I don’t think people appreciate just how radical our neoliberal reforms were to public services and no where can you see the grim truth of throwing out egalitarianism and progressive fairness for money and profit margins better than this brilliant Stuff article that highlights the terrible legacy of fucking over our public health system.
Look at these stats and gasp in horror at what we have wrought…
…people claim this can’t be true, but the facts stack it up and it is true.
We have progressively decreased taxing the richest to fund out public services until the public services fall over and the public scream ‘something must be done’ and the Right ‘here’s something’ and they privatise a little more and you get even less.
The ease with which the sleepy hobbits of muddle NuZilind are led to give the rich more while hurting the poor is a Kiwi super power.
Feel shame at how you anger is manipulated by the Right every election Kiwi.
Let that shame burn.
The Commissioner who has been appointed to be the hatchet man for the first wave of austerity and privatisation inside Public Health is entirely manufactured.
In the Budget, National allocated just 2.9% increase to health services but inflation was 3.3% and population growth 2.6% while an ageing population adds more to costs!
Let that shame burn Kiwi.
National gave 2.9% for health but we needed 8% to stand still, is the electorate dumb enough to fall for National’s latest manufactured public service crisis to introduce more failed free market reforms?
The Minister says we can’t afford $1.4billion for health but we could borrow $14billion for tax cuts, again is the electorate dumb enough to believe this?
Feel that shame Kiwi.
This is really serious and the speed with which it has been forced by a Government hell bent on borrowing for tax cuts but not for public services!
We wouldn’t be needing to find an extra billion if we weren’t borrowing $14 billion for tax cuts!!!!!!
What have you done Kiwi?
This is occurring as Newshub is dead and the level of fourth estate journalism blunted.
The guard dogs of democracy have been anesthetized and replaced with Social Media hate algorithms.
We are in a lot of trouble.
If Health NZ were the Tobacco Industry, would this Government be sacking staff?
This is all on you now Kiwi.
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” Shouldn’t we collectively feel shame that we allowed neoliberalism do this to our public health? ”
I don’t think ‘shame’ is what we should be feeling. I think that’s unfair. That’s like writing and asking ” Shouldn’t we collectively feel shame for being lied to then bullied. I think the shame we should feel is for knowing what neo-liberalism is, knowing who dropped it on us and seeing that we still fail to act. And yes, there’s a stain of irony in there. If you’ve been taking notice you’d have seen a select few bolster themselves against the inevitability of the economic catastrophe building. ( Or have I got that technically wrong…? )
roger and his clones knew exactly what they were doing forty years ago and his disciple, the smirking *rat seymour knows exactly what he’s doing today, covering his twerk meat while preparing to run for it.
There is one thing however that must be making his flat arse go into full rebound and that’s the very real problem that our primary industry, being agriculture, has been so exploited and exhausted to a point of stagnation that it’s going to take generations to repair. In short, and I’m not that short, but we’re running out of money and the roger-clones have fucked off our trading partners who had to go out and find other sources of supply with all that, that entails.
The collective shame we should be feeling is for not using our imaginations to see past the lies and deceit of a small band of evil little cunts and act accordingly.
* No disrespect to actual rats intended.
( I can’t believe that david seymour is in there, inside our governance in a senior role. It’s so bizarre that as I sit here and write I have to wonder, did I die in a car crash or similar and that this is Hell? )
SADLY the kiwi voters and the hate that is rampent in NZ is a blight on our country that will take a long time to pass .The next wave of young voters will lead the way as are the new wave of young under 30 leaders popping up around the country .Local councils are finally showing a bit of courage and are voicing thier distaste of the current government but need to take a stand and say no .They have enough in the numbers game to issue a serious challenge to the government and refuse to bend over to Brown and his fucked plans .The cost to ratepayers is rising by the day under this lot of clowns .If the anti red neck councils band together and say NO what will the government do ? take the whole 60 to court ,I dont think so as they know they will lose .Local councils only need to prove that their right to govern locally and enforce what ever they deem as correct for their local roads or what ever have been under cut by central government .After all the local roads are owned by the local council and its rate payers
Well, neoliberal economic policy, much like other policies spearheaded by the global elitists, are rarely, if ever, talked about by our politicians, let alone their mainstream media cheerleaders so why should everyday Kiwis feel the least bit shamed. We know stuff all about neoliberalism and that’s by design.
Kiwis know that healthcare has been on the decline – and more – but what party and which MSM outlet, is really going to make a song and dance about this. How about none of them. Politics is broken, the media is broken yet still we believe in both of them like we never have believed in them before. Shame is not the word we should be feeling – hoodwinked – is what we should be feeling!
