Snouts in the Trough

We’re constantly told that the NHS needs more and more of our money. Just before the 2015 election, the head of the NHS (IMHO) effectively ‘blackmailed’ our politicians by claiming that the NHS needed another £8bn. Our would-be PMs knew that any refusal to hand over the cash would be electorally disastrous.

One of the reasons we’re always given for the NHS’s insatiable appetite for our money is an ageing population. That may be true. But, on the other hand older people are much healthier now than they were even 20 years ago. Another reason, which we’re never given because of political correctness, is immigration – the 46,000 people who flood into Britain every month. They certainly don’t come here for the weather and they love our NHS.

The NHS gets more money every single year (click on charts to see more clearly)

But where does all this money go? Certainly not on hospital beds. The number of hospital beds has been dropping like a stone:

And we now have almost the lowest number of hospital beds per 100,000 of population of any advanced country:

Interestingly, while telling us they need more money because of an ageing population, NHS bosses claim they need fewer beds because ‘bed numbers have fallen because people are being treated much more quickly – spending less time in hospital – and for many conditions medical advances mean they do not need to go to hospital at all’. Unfortunately, the spokesman didn’t explain why, if treating many conditions was cheaper, the NHS had to have ever more of our money year after year.

I have a few ideas about where our money is going. Firstly there was about £6bn wasted on the Connecting for Health computer system. In my 2006 book PLUNDERING THE PUBLIC SECTOR I spent two chapters explaining why the system would never work and should be scrapped. At the time I was lambasted by the head of the National Audit Office, Sir John ‘Junket’ Bourne. About 6 years and £6bn later the system was finally and deservedly scrapped.

Then there are managers. There were 25,000 NHS managers in 2000 when New Labour began its big spending spree with borrowed money. Under the financially-incontinent Brown and Balls this shot up to 43,000. It has now dropped to 37,000 but is still 50% above the level of 15 years ago. In addition, average salaries for these many managers have more than doubled in the last 15 years since 2000.

Plus there was the catastrophic deal done by New Labour with GPs whereby, GP earnings shot up from around £65,000 a year to over £100,000 a year while also allowing GPs to drop evening and weekend work.

And we had better not forget all the laughable new regulators set up by Blundering Brown and Buffoon Balls:

New Labour set up at least one new healthcare regulator each year it was in power, though 2004 was a bumper year with no fewer than three new regulators being imposed on us.

In 2001, we got the National Patient Safety Agency – about £30 million a year and over three hundred staff. In 2002, there was the Nursing and Midwifery Council – about £24 million a year and two hundred and forty plus staff. In 2002 we also were given the NHS Confederation – £26.5 million a year. In 2003 the Health Protection Agency began work – £250 million a year and over three thousand staff. In the same year there was the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency – £80 million budget and eighty staff. In 2004 our healthcare bureaucrats hit the jackpot. In January, Monitor appeared on the scene – over £13 million a year. There was also the Healthcare Commission – £80 million a year and over five hundred staff. And not to forget the Commission for Social Care Inspection – £164 million and 2,335 staff.

I could go on. There are still a few more to come. But you probably get the picture by now. All these new bodies were apparently Blair’s and Brown’s way of fulfilling the pledge given in New Labour’s 1997 election manifesto, ‘the key is to root out unnecessary administrative cost and to spend money on the right things – frontline care’.

And finally, we must give credit to former Health Secretary Andrew Lansley whose ludicrous reorganisation of the NHS – described by one colleague as ‘incomprehensible gobbledigook’ – wasted billions and made many NHS managers very rich indeed as they pocketed hundreds of thousands of pounds each when their jobs were scrapped, only to start work again the next day in a new position doing exactly what they did before.

Looking at what had actually happened, one commentator recently remarked, ‘of all the billions poured into the NHS, it is just sickening to see how much of it has been soaked up by this ever-expanding bureaucracy’.

With the (I believe undeserved) demolition of Cleggy and his LibDems in the May 2015 general election, my book “GREED UNLIMITED How Cameron and Clegg protect the elites while squeezing the rest of us” has become rather redundant.

I sold rather fewer copies than expected and I was going to bin the remaining copies. But I’d rather they were used than pulped.

So if any readers want one or more free copies, you’re welcome to have them if you’ll just pay for the postage.

If you’re connected to any college or club or school that could use some copies, then I can send you any quantity you wish – 20, 30, 40 or whatever. Or if you just want one or two copies, then I could do that as well.

Here’s what I propose: If you’d like one or more free copies, just go to the donate button on my snouts-in-the-trough website and donate the appropriate amount to cover postage costs. Then send me an email to david.craig54@yahoo.co.uk telling me how much you’ve donated, how many copies you want and the address to send them to.

