Rescuing
Democracy in the United Kingdom from our current Elected
Dictatorship
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Spin, not
face-to-face confrontations with the voters, is the Government's
chosen method of communication. Ordinary
people are dangerous. Ordinary people might ask a question
which throws a politician 'off message'; the Cabinet member
might reveal himself or herself to be a human being like
us, and not a programmed android. Worse still, he or she
might tell the truth.
Ann Leslie - Daily Mail, September
16, 2004
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After
a clear vote against them, we still got eight non-elected
Regional Assemblies. When we vote against the EU Constitution,
we'll get them anyway. Letter from P.Cove, Aylesbury,
BUCKS.- Daily Mail, January 31, 2005
THE
TIMES slavish support for the Government worries some
members of the paper's staff, not to mention any perspicacious
readers who are left. Political editor Philip Webster
was questioned about this when he addressed colleagues
as part of an in-house 'masterclass' exercise. Small wonder.
One of his Blair-worshipping subordinates wrote a news
story yesterday poo-pooing the row over Labours anti-semitic
poster mocking Michael Howard, saying it was merely £5million
worth of 'free publicity' for the party. Ephraim Hardcastle
- Daily Mail, Febrauary 2, 2005
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1.7m
Scots miss out as dentists quit NHS
By IAN JOHNSTON -THE SCOTSMAN - February 5, 2005
Key points
• One-third of Scots are not registered with a dentist -
NHS or private
• Children's dental health not improving
• Not enough dentists being trained to meet demand
Key
quote
"I think the situation is coming to a crisis. Dental health
in Scotland is among the worst in Europe and there are people
within that 35 per cent who want to have regular care and support
from a dentist." - Frances Blunden, principal policy adviser
at Which?
Nearly
1.7 million Scots are not receiving regular care amid Scotland’s
mounting dental crisis, a leading public health consultant has
revealed. Official
figures show that only 52 per cent of the population are registered
for NHS treatment, while about 14 per cent are thought to receive
private care, leaving a third of the population without a dentist.
As
many as 94,000 children may not be receiving any regular check-ups,
allowing minor dental problems to fester until emergency treatment
is needed. The new figures come after a Scottish parliamentary
report earlier this week showed that a third of Scots dentists
were unable or unwilling to take on children as new NHS patients.
The
revelation has caused new alarm among dentists, consumer groups
and politicians, who are demanding immediate action from the Scottish
Executive. Colwyn Jones, a consultant at Lothian Health and a
member of the Scottish Consultants in Dental Public Health Group,
told The Scotsman he estimated that 35 per cent of Scots were
not registered with any dentists. "I think it’s probably
about the right figure. Dental health in Scotland has been improving,
but this problem of accessing a dentist now means things might
start getting worse again.
"If
you look at children’s teeth going back 20 years, initially
there was an improvement, but there hasn’t really been an
improvement in dental health in children for the past eight or
nine years. Part of the reason will probably be that they aren’t
getting along to the dentist."
Between
1983 and 1998, the number of five-year-olds who had experienced
tooth decay dropped from 75 per cent to 56 per cent. But in 2002-3
the figure was still at 55 per cent. "We should be seeing
an improvement [in these figures]," Mr Jones said.
Delaying
a visit to the dentist only made things worse, Mr Jones added.
"If you’ve got a small hole in your tooth, it’s
less painful to get it filled. It’s also a much smaller filling
and it’s going to last much longer." Mr Jones said the
way to enable most people to get the treatment they need was relatively
simple. "The thing that strikes me is we just haven’t
got enough dentists. We’re not training enough dentists in
the UK," he said. "In
Scotland, we probably train twice as many dentists per head of
population as they do in England. But a lot of them come from
English schools and a lot move back there," he said.
This
year, there are 120 places for trainee dentists in Scotland who
have just completed their studies. However Scotland’s two
dental schools currently have 114 students in their final year
and in Dundee just 29 of 51 final-year students are actually from
Scotland. The others may choose to practise elsewhere while a
small number may also fail their exams.
Which?,
formerly the Consumers’ Association, said the 1.7 million
"missing" patients showed a crisis was developing in
Scotland, partly because of a "complacent attitude among
the powers that be". Frances
Blunden, principal policy adviser at Which?, who has carried out
research on the issue, said action had to be taken to increase
the numbers of Scots getting regular dental treatment.
"I
think the situation is coming to a crisis. Dental health in Scotland
is among the worst in Europe and there are people within that
35 per cent who want to have regular care and support from a dentist,"
she said. "I
think sometimes there’s a very complacent attitude among
the powers that be. Certainly, in rural parts of Scotland, it
is a real crisis with levels of registration down to about 20
per cent - that is appalling."
