It is fair to say that when the NHS was set up, way back in 1948, that it was the crowning glory of Clement Attlee's post-war Labour government, and one the 1946 Act that set it up, is still one of the greatest and most important pieces of legislation any government has ever passed. It doesn't, however, mean that things shouldn't change or that everything that was in the National Health Service Act was right or perfect - far from it.
Some supporting the. "drop the bill" campaign (a glib, overly simplistic sound bite that is typical if Ed Miliband's knee-jerk, gesture politics) seem so blinkered in their view, or just plain stupid, that they want the NHS left alone. They argue that it is fine as it is. They don't want anything changed.
That point of view is moronic. It doesn't exist in the real world. Only absolute idiots would support it. Sadly, many of those who were elected as Labour MPs in 2010 fit that description perfectly.
The NHS is an enormous monolith of waste, leaking tax payers' money quicker than a jug of water poured through a sieve.
The problem is that in the 64 years since it came into existence, governments of different colours have tinkered with it. Tinkering is no good. Tinkering is for the short-sighted. Tinkering is for the amateur wanting a crowd pleasing quick fix, but it isn't for the careful, thoughtful politician who wants to move the NHS into the 21st century.
And that's the problem. The NHS is still firmly rooted in post-Second World War politics. It is embedded in the Twentieth Century. Sure, the machinery of medicine might have changed beyond recognition, the treatments progressed, survival rates improved, etc. but the organisation and administration of the NHS, and it's excessive waste, remain firmly in 1950's Britain.
The idiots calling for Cameron's government to "drop the bill" are correct, in as much as this bill isn't right - it fails to address many of the fundamental flaws of the NHS - but they fail to offer alternatives that show any awareness of what is needed, and, in the whole, they want to bury their head in the sand, do nothing and keep repeating their meaningless (and somewhat dishonest mantra) that "the NHS is the envy of the world"!
The concept of the NHS is the envy of the world but no sane country would want to adopt this dinosaur which eats money at a ridiculous rate - way beyond what can be justified and way beyond what can be afforded.
The NHS needs to be reformed. Proper reform. Root and branch. No more tinkering. Someone needs to sit down with a blank piece of paper and rethink the NHS. No sacred cows. Nothing off-limits.
Without fundamental change the NHS will die a long, slow death and we will all suffer.
The NHS has been a major national asset, but as the nation's do graphic changes, we need a new NHS that is designed for the next 70 years, not the last 70 years.
If you insist on your meaningless gesture politics of who h "drop the bill " is one of the most inane that's fine, but start thinking about alternatives, because the status quo isn't the solution.
It's 2012, not 1948. The world has changed beyond recognition. The NHS needs to catch up, and quickly.
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