Private sector urged to counter 'forces of evil' trying to block
changes
By Nicholas Timmins,Public Policy Editor
FT, January 17 2006
The private sector must back the government's health reforms and
face down "the forces of evil" that want to block them,
according to Ian Smith, chief executive of General Healthcare,
the owner of BMI, Britain's largest private hospital group.
The biggest threat to reform was "the old, state-run, NHS
monopoly itself", Mr Smith said, with opposition from the unions
and other self-interested groups posing the biggest threat that
it would be derailed.
His call came as James Johnson, the chairman of the British
Medical Association, has said there is "no going back" on the
government's drive to bring more choice and more diverse
providers into healthcare, at the same time as he has warned the
government must clarify "the rules of the game" for the new
National Health Service market.
In an interview with the Financial Times, Mr Smith also called
for a more creative partnership between the private sector and
the NHS - one where it not only provided treatment for NHS
patients but was allowed to form partnerships with foundation
trusts that would take over failing hospitals and turn them round.
"There are forces for reform in the NHS," Mr Smith said, "but
there are forces for evil who are self interested, who want to
look after their own privileges and pensions and don't want to
be held accountable, or subject to contestability and competition."
The private sector, he said, had to "stand up and be counted"
and publicly support reform.
If the NHS was to thrive services should be provided by whoever
could supply the best outcome in terms of both clinical quality
and value for money for the taxpayer.
"If that's the public sector, fine," he said. "If it's the
private sector, fine. And if it's a mix of the two that is
equally fine."
BMI, he said, treated thousands of NHS patients a year and held
a current contract to provide operations at the standard NHS price.
"We have never had a patient come out of ourfacilities and say
'next time I am going to an NHS-run facility because I believe
in a state run monopoly'," added Mr Smith.
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