CentreRight

The light at the end of the [congestion] tunnel?

Plans proposed today by Network Rail for a £34 billion new rail line between London and Edinburgh, also linking Heathrow, Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester and Glasgow to the capital and Channel Tunnel Rail Link, should be welcomed with a mix of enthusiasm and disappointment. Enthusiasm because evidently it has been realised that such infrastructure is both needed and beneficial, and disappointment because it shows a decidedly 20th Century view of the railways.

The plans have been framed as a way of rivalling domestic air travel, indeed the proposed routes (see diagram) are specifically designed with such an aim, linking city centre to city centre. The proposed route would indeed be attractive to current domestic air passengers (it would do Birmingham in 46 minutes, Manchester in 1 hour 6 minutes, Liverpool in 1 hour 23 minutes and Edinburgh in 2 hours 9 minutes, and mean no airport hassles), but so would any decent North-South rail link. To devise a line with this trade foremost in mind, indeed solely in mind, misses the massive potential of such a construction – to compete with the roads.

Now I am a firm believer that, for long distance travel, you can never compete with the roads. Unless the train station is walking, tube or reasonable taxi distance from your destination, even those of us sympathetic to the railways and who enjoy rail travel will reach for the car keys. It’s a no brainer – it’s door to door.

But if you can’t beat them, why not join them?

Cameron is right on NHS spending

I don't often differ wildly from the ConservativeHome editorial line. I don't often stray too far from the mainstream views of Conservative members, save being a bit more obsessive than most about individual liberty and a tad more open to reform. But on this rare occasion I must disagree with 63% of you and support David Cameron's plans to "ring fence" NHS spending and continue to increase it at an above inflation rate.

You see it's not because I believe savings cannot be made in the NHS without directly cutting services. Savings can be made, lots. Billions upon billions. Local pay deals, better contracting, an end to Labour's bizarre management style and the introduction of more business like management - with greater use of the private sector - would and indeed will save a fortune. But all such savings will soon be gobbled up by the benign but extremely hungry health monster. New drugs, new treatmments, and an ever greater need for staff to administer these life saving marvels will be compounded by the aging population.

As more and more people live longer lives, and as more and more people live years on medication - perhaps from childhood in some cases, middle age in many more - the costs will continue to tick up. Here we are not alone, America - which spends 15.6% of its GDP on healthcare compared to our 8.3% (2005 figures) - expects to spend one-fifth of GDP on healthcare by 2018. Hopes of returning money from the healthcare budget to taxpayers or using it to partly plug the budget black hole just aren't realistic, and we'd be both fooling ourselves and worrying voters if we banked on it even as an option. In healthcare we must at least walk briskly to stay still.

Conservatives can win the health debate. Conservatives must win the health debate.

As the dust settles on surely the silliest silly season story ever – Dan Hannan on Health, henceforth known as Dangate – the silver lining of that bizarre storm may well be arriving.

President Obama I understand has a motto. Whilst Gordon Brown adopted the rather hollow self-satisfied one of his alma mater – “usque conabor” [I try my utmost] – when he became Prime Minister, Obama’s is more a piece of practical advice: “Never waste a crisis”.

It’s a good rule to follow, for in this week of outrageous headlines and Labour lunacy a strange if stormy planetary alignment occurred in the political solar system that is a very rare occurrence indeed. Healthcare was not only the main issue in political saliency but it was in an international perspective – where the UK performs poorly, especially in comparison to Europe – and, to top it all off, the ruling party was showing a shocking level of complacency, arrogance, and – quite frankly – utter delusion.

Although it is later than I would have advised, the big speech expected will hopefully take advantage of this so called crisis.

Not only is it an opportunity to emphasise the fact the NHS is rightly a priority of the party and how this is a change from the “old”; it is more importantly a chance to cast Labour as the out dated, old fashioned and the [in the anti-reform sense] “forces of conservatism”, with the Conservatives as the modernising, fresh and reformist “progressives” of the show.

After all, we have seen Labour nail their colours firmly to the zero reform flagpole with a “my country, right or wrong” attitude to healthcare policy. Opposition to reform can never be progressive, can it? With statistics such as National Health Service patients being four times more likely to die than Americans in surgery, Cancer survival rates in Britain being among the lowest in Europe, and stories such as ‘Woman gives birth on pavement after being refused ambulance', their healthcare patriotism can be ridiculed.

The cause of Change can be easily made, all we need to do is make it.

And “Change”, as we know, is a very powerful message...

