HOSPITAL HYSTERIA! How a privileged Labour activist shat on the people who saved his daughters life for a cheap publicity stunt
HOSPITAL HYSTERIA!
How a privileged Labour activist shat on the people who saved his daughters life for a cheap publicity stunt:
Leading to a hate campaign against a journalist in bitter revenge for the truth being exposed:
A look at the REAL problems faced by the NHS…
…
On the morning of September 18th 2019, BBC News hit the airwaves and social media with a hot scoop: An angry concerned father had confronted Prime Minister Boris Johnson, regaling him on the scandalous state of the NHS, “The NHS is being Destroyed!”, and how dishonest Johnson was claiming there were no press while being filmed by cameras…
Oh no! What an awful lying dictator Johnson is! Etc! The Media rushed to put the boot in “Boris Johnson Shamed!”
The media loathes the Prime Minister for his determination to deliver Brexit, and the BBC is stuffed with the kind of Marxists who will do anything to show him up…
But what really went down?
Within an hour the website Guido Fawkes identified the man who’d confronted the Prime Minister as Omar Salem.. who turns out to be a privileged Labour activist and former aide to current Shadow Home Secretary Emily Thornberry, who dedicates his life to stopping Brexit and bringing about a socialist Europe…
https://order-order.com/2019/09/18/boris-heckler-labour-activist/
Omar Salem confirmed this himself with his own tweet:
https://twitter.com/OmarSalem/status/1174301286692532224
This immediately swung the scales of coincidence heavily toward the “unlikely”, that Johnson happened to be confronted by the assistant to the left hand woman to his opposition counter-part Jeremy Corbyn.
Then further details emerged…
So the story seems to be, Omar Salem’s week old daughter got into unspecified difficulty. He took her to A&E at Whipps Cross Hospital. She was seen by Doctors, treated, assessed, and then sent to the general neo-natal ward (not Intensive Care), most likely for overnight observation.
During the night, there was an unknown emergency elsewhere in the Hospital, this could have been a gunshot, stabbing, road accident or something else. To meet the need and in the interest of saving lives, the Nurse registrar staffing at the desk on the ward was cut from two to one to help manage said emergency. There is no suggestion his daughter was in any danger during the night, most likely she was sleeping peacefully. And Salem uses this to claim his daughter, who hadn’t even been in the Hospital one day, was “neglected” while ranting in the Prime Ministers face. In so doing, he spat on the staff and all they had done for him. Nice!
Exposure of Salem’s activist affiliation forced swift corrections to initial reports, and this angered Far Left Communist supporters of the “Momentum” group that is the backbone of Corbyn’s grip on the Labour Party. When a woman they love to hate for her effective confrontations of Corbyn in interviews, BBC Journalist Laura Kuenssberg, retweeted Salem’s own tweet drawing attention to himself, they went into a deranged state, causing #SackLauraKuenssberg to top trend on Twitter in the UK. They claimed that by retweeting Salem’s tweet, Kuenssberg directed a right wing hate mob to “troll” Salem’s twitter, a claim they only make about her and not the many other journalists who also retweeted the same tweet. Not that there is any sign of “hate mobs” on Salem’s tweet. The one thing the radicalised cannot stand is people pointing out why they are wrong…
And Omar Salem’s farcical claims ARE wrong, being hysterical about a "destroyed" NHS while standing in a very busy and award winning hospital that had just saved his daughters life. and politicising her to take unjustified punts at the Prime Minister.
One claim that went round the net last night that was wrong, was the claim Salem was mic’d up when confronting Boris Johnson. This is categorically not true and based on the misinterpretation of a belt loop in lower resolution images.
But it’s hardly impossible to understand the suspicion of press collusion with a left wing activist to embarrass a right wing Prime Minister: such things have happened before.
Regarding “no press here” Boris may have misspoke, as from his POV he was at the Hospital for fact-finding not press conferences, or it may be Omar Salem had colluded with the press and they were waiting for his “gotcha” moment. After all he knew where the cameras were while Johnson did not. Or it may be these were paparazzi types who follow Johnson everywhere but have nothing to do with official arrangements from the PM. Although the footage broke on BBC, its unclear if it was a BBC employee who actually shot it.
Regardless, Johnson is not a stupid man and wouldn’t have told a stupid lie, and his body language shows sincere engagement with Omar Salem, while Salem showed emotional hysteria. While having a sick child will upset anyone, Salem’s disrespect for the office of Prime Minister, and for the Hospital staff with unjustified claims of Neglect show a high level of self-obsession.
