Private firms are running frontline NHS services by stealth

But how come KJ is a lot more disappointed than Fee and Chris?SOURCE MIRROR: Private firms are running frontline NHS services by stealthDavid Cameron’s election campaign promised the NHS was safe in his hands, and that frontline services would not be touched. But Virgin Care’s interests include sexual health services, children’s services, radiology departments, diagnostic and urgent care centres and even entire GP practices. More than 100 NHS services are now run by Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Group. Health reforms have already handed £7bn...

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Rip-off News round-up. Our pick of the last week's media (Thu 30th May)

Private firms are running frontline NHS services by stealthDavid Cameron’s election campaign promised the NHS was safe in his hands, and that frontline services would not be touched. But Virgin Care’s interests include sexual health services, children’s services, radiology departments, diagnostic and urgent care centres and even entire GP practices. More than 100 NHS services are now run by Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Group. Health reforms have already handed £7bn in contracts to private firms such as Virgin, Care UK, Serco and Circle, with a...

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Big crooks getting pilloried by courts and parliamentary committees may be good. But don't let that be a distraction from actual change.

Size is relative. To a little kid a big kid is big. To the big kid the bigger kid is big. And to the bigger kid the biggest kid is big.In school most of the bullying is actually not done by the biggest kid. There is only one 'biggest' while there are plenty of 'bigger' so the cumulative capacity for being mean is bigger among the many bigger than the solitary biggest. Punishing the biggest kid does not address bullying. But it does give the impression 'something is being done' even though nothing much is achieved.Which is something rippers-off...

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In 2012 Amazon received more money in government grants than it paid in UK corporation tax

Fee and Chris boycott Amazon. KJ is not so sure...SOURCE CHANNEL 4 NEWS: Amazon pays less corporation tax than it got in government grantsThe UK arm of internet shopping giant Amazon received more money in government grants than it paid in UK corporation tax in 2012, according to its accounts. Amazon's UK subsidiary paid £2.4m in corporation tax in 2012, but it received £2.5m in government grants during the same period. The company has previously said it made £4.26bn in sales to British customers. Amazon received the grants from Scottish...

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Rip-off News round-up. Our pick of the last week's media (Thu 23rd May)

Amazon pays less corporation tax than it got in government grantsThe UK arm of internet shopping giant Amazon received more money in government grants than it paid in UK corporation tax in 2012, according to its accounts. Amazon's UK subsidiary paid £2.4m in corporation tax in 2012, but it received £2.5m in government grants during the same period. The company has previously said it made £4.26bn in sales to British customers. Amazon received the grants from Scottish Enterprise, part of the Scottish government, to develop its operations in Scotland...

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Four times in six months the Office of Budget Responsibility and the UK Statistics Authority have publicly corrected Cameron and IDS for mis-using statistics

Cameron and Welfare Secretary Iain Duncan-Smith decide to check their facts...SOURCE BBC NEWS: Iain Duncan Smith caught exaggerating benefit cap figuresThe Work and Pensions Secretary said that his new benefit cap was having "the desired impact" because 8,000 people who would have faced a benefit cut had been incentivised to get jobs. But the UK Statistics Authority, the statistics watchdog, said his figures were simply "unsupported by the official statistics published by the department". For the third time in just six months, the head of the UK...

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Liebrary: "If it isn't hurting, it isn't working". How Austerity worked for the few by hurting the many

An earlier Tory chancellor during an earlier crisis claimed "If it isn't hurting it isn't working". This, together with the fib from a later Tory prime minister "We are all in it together", is used to convince the majority of us ripped-off Britons to keep taking the painful poverty pill while the elite take the opportunity to reinforce their positions. As Lord Young, former Tory minister and advisor to David Cameron, said "a recession can be an excellent time to start a business. Factors of production such as premises and labour can be cheaper"....

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Liebrary: "If it isn't hurting, it isn't working". How Austerity works for the few by hurting the many

An earlier Tory chancellor during an earlier crisis claimed "If it isn't hurting it isn't working". This, together with the fib from a later Tory prime minister "We are all in it together", is used to convince the majority of us ripped-off Britons to keep taking the painful poverty pill while the elite take the opportunity to reinforce their positions. As Lord Young, former Tory minister and advisor to David Cameron, said  "a recession can be an excellent time to start a business...Factors of production such as premises and labour can...