You should then receive your copies within 3 to 4 days.

Here are the estimated postage costs:

1 copy  – £2.50

2 -3 copies – £3.00

4 – 20 copies – £11.00

21 – 40 copies – £16.00

41 – 60 copies – £21.00

60 – 100 copies £35.00

Here’s just one white girl’s story of the joys of multi-culturalism. It’s pretty harrowing stuff, especially when you consider that hundreds of child protection officers, social workers and police knew precisely that was happening to thousands of white girls. But they said and did nothing because they were terrified of being called “waaacccciiiisssstttt” and losing their well-paid, well-pensioned jobs.

“I was the victim of M*sl*m grooming gangs for well over a decade.

I was very young when it started. I have a very fuzzy memory of the very beginning. My childhood friend remembers me being picked up from a primary school by an older man and being given ketamine, coming home completely out of it, with lots of new underwear, so it began earlier than I remember. My parents worked a lot, so they weren’t really around to notice anything. My friend did at some point tell my parents, but I’m not sure when she did that.

We ended up moving areas, but not too far. Now my earliest clear memory starts at 14. We had moved house. I was waiting to be accepted into a school, from what I remember. This man, the very same man picking me up from primary school came to my parents’ home while they were out working, and while my brother was at his school. It was a morning. His name was Jason, I don’t know if he was a M*sl*m. He was 28 or in his early 30s.  

I was quite naive. He had come to take photos of me for a modelling portfolio — at least that’s what he said. They ended up being pictures in my underwear. Eventually he said we needed a different environment and asked if there was a bedroom we could use. I took him to my parents’ bedroom. I thought nothing of it, I didn’t realise it would get worse.

He took more pictures. Then he told me to take everything off and gave me some stockings to put on. I remember the feeling of my stomach turning over, I was really scared. But I did as I was told.

As far as I am aware, I had never been naked in front of a man before then. It’s hard to know with what my friend has recently told me about the ketamine.

Anyway, more pictures were taken. After a while, I heard my brother come through the door with his friends. It would have been school lunchtime. I panicked, jumped up and held the door shut, I shouted to him not to come up the stairs as I had just got out of the bath. By the time I turned around Jason had taken off his clothes. Again I was shocked. I’d never seen a naked man before. In fact, I’d never even kissed a boy. 

I felt myself going red with embarrassment. I told him he would have to go as soon as my brother left. He told me I had better be quiet or my brother would hear me and my parents would find out what I had been up to. He forced himself into me and raped me. I remember him laughing and saying to me, “you’re a virgin, aren’t you?” 

I’ll never forget the smug look on his face in that moment. When he was done with me, he threw money into the bed and told me to buy some nice underwear and that he would be in touch.

The minute he left, I ran a hot bath and just lay on the floor crying while I waited for it to fill.

I felt so ashamed and dirty.

Everything changed that day. I didn’t come out of my room unless I had to. I barely ate. I hated myself.

It wasn’t long until he was back in touch, demanding that I see his friends. The majority were Pakistani M*sl*m men. If I objected, he threatened to show my parents the photos of me.

I was terrified of them finding out, so I did as I was told.

When the pictures didn’t bother me anymore, and I objected, I would get beatings instead. My ribs were kicked in several times, leaving massive bruises. I was hit with a chain. I was gang raped. I became very compliant, because saying no always lead to much worse. The lives of my family were threatened by Jason and his friends: they said my house would be burned down while we slept, or people would come with baseball bats. I didn’t want my family hurt, so I just did everything I was told.

I have seen some horrendous things, heard some disgusting things when they talked amongst each other about the evil things they do to their wives. The men often spoke in groups about the horrific things they did to their wives and other women. I had to sit and listen.

I was made to talk to their wives on the phone while they raped me, on many occasions. They found it funny, the men. 

I have also been through some unimaginable things. I have had a knife held to my throat while I was raped and told by my rapist that he could kill me then put me under the floorboards of his home and no one would know because he was going to Pakistan in a week. I was 16 or 17 years old.

I have had a drill held to my knee while I was sat in a lounge room with around 6 other men, who all laughed and talked in their own language. All of these men were Pakistani M*sl*ms. This all happened while they were waiting for their turn to rape the girl in the other room. This is how they worked. It was a bit like a production line.

I remember it all very well. I would be taken to one of many places, the back of a shop, a takeaway, a taxi office, a barber shop, wooded areas or countrysides very late at night, which was terrifying (they threatened to leave me there once). Most of all I was taken to houses or flats, on the odd occasion a hotel. A lot of the time I was taken to flats they were renovating.

After some time I was no longer having to see just one man at a time as standard. I would be taken to a flat by 2 or 3 men, and when we got there, most often there would be more men waiting inside — on average around 8 men one after the other.