So many have work and private insurance schemes that they may not be aware of what the dwarf from Dipton embarked upon when sabotaging what was once a very good free national health service. Shame lies with the politicians who see the full picture and refuse to act ethically and responsibly.
Yes the silverspooner Double Dipper From Dipton , (who is still in the background sticking in his rotten oar), alongside the slippery snake Key, were about as trustworthy and as competent at running the country as a love child from a used car dealer and a realestate agent.
English was/is fundamentally hopeless… clueless in fact…stupid ideas…no commonsense… no vision..
Your typical silverspooner…
A country version of the Epsom crowd.
And yet there he is …still clipping the taxpayer ticket for not only himself, but his offspring now, for their uselessness!
Martyn – The Health Boards are stacked with over paid yes men and women, who do not have medical backgrounds, and limited abilities in managing resources.
Great article. The graphic showing the number of hospital beds – and in particular the decline in private beds – is exceptionally insightful. Because the ‘free market’ expectation is that a decline in public provision would be taken up by the private hospitals. But instead we see the opposite. This is because, as seen in a number of sectors in NZ, scarcity is the key to profitability. If either the public or private health system were to meet demand then the private sector would not be profitable.
Voters in the majority are not impacted by serious health issues so it is very electorally feasible to run the health system into the ground and suffer no electoral blowback. This was proven by the UK Conservatives who retained power for 14 years and did exactly what Reti is doing now – despite everyone in the UK proclaiming to love the public health system.
There is a hiring freeze in our health system and don’t let the trolls tell you any different. Who said again it would not affect the frontline staff are all liars,every single one of these ministers aided and abetted by their backbenchers with no conscience.
Bob claims the right to disagree.
‘Bob claims the right to disagree.’
Bob can indeed disagree but:
As Lenin said to Trotsky,
‘Everyone has the right to stupidity – but you abuse the privilege!’
” The Minister says we can’t afford $1.4billion for health but we could borrow $14billion for tax cuts, again is the electorate dumb enough to believe this ? ”
Yes Bomber and we have been brainwashed to expect a tax cut is of more benefit to us being better off until we need to seek treatment in a public hospital.
We need only to look to the situation in the U.K after fourteen years of Conservative government and their extreme austere approach to public services that will become reality here.
” They saw the problems developing in the NHS; the deterioration of services, the under-staffing, the poor treatment of the staff who remained – and many attributed those problems to our political leaders. ”
” Horribly, I suspect that many people have absorbed inaccurate, unhelpful, sometimes even abusive messaging from certain media outlets and politicians in recent months, which scapegoat immigrants for many of the problems in our society instead of drawing attention to the policies and budgetary decisions made by the Conservative government ”
https://www.thecanary.co/opinion/2024/09/01/nhs-immigration/
When you add in that NZ population has pretty much doubled over that period the picture gets twice as bad. Its gone from 1 bed per 100 people to 1 bed per 500 (approx)
It is now a painful reality that a certain percentage of voters in NZ are as thick as the MAGA idiots in the USA.
Anyone that supports this coalition of callous arseholes needs help.
Bomber, its a planet wide, more dosh here come, and thats been the so called rule, of open market , outside its shame of health care, debt what a a teach to be who you care to be, market cost and 0ayment.
Deepening crisis in New Zealand public health system
Tom Peters
2 September 2024
New Zealand’s public health system faces a rapidly worsening crisis, with growing levels of unmet need and understaffing, as the National Party-led government ramps up its brutal austerity program. The ruling class is forcing workers to pay for the economic downturn with cuts to jobs, wages and vital public services.
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2024/09/03/bmlf-s03.html
In July, the government replaced the board of Health New Zealand with a commissioner, former private hospital chief executive Lester Levy, who is tasked with making $1.4 billion in “savings” across the health system.
This is to be achieved largely through job cuts. On August 28, Health NZ called for “expressions of interest in voluntary redundancy” from workers in non-clinical roles. Chief executive Margie Apa told workers in an email that this would likely be followed by “formal change consultation processes over the coming months,” i.e. mandatory cutbacks. Thousands of people could lose their jobs.
The reduction in so-called “back office” roles is accompanied by a hiring freeze in many hospitals, despite a desperate shortage of thousands of nurses and doctors.
Correct. Interesting that the child National MP in charge of idiotic CHEs went on to be a good environmental commissioner. But the rich always have a 2nd, 3rd, 4th chance, and the poor not even one.
OH! Rodger, and your cronies, what a care our thought, of yours.