The
British Dental Association, effectively a trade union for dentists,
echoed Mr Jones’s view that more dentists were required.
"The
UK as a whole has an acute shortage of dentists, but the situation
in Scotland’s Highlands and Islands is particularly bad,"
a spokeswoman said. "Each
year we produce just 800 new dentists from our 13 dental schools,
a figure which is too low to meet patient demand. The BDA has
called on the government to increase the number of undergraduate
places by 25 per cent. "However, even if these increases
were due to come on- stream in October 2005, the new graduates
would not enter the profession fully until 2010."
Richard
Lochhead, an SNP MSP for North-east Scotland, where the problems
are particularly acute, said dentists were not to blame for the
lack of NHS provision. "[They] are between a rock and a hard
place. They want to serve the public but are finding that the
economics don’t stack up," he said.
"The
fee structure requires modernisation, and special incentives have
to be put in place to attract new dentists to those areas where
NHS dentistry is imploding. Some
dentists would rather work privately but others leave the NHS
with a heavy heart because it’s the only way they can balance
their books."
Nanette
Milne, the Scottish Tories’ new health spokeswoman, said
the number of people not registered with a dentist was a cause
for concern. "Coming
from Grampian, it doesn’t altogether surprise me," she
said. "I know it’s particularly bad in certain areas
and we have known this for a long time in Grampian, but I think
it’s now becoming known elsewhere."
A
source at the Executive insisted the situation was "not a
crisis". However, ministers are to publish a report on the
state of dentistry in the next few weeks and there are hopes of
radical steps to address the situation.
An
Executive spokeswoman added: "It is common practice for health
visitors to advise parents of newborn babies to register them
as soon as possible. As part of our children’s oral-health
consultation we looked at ways of encouraging people to register
with a dentist."
Pain
of patient who paid a high price for lapsing
LEAH
Harvey hadn’t been to the dentist for seven years when, one
day, she felt a slight pain in her tooth. Gradually
the pain grew to a point when she decided she would have to get
some help - and that’s when her problems really started.
The
28-year-old, who lives in Aberdeen, was to experience utter agony,
have a total of six weeks off work and pay £100 for a private
dentist just to have a look.
Miss
Harvey, who works as a marketing co-ordinator, had been registered
with a dentist, but this had lapsed after she went to study at
university in England. When she started suffering pain in her
tooth she tried unsuccessfully to find someone in the area who
would treat her on the NHS. Eventually
it became so bad that she went to a private firm, where she was
told it would cost £400 to fix the tooth or £200 to
remove it.
"When
they said ‘We’ll have a look at it’, I didn’t
think it was going to be that much money. I really couldn’t
afford it," she said.
But
one night the pain become so bad she went to the dental version
of accident and emergency and there the tooth was pulled. "The
pain was just unbearable. It was like somebody had a hot poker
in my mouth," Miss Harvey said.
She
had already had two weeks off work because of the agony of her
tooth, and after the extraction her gum became infected, leading
to a further four weeks off. She had to go to another private
dentist to get treatment for the infection. "It’s
pretty upsetting because you pay your National Insurance and you
cannot get anything back," she said.
Private
bills cost 'five times NHS fees'
ALISTAIR CHIVERS and IAN JOHNSTON
PRIVATE
dental care can cost nearly five times as much as NHS treatment,
according to a snapshot survey of practices by The Scotsman. And
there are big variations between private clinics across the country:
an amalgam filling could be as much as £70 in Inverness
and as little as £20 in Dundee. This
comes two years after an Office of Fair Trading (OFT) investigation
into private dentistry that found customers were being ripped
off.
Private
dentists claim the differences are due to variations in treatment
and insist NHS prices do not reflect the true cost of procedures.
They claim that the "low" prices dentists are paid for
NHS work mean that they have to rush treatment.
Frances
Blunden, principal policy adviser at Which? (formerly the Consumers’
Association), said the main issue in private dentistry was a lack
of transparency about prices. She
said: "Patients often don’t have an idea about what
the price will be before they let themselves in for it. Following
the OFT investigation, dentists are supposed to display indicative
prices so people can compare dentists. While some dentists do,
there’s a lot of evidence they don’t all do that. When
you haven’t got that price transparency, customers cannot
compare, so the market tends not to work very well." She
said some price variations were "inexplicable".
The
insurance company Denplan said people should not be surprised
by the gap between the price of private and NHS care. "NHS
fee rates are not a sound benchmark to assess the true cost of
delivering high-quality dental care," a spokesman said. "Private
dental fees are typically two to three times the NHS rate, but
this is a realistic reflection of the costs involved in spending
appropriate time with patients and delivering high-quality, modern
care."