I cannot love the NHS

Forget swine flu. Forget bird flu. Forget SARS. Forget salmonela in your eggs and every other Daily Mail panic you can think of. A new highly contagous syndrome is spreading fast. Symptoms are distinct. Patients become convinced to the point of dellusion at times that they, their family, their friends and many others "owe" their lives to a body they refer to with the anacronym "N-H-S", which they believe is the "envy of the World", and that anyone who does not share their unquestioning "love" of this "N-H-S" by Tweeting #welovethenhs and praising its every last action is a dangerous heretic bent on denying healthcare to millions.

Every kind action of a nurse or doctor is not attributed to that individual as a human being but instead to the all mighty NHS, and every criticism of the NHS spun as a personal attack upon those same good staff who's kindness, caring and human goodness the monolithic institution hides behind and claims as its own. The NHS is the national religion, as I believe Lawson called it, and all who complain in any way, or propose improvement, or offer constructive critique, or don't profess their "love" of this particular anacronym, are branded heretics. I guess I'm a heretic.

But like many people branded as heretics, I have its best interests at heart, that's why I criticise. I believe in universal healthcare. I believe everyone should get the treatment they need. I believe in high quality healthcare for all. I believe only the best is good enough. I believe these things strongly, but the NHS isn't these things, and I do not love it.

Alan Sugar and the enormous intellect

There are many things that can be held as testimony of the desperation of this Labour government – the repeated returns of Peter Mandelson, for one – but the biggest one to me is the appointment of celebrity businessman Alan Sugar as their chief business advisor, the so called “Enterprise Tsar”.

The decision now of Siralan – surely the first man in history to have his title and name merge portmanteau like into something that sounds like an alien species from Doctor Who – to sue Quentin Letts personally for calling him “a dipstick…wally” and “not having an enormous intellect” has been rightly condemned. Journalists and Editors must not be afraid to criticise and make fun, and those in the public eye must be grown up about these things.

Sugar certainly dishes out some particularly personal spite in the most bullying of ways, so it’s a bit much for him to now claim to be some kind of delicate flower.

For the Conservatives however there may be much to gain. Much has been said of how Sugar didn’t seem to understand what being a peer entailed etc, but there’s more than that. Sugar has nailed his colours to a very welcoming Labour Party, but those colours aren’t as pro-enterprise and conducive to business as they think. If the press begin examining the allegations of Letts and the claims of Sugar then this could soon become very damaging.

Now Alan Sugar has been hugely successful, no one is knocking him that way, but so have lots of people. He is in no way qualified to claim the title of the nation’s top business guru as he largely has. Quite the contrary in fact, which no doubt partly explains why Quentin Letts decided to label him as he did.

Buy the best

One of the few things that have definitely improved over the last few years is the recognition of our troops via the revival of homecoming parades. A well deserved moment of pride over a job well done (as ever), loved one’s relief after a safe return, of joy for families reunited. A chance for family, friends and the wider community to show their support, belief and thanks to a military that has always been there for us even though we haven’t all always been there for them.

But all too often someone or several are missing from the festivities.

British forces have seen some of the fiercest fighting since the Second World War in the all too aptly named Helmand province of Afghanistan, and the toll has been high. Each soldier missing from the homecoming parade lines is a son, brother, and often Father lost from a family. Each family missing from the cheering crowds is a family that will forever henceforth be incomplete.

Their deaths get a brief mention on the evening news, a few words of condolence at the dispatch box, before joining the regiment of statistics.

The Government has failed us in the fight against swine flu

Have you ever seen this experiment? Volunteers one by one were put in a waiting room with people they believe to be other volunteers but are in fact actors who have been told to sit still and calm. The volunteer thinks they are waiting to be told what the test is, but in reality they are already in it. After a short while smoke begins to waft under the office door; gradually at first, but then in ever greater quantities, filling the room. All logic says there’s a fire. But what do you do? Do you go to look, or press the fire alarm? You mention it but the others are sitting calmly. They aren’t worried, so why are you? You don’t want to look like a paranoid, do you?

The majority do nothing.

The experiment was devised after a fire killed numerous people in a restaurant, most of whom had stayed calmly seated eating their chips. No one shouted “Fire, everyone out!” and so no one acted. In the 9/11 attacks at the WTC some offices left fast but others ambled even with the alarm – the average time being 5-8 minutes – and some took up to 40 minutes; finishing emails, logging off, shutting down, tidying up. No one wanted to be seen to panic, to be seen as over-reacting, or acting disproportionately.

That’s where we’re at now with swine flu.