NHS: will David be a saint or sinner?

NOW we know Dr Cameron’s prescription for the poorly NHS but what we don’t know is whether he will go down in history as Dave the saviour or Dave the destroyer.

The NHS does have far too many pen-pushing, clipboard-carrying bureaucrats but is getting rid of them and giving £80billion to GPs to run the hospitals a good idea?

Putting the NHS into bed with the private sector — one bedpan between them — sounds great, but can we afford it?

It’s true that the only waiting lists that the often luxurious private hospitals have is for the morning cup of tea and copy of the Daily Telegraph and that operations are generally carried out when patients want them rather than when busy surgeons can fit them in. But as users of private medicine would testify — or rather their bank or credit card statements would testify — the hotel style luxury service with individual TVs (no X-rated channels for fear of heart attacks, raised blood pressure) is expensive and beyond the reach of many.

Dr Cameron insists that the NHS could compete with its richer younger cousin and that combining the two would help to drive up standards in local hospitals. He is Messianic about it, but that does not mean he is right nor does it tell us what the plan B will be if he has dismantled the NHS only to find that it can’t compete with the private sector after all.

Will hospitals close and would the consortia of GPs be better off putting the £80billion on the jockey in the red cap in the 2.30 at Wetherby?

Hand out the tranquillisers.

THE surprising thing about this week’s story that, according to cyclists, Oldham ranks 172 out of 212 authorities in a national count- your-potholes league, is that there are 40 authorities worse than Oldham.

The information is contained on a catchily named website, “fillthathole” (and I don’t know why they’ve filled in the holes between the words, perhaps it’s to make their point).

Oldham Council, though, denies that it is guilty of pothole neglect and says that last year, it dealt with 5,868 potholes (now there’s a great job, council pothole repair counter). And that’s a great effort, but if Oldham’s roads, which do look as though giant moles live beneath them, actually had, say, 9,876 potholes then that still leaves 4,008 potholes for cyclists to fall into.

FINAL WORD: The pneumatic Katie Price (aka Jordan) is divorcing her latest husband, cage wrestler Alex Reid because he wanted to attract media attention and promote himself. Sound like a couple made in heaven (in plastic) to me.