Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Tamas]

And apparently the biggest strain on it is the influx of working age adults coming in and paying their contributions.

[Gups]

Is there some major crisis of the NHS or why is the EU membership always contrasted with more investment into the NHS? Our healthcare system is currently not really in any kind of political focus, so I am surprised it seems such a huge issue in Britain right now.

Because Leave say that the £350m [sic] we pay to Europe a day could be spent on the NHS - they have posters etc to that effect. The link with the NHS is quite clever. The NHS is it serious financial difficulties and nobody really objects to spending more on it (apart from a few  iconoclasts like me)

[The Larch]

Isn't also the NHS quite fetishized in the British mindset, in a way that makes any setback to be blown out of proportion?

[Gups]

Isn't also the NHS quite fetishized in the British mindset, in a way that makes any setback to be blown out of proportion?

Yep. The media, especially the BBC never shut up about the fucking NHS.

[The Larch]

Isn't also the NHS quite fetishized in the British mindset, in a way that makes any setback to be blown out of proportion?

Yep. The media, especially the BBC never shut up about the fucking NHS.

Do I sense some exasperation?   

Btw, I think it must also be taken into account that the EU has been beneficial for the NHS in that it has allowed it to be staffed by other EU nationals. For years nurses have been recruited in droves in Spain (and I guess in other countries as well) to staff British hospitals, for instance. I don't know where I read that EU nationals were something like 10% of all the NHS' doctors, with non EU doctors holding an even higher %. It seems to be that the NHS is quite dependant on qualified inmigrants to be properly staffed.

[Richard Hakluyt]

The proportion of GDP spent on the NHS has been falling (slightly) in recent years. The increase in the numbers of elderly, expensive new drugs, fancy new treatments and simple expectations makes this difficult.

http://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/node/3776

The fuss is out of proportion.

[Gups]

Isn't also the NHS quite fetishized in the British mindset, in a way that makes any setback to be blown out of proportion?

Yep. The media, especially the BBC never shut up about the fucking NHS.

Do I sense some exasperation?   

Btw, I think it must also be taken into account that the EU has been beneficial for the NHS in that it has allowed it to be staffed by other EU nationals. For years nurses have been recruited in droves in Spain (and I guess in other countries as well) to staff British hospitals, for instance. I don't know where I read that EU nationals were something like 10% of all the NHS' doctors, with non EU doctors holding an even higher %. It seems to be that the NHS is quite dependant on qualified inmigrants to be properly staffed.

Leavers would argue (rightly I think) that there would be nothing to stop the UK from recruiting in Spain and elsewhere whether we were in the EU or not

[Valmy]

Leavers would argue (rightly I think) that there would be nothing to stop the UK from recruiting in Spain and elsewhere whether we were in the EU or not

Yeah I would think the UK government would not have much trouble getting the UK government to let in their own employees. Or maybe not, you know how some of those departmental rivalries can go.

But surely the UKIP crowd would want the focus to be on training good British people for good British jobs in good British hospitals to help good British patients.

[Tamas]

Leavers would argue (rightly I think) that there would be nothing to stop the UK from recruiting in Spain and elsewhere whether we were in the EU or not

Yeah I would think the UK government would not have much trouble getting the UK government to let in their own employees. Or maybe not, you know how some of those departmental rivalries can go.

But surely the UKIP crowd would want the focus to be on training good British people for good British jobs in good British hospitals to help good British patients.

This notion is near ridicoulous.

Either you open up your market to Spain etc. as a whole in which case you are in Leavers Nightmare Land of EUROPEANS COMING IN OMG, OR you introduce a Canadian/Australia-style point system, which I am pretty sure would drastically reduce the number of available nurses, and thus wouldn't really be a cheaper source of workers.

[Gups]

Leavers would argue (rightly I think) that there would be nothing to stop the UK from recruiting in Spain and elsewhere whether we were in the EU or not

Yeah I would think the UK government would not have much trouble getting the UK government to let in their own employees. Or maybe not, you know how some of those departmental rivalries can go.

But surely the UKIP crowd would want the focus to be on training good British people for good British jobs in good British hospitals to help good British patients.

This notion is near ridicoulous.

Either you open up your market to Spain etc. as a whole in which case you are in Leavers Nightmare Land of EUROPEANS COMING IN OMG, OR you introduce a Canadian/Australia-style point system, which I am pretty sure would drastically reduce the number of available nurses, and thus wouldn't really be a cheaper source of workers.

The leavers argue for the latter. They would say that it would not reduce the number of available nurses, because (if there is a shortage) being a qualified nurse with a job to go to in the NHS would get you enough points to qualify to immigrate.

[Zanza]

So instead of using a market mechanism, they want to use a government bureaucracy? Commies.

[Richard Hakluyt]

You could reduce the number of expensive Spanish nurses coming over and maybe get cheaper ones from the Philippines 

[Barrister]

Leavers would argue (rightly I think) that there would be nothing to stop the UK from recruiting in Spain and elsewhere whether we were in the EU or not

Yeah I would think the UK government would not have much trouble getting the UK government to let in their own employees. Or maybe not, you know how some of those departmental rivalries can go.

But surely the UKIP crowd would want the focus to be on training good British people for good British jobs in good British hospitals to help good British patients.

This notion is near ridicoulous.

Either you open up your market to Spain etc. as a whole in which case you are in Leavers Nightmare Land of EUROPEANS COMING IN OMG, OR you introduce a Canadian/Australia-style point system, which I am pretty sure would drastically reduce the number of available nurses, and thus wouldn't really be a cheaper source of workers.

We have an immense number of foreign doctors and nurses here.  Our immigration system doesn't seem to reduce the number of available foreign-born medical professionals.

[Tamas]

Fine then, although I can't imagine the administration and the dealing with the visa stuff won't be a barrier of entry for a portion of the cheap workforce.

Then again I guess there are enough street cleaners and couriers already, so it shouldn't be an issue.

[Tamas]

You could reduce the number of expensive Spanish nurses coming over and maybe get cheaper ones from the Philippines 

That reminds me of the apparent stance of these people that it is much more welcome to take immigrants from Asia than from Europe. I genuinly wonder if indeed they have a lower opinion of Eastern Europeans than, say Pakistanis, or it is just that it's safer to be racist when the subject is white and Christian.