Toynbee's toss

I'm afraid to say that Polly Toynbee wrote in the Guardian again recently:

"Spending has trebled, heart deaths are falling, waiting times for inpatients are at just an average 6.6 weeks and 90% of hospital patients report that their treatment was "excellent". By almost every indicator, ask any expert, there is no doubt things are very much better."

"Consultants have always found a way to run the show, and their power is little diminished, but even that little has made them dangerously incandescent."

"Some 50 Save Our Hospital campaigns are doing lethal electoral damage locally: shutting dangerously underspecialised A&Es is the right thing to do, but not at the same time as a savage clampdown on age-old deficits, so everyone thinks closures are cash - not clinically - driven."

Does this ill informed Blairite never cease to produce party propaganda that poses as a newspaper articles? It seems she was caught discussing anti-Tory ideas at a non-partisan, non-political charity event just before the general election. Polly is hardly the objective bystander.

There is some great reader opinion left below Polly's article, I would imagine that she probably doesn't bother reading this as the truth hurts a bit too much. I've heard Labour politicians use the same argument before, the one that claims that every 'expert' agrees with the government's reforms and that the NHS reconfiguration is based on clinical need alone. Unfortunately these arguments are nothing more than lies. The relationship between hospital closures and clinical needs are weak, and Labour ministers have been caught deliberately plotting closures in non-Labour areas behind closed doors. If Polly chose to digest anything other than Labour party political broadcasts then she may be aware that there are thousands of experts speaking out against the current health service reform. It's certainly hard to hear them when you have you fingers in your ears.