Watching the Panorama involving the blogger PC Copperfield reminded me more than just a little of the NHS. In fact it was quite remarkable to see how the government's stupid target based approach is failing in policing and in health care in the same ways.
The government cares not for protecting the public from crime or from ill health, they have put the emphasis solely on the gathering of meaningless political propaganda at any cost. In this way trivial misdemeanors are criminalised at vast expense, just so that the statistics can be spun. While in the NHS ill thought out blanket targets result in sick patients not being given the priority they deserve, ahead of those with far less urgent and more minor ailments.
The professionals, whether they be doctors or police officers, are treated like idiots by clip-board wielding halfwits who have no idea about the practicalities of doing a good job for the public. Clinical priorities are ignored by our political masters who do not understand the concept of clinical need, while practical policing is ignored at the expense of statistic gathering. The parallels are obvious, the government seems too stubborn to learn from its rather glaring mistakes; and the public are the ones to suffer, as we now have public services that are set up to manufacture propaganda, as opposed to providing a good service for the public who fund them.