But what about the NHS? Is it being “Destroyed”?
THE NHS IS BETTER FUNDED THAN EVER BEFORE
This is simply a fact. More money is being spent on the NHS now than ever before:
https://fullfact.org/health/spending-english-nhs/
So, if the NHS is being destroyed, it certainly isn’t for lack of money.
Of course, Johnson himself gets a lot of heat, and was subject to a failed vexatious court case, for standing in front of “The RED bus!” during the EU referendum campaign that declared we could take the 350 million (its actually more) we send the EU each week and spending it on the NHS instead.
Something that Johnson’s critics are generally ignorant of is this promise has already been kept. NHS funding was increased by £394 million a week by Theresa May to fulfil this pledge: https://fullfact.org/health/nhs-england-394-million-more/
But sadly, although billions of extra pounds in funding a year sounds like it will make a difference: it probably won’t: because no matter how much one pisses, one cant fill a leaky bucket…
CRIPPLED BY DEBT
Probably the biggest single financial problem the NHS has is crippling debts. These were caused by the disastrous PFI deals signed during the New Labour government. Rather than direct government borrowing to fund new Hospitals and upgrades, PFI (Private Finance Initiative) deals were made instead. The private sector funded new building under very advantageous deals that require the NHS to rent its buildings from the private sector until the loans are repayed. No new PFI deals have been signed since 2008, so they are certainly not the fault of the Conservative governments we have had since 2010, but the loan terms are so generous Hospitals will end up at least 3 times more expensive to build that if the government had borrowed to build them directly, and will take at least another couple of decades to pay down. This has crippled Hospital trusts across the nation, including St Barts health that runs Whipps Cross Hospital. In fact, St Barts is crippled by 93 million in debt, the reason Johnson was visiting that particular trust in the first place.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-42724939
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/675043/May-Fair-NHS-expenses-Barts-Royal-London-Hospital
It is modern Labour party policy to nationalise that debt:
But the private sector is involved in contracting to provide 70% of NHS services, often highly effectively. The CBI, who the same Labour party treats as Gospel with its claims of apocalypse in event of a No-deal Brexit, say that Labour policy would cause investment in the NHS to collapse as contractors flee, which could only plunge the NHS into severe crisis:
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/sep/25/john-mcdonnell-labour-would-bring-pfi-contracts-back-in-house
UNION POWER PLAYS AND THE NURSING CRISIS
The NHS is a socialised system. There is a long history of back-and-forth between Unions and Government, with everyone playing on the NHS sacred cow harp.
One of these consequences was raising the status of Nursing to a degree level job. Its debatable if years of university education are necessary to give an injection, take a temperature, or accurately follow medication instructions, but by raising the status of nurses it raised the minimum they could be paid. This in turn led to nurses refusing to do the kind of care tasks they had previously done before, requiring the hiring of hospital care assistants to give patients a wash.
But this also led to Nursing becoming a far more demanding career for British People to get into.
Then in 2015, then Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne, pinching pennies on behalf of EU mandated austerity, abolished bursaries and maintenance grants for student nurses. This led to aspiring nurses having to sign up for £50,000 plus of student debt just to qualify, and despite the high number of people who would like to be nurses, the number of Nurses Britain is training itself has understandably collapsed.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/may/26/nhs-short-of-70000-nurses-bursaries-abolished
DONT TALK ABOUT IMMIGRATION, ITS RACIST
Heaven forfend Omar Salem should say the NHS services is overloaded by demand. But they are!
With the collapse in home trained nurses, the NHS has had to rely on ever more numbers of foreign nurses. And there is nothing wrong with that, although by taking foreign qualifications as equivalent, these non-British Nurses have had a far easier time getting into the industry. But it has led to increasing hysteria that the NHS will not get staff from abroad after Brexit. This is entirely wrong: the NHS provides well paying jobs people from around the world are happy to do:
https://fullfact.org/health/eu-staff-nhs-what-has-happened-referendum/
But while the situation for training Britons to do the job is effectively sabotaged by the insane debt only the most dedicated are willing to take on, even recruiting from abroad cannot keep up with the ever increasing demand.
Demand that is felt at full force in a central London hospital trust like St Bart’s health.
Not only is legal mass immigration from both the EU and the rest of the world combined running at over 600,000 a year, many come to London for the opportunities, and all people know that this has created huge pressure on services, with waits of over two weeks common just to get a basic Doctors appointment, let alone access more sophisticated Hospital consultancy services. On top of which, London has at least 500,000 illegal immigrants.