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Whistleblower says Britain's biggest out-of-hours private care provider Harmoni routinely jeopardises safety to cut costs

KJ, Chris and Fee have a brilliant idea...SOURCE DAILY MAIL: One nurse for 250,000 patients: whistleblower reveals nurses are replacing GPs to cover entire countiesThe revelations about Britain's biggest out-of-hours private care provider Harmoni come from a whistleblower GP. Harmoni makes £100million a year from NHS contracts. The GP has made a number of other startling allegations about how Harmoni is routinely jeopardising safety to cut costs. They include:Terminally-ill cancer patients made to wait eight hours for a doctor to visit...

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Rip-off News round-up. Our pick of the last week's media (Thu 16th May)

Cameron threatens to prosecute oil bosses for fixing the price of petrolBP and Shell’s London HQs have been raided for evidence by the European Commission. They are investigating claims that prices were rigged for more than a decade. It could have had a "huge impact" on the price of petrol at the pumps "potentially harming final consumers". Four months ago the UK’s Office of Fair Trading (OFT) ruled out an investigation into petrol price fixing after finding "very limited evidence." TELEGRAPH(Oh no, not another EU initiative that tells us what...

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UK Uncut exposes Goldman Sachs’ £20m tax dodge deal with HMRC, struck “to save Government embarrassment”

Cameron interrogates Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs...SOURCE INDEPENDENT: £20m 'Sweetheart' tax dodge deal between HMRC and Goldman Sachs was struck to save Government embarrassment, court hearsThe deal has become the subject of a legal challenge by UK Uncut, the tax pressure group. The deal allowed Goldmans to escape paying between £6m and £20m in interest on tax owed to the Exchequer. HMRC apparently feared that Goldmans would pull out of George Osborne’s new tax monitoring agreement unless it was let off the tax. UK Uncut wants...

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Liebrary: The truth according to the Office of National Statistics (ONS) behind the Public and Private Sector pay differential

The government gets regularly rapped by its own statistics body, the UK Statistics Authority, for making up stuff to support government policies. In May 2013 the Secretary of State for Works and Pensions, Iain Duncan-Smith, was put on the naughty step for fibbing about the number of people enthused into getting a job as a justification for his draconian policy of cutting benefits. Duncan-Smith's claim that the statistics "clearly demonstrates that the cap is having the desired impact" was quickly shot down by the UK Statistics Authority....

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£80bn for Help to Buy 'bubble' could push house prices up by 30%... How about building some houses!

KJ and a banker discuss...SOURCE TELEGRAPH: Help to Buy 'bubble' could push house prices up by 30%The Government’s "reckless" Help to Buy scheme uses taxpayer money to provide a loan of up to 20% of the value of a new build property, provided the borrower can raise a 5% deposit. But it risks creating a new housing bubble and could push the average UK house price up by 30% to £300,000 by the end of 2015, a leading economic think-tank has warned. “Help to Buy is a reckless scheme that uses public money to incentivise the banks to lend precisely...

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Rip-off News round-up. Our pick of the last week's media (Thu 9th May)

“Shrinkflation”: Food products are getting smaller while the price you pay stays the sameManufacturers and retailers are increasingly sneaking in new reduced sizes while describing them as special offers or re-launches. One shopper said: ‘It feels like being lied to. Why act in a deceptive manner unless it is to make more money out of us?’ The shrinking has happened over the past few years, with many customers being none the wiser. Bakery chain Greggs cut the meat content of its Steak Bake pie by 15% while keeping the price at £1.35.Walkers...

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Should the wealthy elderly return their benefits, or the super-rich and corporates return their £70bn+ dodged taxes?

Cameron and Iain Duncan Smith do the sums...SOURCE BBC NEWS: Iain Duncan Smith urges wealthy elderly to 'hand back' benefitsWealthy elderly people who do not need benefits to help with fuel bills, TV licences or free travel should give the money to his department, said the work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith. He said he would "encourage" people who do not need such financial support "to hand it back".OUR RELATED STORIES:In numbers (+ a cool animation): Global tax evasion and money launderingThe Top 5 tax loopholes, and the "no...

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House of Lords refuses to block bill forcing NHS to tender services, and taking away their right to reject dodgy providers

The local elections in May 2013 reminded many Tories that their time at the trough maybe shorter than they had thought. Like children stuffing themselves in an unguarded sweet shop they will have two things on their minds:1) How to stay in the sweet shop as long as possible, stifling their rustling and their chuckles hoping no-one will hear them.2) How to take as many sugary delights with them when they are eventually ejected.The sugary delights in question being the lucrative transfer of public services to the private sector. It is not that the...

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