GORDON PARSONS enjoys the wealth of wisdom and the clarity of expression from a dialogue between Chomsky and Mujica
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The fight to save the NHS
HELEN MERCER welcomes the personal account of an NHS worker and activist for its lucid exposition of the impact of privatisation by stealth
NHS SAVIOURS: Unite the union members protest outside the Department of Health, London on December 18 2023
GUILLERMO THOMAS enjoys a survey of the current state of the CIA (aka Langley) from an expert and insider of sorts
MARIA DUARTE, FIONA O CONNOR and JOHN GREEN review The Choral, Belen, Dragonfly, and Colossal Wreck
WILL STONE is frustrated by a performance that chooses to garble the lyrics and drown the songs in reverb
RITA DI SANTO points out the social experience of exploitation and oppression that inform the popular winners at this year’s festival
PETER MASON is tickled by a new book and exhibition that mine the rotten anachronism of the monarchy for laughs
A Nazi zeppelin whodunnit, death amidst detoxification, a twistaholic’s delight, and noir fiction for criminals
Critical: Why the NHS is being betrayed and how we can fight for it
Dr Julia Grace Patterson
Mudlark, £16.99
RISHI SUNAK wants us to unite around ”shared values,” so here’s one – the NHS. An Ipsos Mori poll in August 2022 found that the NHS came out top when the public was asked “what makes us proud to be British?”
The poll is cited in Julia Patterson’s excellent book, which provides a heartfelt introduction both to the strengths of the NHS as originally constituted and the disastrous process of the last 40-50 years by which the NHS has been privatised, fragmented and (part of the process of privatisation) starved of funds and trained staff.
Julia Patterson is an NHS psychiatrist who now works full time with the campaign she co-founded – Every Doctor. I would urge everyone to go to the Every Doctor website, https://everydoctor.org.uk, for invaluable maps showing just how extensive outsourcing and PFIs are across Britain and the extent of MPs’ (Conservative and Labour) financial interests in private healthcare companies often through investment funds, such as Egerton Capital or Apax Partners LLP (linked with Keir Starmer and Teresa May respectively).
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