A
spokesman for the British Dental Association said: "Fees
for private dental treatments vary according to a number of factors,
including the level of training and expertise of the dental team
and the location of the practice."
For
the health of our democracy, we, the people of the United Kingdom,
must find a way to force Mr Blair to resign
Such
defiance of the democratic process and the will of the majority
of we people of the UK, must be exposed by voters as a matter
or urgency, and not just in the two by-elections we have had this
July and the European elections in June 2004. But how can this
be done?
The
most effective way of getting our deceitful PM to resign would
be to mobilise the army of Labour MPs currently in the House of
Commons and get them to demand it, the loss of their seat to be
a penalty if they did not. All voters in Labour-held constituencies
need to write a letter along these lines to their local Labour
MPs:
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Dear
Despite
his absolute and unequivocal assurances over the past year
of the serious risk to our security of Saddam Hussein's
'weapons of mass destruction', Prime Minister Blair
has admitted, that the threat was non-existent. For that
critical error of judgement and for his gross incompetence
in handling this very important issue, I ask you to take
immediate steps to ensure that Tony Blair does the honourable
thing and resign without delay..
I
would therefore be much obliged if you would propose and
help mobilise a Parliamentary vote of 'No Confidence' in
Mr Blair which, despite Labour's huge majority, would leave
the PM with no option but to resign.
If
I get no reply to this letter, I shall assume you will continue
to support Mr Blair as our Prime Minister. In such circumstances
I shall not vote for you in the forthcoming General Election.
Signed:
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Simple,
non-violent, protest letters along these lines on a variety of
issues could be the basis for re-vitalising our democracy and
increasing voters' interest and participation in politics. Download
a printable copy of the above letter here.
There
is another way for the voice of the silent majority to be heard,
a voice that made sure broken promises would not only be revealed,
but punished in subsequent elections.
In
the year available before the General Election expected in 2005,
many topics are available as ammunition, each one asking questions.
A weapon for our purpose will be the results of Opinion Polls
in individual constituencies using ICM, NOP, Gallop, Mori
or YouGov.
Questions
suggested for this purpose are listed here.
CAST
YOUR VOTE ON A VARIETY OF OTHER IMPORTANT ISSUES HERE.
Current
and prospective Parliamentary candidates of all Parties running
for election could share a platform at public forums in every
constituency. They would be presented with the results of
polls on this issue expressed by the majority of voters in that
constituency.
The candidates could be asked if their own views and that of their
Party manifesto corresponded with the polls, and if not, how they
intended to represent the will of the majority of local voters.
Local and National Press, Radio and TV coverage would be arranged
and the results published on this web site.
Here
is another powerful strategy for using your vote effectively in
the forthcoming General Election. Send your sitting and prospective
MPs a letter defining your requirements if they want your vote.
This example deals with the proposed
EU Constitutional Treaty.
Your
letters would end: "If you do not answer
this letter, I shall take it that you intend to follow the Government
line. I shall act accordingly in the forthcoming General Election.
Or
why not create a questionnaire that you send to all the candidates
in your constituency, getting them to give yes/no answers to questions
of your choice, and ending it with the same paragraph(above).
Download
a printable example of the questionnaire.
It
is high time for the people of this United Kingdom to stop allowing
themselves to be manipulated by politicians. We need our representatives
in Parliament to genuinely reflect the view of the majority in
their own constituency, even if this means going against their
personal and/or their party's policy. While they may argue their
case, hoping to change the minds of the majority in their constituency,
they should ultimately be obliged to reflect the majority view
of those who elect them.
It
will be argued by politicians of all parties that most voters
don't have the knowledge necessary to express an opinion on important
subjects at issue, and that our vote is a form of delegated democracy.
We should argue that it is their duty to ensure that we voters
do have ready access to such information as is necessary to form
an intelligent opinion. That, after all, is one main purpose of
Opposition Parties in our Parliamentary Democracy.
Most
important of all, such proceedings would rekindle in voters their
latent interest and obligation to cast their vote, knowing that
the candidate of their choice would be more likely to act in accordance
with their wishes. A much higher turnout in elections would be
the result.
Contact
your local Party Chairman. Gain his support for setting up public
forums in your constituency on these, as well as any other relevant
topics, well before the next General Election expected in 2005.
You should then, depending on the integrity of the candidate of
your choice, feel fairly certain that your view on any subject
being debated in Parliament will more accurately be reflected
by your representative in that assembly.