How can any Government or Hospital Trust effectively plan for services when its got no idea how many people it may have to treat?
Don't expect people from Omar Salem's extreme end of the political spectrum to talk about THAT problem: as we all know from many years of them beating that drum: that's RACIST!
While an increasing number of elderly people need NHS services, so immigration cannot be the only factor in that increasing pressure, migrants to the UK have increased the demand for and therefore cost of services and wont be leaving the UK, and this is felt even more acutely in areas like London where a major proportion of immigration is focused, although effects have been felt country wide. The counter argument that immigrants are required to run the NHS only confirms a Catch 22 of ever escalating pressure and costs.
http://www.pharmatimes.com/web_exclusives/nhs_strain_set_to_worsen_without_immigration_plan_1252694
BLOATING GRASPING AND LOOTING
Despite historic spending levels, the NHS has been lumbered with inefficiency caused by excessive management tiers, too many pens being pushed, far more than in other comparable health services like Germany’s.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/personal-view/5062266/Cure-the-NHS-with-far-fewer-managers.html
On top of which, as the NHS has struggled to meet demand with soaring immigration pressure on services, it has had to pay eye-watering salaries to fulfil the management levels the law says they must have to comply with Health and Social Care legislation:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/08/19/managers-400000-year-failing-nhs-authorities/
And where there is Socialism, there is sponging. Since its very inception, the NHS has been used to covertly boost the profits of Multi-National drug companies. In a problem the American system also suffers from, the NHS pays excessively for its branded drug supplies, as it has become corporate socialist welfare for Big Pharma. And when the NHS tries to cut these costs, it gets sued..
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/nov/21/drug-firm-concordia-overcharged-nhs-with-6000-price-rise
^One example of many.
In addition, its hard for any politicians to take these companies on when they are major funders of political parties.
While any government that has even tried to tackle these problems also faces a tooth and nail fight with those unions…
CONCLUSION:
The NHS is NOT “being destroyed”, it is a very well funded service that should be delivering world class service for the British people.
But the NHS is undermined and struggling under the weight of difficult and intractable problems that more money on top of more money when it is already funded to a record high simply wont solve.
The more the NHS does, the more the NHS is asked to do, the greater the strains put about it. Gender Realignment surgery? Health Tourism?
St Barts health trust is owned close to £30 million by foreign citizens who have used its services and then swanned off without paying.
The complexity of this is of no interest to Omar Salem, who is completely consumed with support for policies that certainly wont fix the problems, and will probably make them far worse.
However there certainly is a need for proper frank and full national debate about these issues, to get the public support to push for and enact real solutions.
This goes right over the head of those easily radicalised by emotion stirring sound-bite reporting, and many hate Johnson because of Brexit so will jump to hate on him and think the worst.
But the real truth here is probably that a privileged man like Omar Salem doesn’t usually set foot inside a London Hospital, and it all came as quite a shock.
Unfortunately these are cynical times, and it seems a politically minded operative like Salem would be quite capable of setting up a “sting” with the press once he knew the Prime Minister would be visiting the Hospital caring for his daughter: or it can be simply an extraordinary coincidence.
Either way he neither did himself, his daughter, or his cause, any objective good with his actions and the saga of the NHS will take many years and much effort to improve.
The NHS is far from destroyed: it remains free at the point of delivery for all, whether British Citizens or not:
But if the British people cannot take on the real challenges and difficulties it faces, and support real solutions: it may implode and collapse under an impossible load that no amount of funding alone can solve.
One wonders if Boris Johnson will be able to make progress on this with his upcoming new government agenda when he unveils the new Queens Speech in mid October…
The best politicians know, even the worst of problems can be turned into opportunities, after all…
John The White
ADDITIONAL NOTE
The Far Left are still boiling with anger at Laura Kuenssberg, blaming her for "outing" Omar Salem. This is UTTERLY False!
Reviewing the timestamps gives the true sequence of events:
Omar WANTED the publicity, he outed his OWN ID because the Mirror gave a write up, without that, no-one would have known he was Labour SENIOR activist, at least not so easily.
He blew up credibility of his OWN story!
- Omar identifies himself
- Guido picks it up
- Laura K Tweet
But "tolerant" far left extremists never show restraint hating on a woman when they are angry enough, and hate enough, to wipe their arses with their own hypocrisy and show it to the world...
