. Always a good scene in any film when plucky British troops plug a gap in the wall with sandbags but these are just empty bags with no sand.
Care redesign. Well this is a bit like the dinner party scene in the Carry on Up the Khyber film in terms of stemming the offensive and looks like actually encouraging it.
So as GPs and their staff woke up to the news that a relief column is coming will they be thinking that this is the relief of Mafeking provided by NHS England or merely a continuation of Rourke’s Drift depicted in the film Zulu on a ground hog day basis? Or will it continue to feel like the final scene of the 1962 film The 300 Spartans as numbers decrease and more arrows are in coming?
It is said that attack is the best form of defence and one should always go forward but NHS England with this announcement have only provided a relief column that will do nothing now other than continue to mark time while the siege continues unabated.
Praise be to the Party and for all those who work at NHS England they are such bright chaps. Scum of the earth perhaps as Wellington once said? Other generals may disagree believing this to be yet another Pyrrhic victory for their “troops” in the BMA pay and catering corps.