I’d be put in a room and told to take off all of my clothes. I would have to lay there and each man would take his turn one after the other, sometimes some of them would come back again. Sometimes more would show up.

I wasn’t allowed to move, clean myself up, until they were all finished with me. I was not allowed to leave that bed even to use the bathroom until they said so, and most of the time there was no running water or toilet paper, at very best there was cold running water. None of the men used protection, so I caught multiple STIs several times. I wasn’t allowed to use protection. I felt disgusting, so dirty.

Each time I was taken off with these men, sometimes this would happen two or three times a day. Whenever they wanted me, I had to go, whatever time of day it was. I missed a lot of school because of this.

It didn’t matter if I was crying while they raped me, they would laugh and do it anyway.

Just to list some of the things they did to me:

I have had a razor blade squeezed into the palm of my hand.

I have had a knife to my throat more than once. Also a knife held to my stomach.

I have been told how I could be murdered and put under the floorboards by a M*sl*m man while he raped me, holding the knife in one hand, my wrists pinned to the bed with the other.

I’ve been taken to the woods after midnight and threatened to be left there if I didn’t do as asked.

I’ve been peed on, spat on, slapped, kicked, punched, called a white whore.

They tried to get me to marry M*sl*m men into the country.

They wanted to take me to Pakistan a few times. Luckily for me, I didn’t have a passport.

I can’t even count the amount of times I’ve been passed to M*sl*m groups.

There were other girls. I wasn’t the only one. There was a lot they did to us. None of them were ever nice.

I was told if I ever told anyone what was happening to me, I’d have acid poured down my throat.

I remember one afternoon being taken into a room by two men, one being quite drunk. I tried to leave and he threw a vodka bottle at me and flew at me. His friend stopped him beating me and started to talk to him in their language and before I knew it I was pinned between them both and they both raped me. They were laughing as I cried.

They then made me sit with them while they finished their drinks. Eventually they allowed me to leave. I walked 2 miles to get home.

I self-harmed a lot, so I am now covered in scars. I did it at first to make myself less attractive to these men, hoping they wouldn’t want to touch me. That never worked, one of them wanted to cut me some more, for blood play. 

I tried to commit suicide several times, as I saw no escape from this. I have no idea how I survived the last overdose, I took 630 mg of codeine, along with sleeping pills and a bottle of alcohol.

These men find it ok to rape non-M*sl*m girls. It’s in their culture. It’s a brutal cult and needs to be stopped. I still see these men today, they still recognise me, I have moved several times but it’s ineffective.

They are all still free. The English “justice” system is crap. When I was around 15, my mum called the police. The officer sent to deal with me was a well over 6 foot tall built up black man who I found intimidating. He seemed angry with me, asking me very intimate and upsetting questions. When I asked him to stop, he said I had to get used to it, as this is what I would have to deal with in court. He told me that if I were to testify, I would get no protection. For that reason, I never took it further.

The police told my mother that I was a known prostitute and to leave me to it, that I’d stop when I was ready.

In anger, my mum took my phone and rang Jason. He laughed and told her what he did to me in her bed, and that I loved it and couldn’t keep my hands off him.

After a while, I would have been just about 16, my mum had to kick me out because it was all getting too much. My mental state was bad, men were showing up at our home, hanging around in gangs outside the house in cars. It was too much for her and she had to protect my brother too, so I had to go.

I went to live in a youth hostel, where things went from bad to worse.

I was eventually controlled by a M*sl*m man in his forties or fifties. His name was Yusuf.

I have records dating back about 14 years of me trying to get help, telling medical professionals. And them not believing me. All but one.

Some still see me today and talk brazenly about the things they did, and still do. The police haven’t been helpful. I am utterly disgusted at the lack of interest from the police and the lack of protection they have given me despite the information I have given them. These people do know where I live, so I just hope the police do not use my name in their reports, like they said they may have to.

They ruined a big part of my life. Now, I am angry. I can’t let them win. I’m afraid, yes, but I am now doing what I can to get the message out there of what goes on with these gangs.”

Huge jubilation on BBC news this morning as they announced the results of the Irish referendum approving same-sex marriages (SSMs)

But did the Irish actually have any choice?

Some readers may remember that in 2001, the Irish were given a referendum on the EU’s Treaty of Nice. The Irish made the mistake of voting ‘no’. So, in 2002, they were given yet another referendum to see if they would give the answer the EU wanted. This time the Irish got it right (in the eyes of their EU masters) by voting ‘yes’. That’s democracy in the EU.

Now, same-sex marriages;

You might have noticed an almost unseemly rush in both the British and French parliaments in 2013 to legalise SSMs. What a coincidence that two major EU countries decided to do this at almost exactly the same time!

But for those of us who don’t believe in coincidences, here’s the real explanation why both countries hurried to legalise SSMs – because their EU masters ordered them to. But our lying, slippery, deceitful politicians desperately try to hide the fact that they were acting under duress from the EU as this would outrage many ordinary people and stoke up even more resentment against our EU overlords.

Let me try to explain. One of the human rights guaranteed by the European Convention on Human Rights (to which all EU countries must be signatories) is Article 8  – “The right to respect for private and family life”. “Private Life “ was defined as including “relationships between homosexuals and their partners with or without children”. Thankfully, for the moment, “Private life does not extend to the relationship between an owner and his pet.” Though, that could change in the future.

The European Court of Human Rights has already announced that same-sex marriage would be a “human right”, as soon as a few countries had legalised it. The court found that “the recognition in national law of same-sex relationships had, by our present day, reached a degree that justified a broader understanding of family life as that term is used in Article 8 of the Convention”. In addition to Britain and France, SSMs are already legal in Belgium, Denmark, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and at least five other EU countries.

If the Irish had voted ‘no’ to SSM legislation, then gays could have gone to other EU countries that allowed SSMs and then come back to Ireland and demanded that their marriage be recognised. And, of course, if the married gays took their case to the European Court of Human Rights, they would have won. This would have been hugely  embarrassing to Irish leaders as it would have exposed how little freedom and sovereignty they actually had.

So, our rulers all support SSMs, but don’t dare mention the real reason why – that this is being forced on them by their EU bosses. And when our leaders claim they’re legalising SSMs because “it’s the right thing to do” they’re lying.

Liars, scumbags and traitors the lot of them!

And if the Irish had voted ‘no’, they’d probably have been told to vote again and again and again until they got the ‘right answer’.

Don’t expect the BBC or any other mainstream media to mention the truth behind Ireland’s great ‘democratic’ referendum.

I’ll try to keep this simple today in case some useless, overpaid, overpensioned politicians are reading it. Though I doubt any are. They’ll be too busy cheating on their expenses and finding second, third and fourth jobs to fill in all the free time they have and fill up their bank accounts.

Imagine I have to fill out some official document and it takes a civil servant an hour to check what I’ve written and input it into some computer system. Let’s call that ‘one transaction’. What will that transaction cost the taxpayer? Probably about £50 in administrative time (including the civil servant’s salary, pension, office costs, manager’s time etc etc).

Imagine a million people fill in the same form. Ooops, those million transactions will cost the taxpayer £50m in administration. Now let’s imagine the Government makes the system more complicated with more rules and the document becomes twice as long and more complicated. So we’re up over £100m.

With me so far? The more transactions that are generated and the more complicated those transactions are, the more the administrative cost will rise.

Now let’s take one of the stupidest policies ever devised by a politician – Gordon Brown’s ‘in-work tax credits’. These were designed to help people on low earnings.

Here’s a brief outline of in-work tax credits:

So, the basic working tax credit is worth just over £40 a week – say £1.20 an hour.

Just taking a guess, I’ll assume it takes about 5 hours a year to calculate and administer each tax credit claimant’s situation – £250 in administration.

The total number of people claiming ‘in-work tax credits’ is around 3,300,000. So, it’s possibly costing £825m a year to administer.

Wouldn’t it be much simpler to abolish in-work tax credits completely and just increase the minimum wage by £1.20 an hour while scrapping NI on anyone earning less than say £8/hour? That gives you massive simplification, cuts administrative costs by £825m and doesn’t increase employers’ costs by much as, even though they would pay an extra £1.20 per hour, they would no longer have to pay NI on the low-paid.

The problem with in-work tax credits is that, like everything developed by politicians who have never had a proper job in their lives, they fail to understand that something which looks simple on paper for just one person, suddenly becomes a costly nightmare when it has to be administered for millions.

When I worked as a consultant, one of the acronyms we used was USA – Understand, Simplify, Automate. Understand how a process works; Simplify it as most processes become more complex over time as people meddle with them; then Automate it to make it cheap to run.

Sadly our politicians, having never worked in their lives, don’t understand how the number of transactions and their complexity just lead to ever more administrative cost.

The latest example of this stupidity can be seen in Osborne’s plans for inheritance tax (IHT). Osborne claims he wants families to keep more of their wealth. So, the easiest thing would be to increase the IHT threshold from the current £365,000 to say £500,000. But no, instead Osbum has come up with some complex idea of each parent being given as extra £175,000 tax exemption on the value of the family home or something like that. As usual with politicians, more complexity, more confusion, more administrative cost.

Please could someone tell our useless, clueless, never-had-a-proper-job-in-their-lives politicians that they must USA – Understand: Simplify: Automate – otherwise they can never cut public spending as they continually increase administrative costs.