The Labour Party is in turmoil and unable to provide an effective opposition and so the BBC steps up and does the job for them. There are changes being planned for the NHS and the BBC has decided to shout very loudly that, in its interpretation of a study, these are being kept secret for political reasons. That’s despite being told in no uncertain manner by the report’s author that this is not the case. The BBC has gone through the 90 page report with a fine tooth comb, ignoring the vast bulk that explains what is going on and carefully, very carefully, selected out, from a single, very small section, the few words or phrases that support its contention that there is a huge cover up going on and changes to the NHS are being deliberately kept from the Public.
As said the BBC knows this isn’t true as the report author on the Today programme made clear and an honest analysis of the report itself would show.
Here’s what Chris Ham from the King’s Fund said [08:34] in response to Justin Webb suggesting the changes were being ‘conducted on purpose in secret’….
‘Can I just say these plans haven’t been developed in secret…There hasn’t been a plan to consult on until the end of October which was the deadline for each of these areas to submit their plans….they’ve been developed by the senior [NHS] leaders using their expertise knowing public consultation would have to occur.’
Justin Webb then did a u-turn and agreed that it was sensible not to publish the plans before they were developed properly…
In a way its perfectly right that they hold these talks in privtae as the risk is that you get all sorts of interest groups getting involved early on and possibly skewing them in a way that isn’t good for the Service [NHS]…more political than sensible…’
And yet the BBC has consistently ignored that and instead throughout the day been reporting a sensationalised story about ‘secrecy’ which came from one passage of the report and wrongly gives overemphasis to it thus creating a dramatic and sensationalist story of that supposed ‘secrecy’…..the use of the word ‘secrecy’ is of course a highly suggestive one that gives rise to thoughts of sinister plots and underhand dealings….the BBC has deliberately chosen that headline for political effect…..
NHS bosses ‘trying to keep cuts secret’
NHS chiefs are trying to keep plans to cut hospital services in England secret, an investigation has found.
Full details of 44 reviews of services around the country – which involve closing some A&Es or, in one case, a whole hospital – are yet to emerge.
That is because NHS England told local managers to keep the plans “out of the public domain” and avoid requests for information, the King’s Fund suggested.
Managers were even told how to reject freedom of information requests.
The local managers said they had been told to keep the process “private and confidential”, which one described as “ludicrous”, while another said the leadership had made the “wrong judgement call” in its approach to managing the process.
Another person involved complained about being in meetings and wondering why there were no “real people”, such as patients and members of the public, involved.
The King’s Fund was told senior leaders at NHS England and NHS Improvement, which regulate NHS trusts, wanted to “manage” the narrative around the process, because of the sensitive nature of some of the changes.
Let’s just look at who else is peddling that line about secrecy…..
One of the most alarming aspects of the STPs is their secrecy…. In the world of the STPs, the public have no right to know.
And the left-wing campaigning group 38 Degrees
…..published an investigation into STPs that was covered by all major newspaper and broadcast outlets. News items focused on the ‘secrecy’ and lack of public consultation on the plans, as well as making frequent links to potential ‘cuts’, ward closures and the downgrading of A&E services.
The plans are so ‘secret’ that the report tells us…
STPs have attracted growing media attention since they were first announced
(see box, pp 14–5), particularly after some draft plans were published following an
early planning deadline in June 2016.The plans have also attracted growing political attention. A large number of
parliamentary questions have been asked about STPs since June 2016
The existence of the King’s Fund report itself suggests no ‘secrecy’, the information coming from the NHS itself…..
We carried out a series of interviews with senior NHS and local
government leaders involved in developing STPs in four parts of the country. This
report is based on analysis of data from these interviews.
The bulk of the BBC story came from this single passage on page 38 of the report…
As well as the timeline creating a barrier to meaningful public engagement, national
NHS bodies had also asked STP leaders to keep details of draft STPs out of the
public domain. This included instructions to actively reject Freedom of Information
Act requests (FOIs) to see draft plans. Two main reasons were given for this. The
first was that national NHS leaders wanted to be able to ‘manage’ the STP narrative
at a national level – particularly where plans might involve politically sensitive
changes to hospital services. The second was that national leaders did not want draft
proposals to be made public until they had agreed on their content.
But even then the BBC has opted to miss out the second reason for not publishing their plans…they hadn’t agreed on their content yet.
If the BBC had been honest it would have reported the real reasons for limiting consultation in the initial stages of drawing up plans….the very tight time constraints, the extreme complexity of the subject, the enormous number of people and organisations that would want their own vested interests considered and thus complicate and slow down the process enormously, engagement fatigue as a result of all that complexity and the inability of some groups or people to understand what was going on and, because of the complexity and number of groups involved, an inability to coordinate efficiently between them, as well as legal constraints on publishing and the fact that some plans had already been drawn up that had been through a process of public consultation and thus didn’t need to do so again.
As you can see there are many reasons for not immediately making the plans public…none of them due to a deliberate plot to hide cuts from the Public…the BBC has decided that the NHS wanting to ‘manage’ how the plans are presented, and to do so as a national issue rather than just local, is suspicious but isn’t that just common sense so that people get the whole picture and are not thenn subject to individual plans being hijacked and sensationalised by politicians or campaign groups out to cause trouble when a full, broader perspective might make the plans seem more sensible and reasonable?
Here the King’s fund lays out some of the reasons for limiting consultation in the early stages…..not quite as simple as the BBC makes out…..
It is important to recognise the context in which the plans are being developed.
The pressures facing local services are significant and growing, and the
timescales available to develop the plans have been extremely tight.The plans are also being developed within the fragmented and complex organisational
arrangements created by the Health and Social Care Act. In this context,
credit needs to be given to local areas for the progress made on STPs so far,
notwithstanding the major challenges identified in this report.It is important to recognise the constraints facing national as well as local leaders
in the NHS.•• STP leaders and teams have worked hard to develop their plans on top of
their existing day jobs and various other initiatives. This has not been easy.
The additional workload for most areas has been significant and is unlikely to
be sustainable in the long term. Management consultants are also routinely
being used to support the local STP process.
•• The limited time available to develop STPs has made it difficult for local leaders
to meaningfully involve all parts of the health and care system – particularly
clinicians and frontline staff – in developing the plans. The involvement of
local authorities has varied widely between STP areas, ranging from strong
partnership between the NHS and local government to almost no local
government involvement at all. Patients and the public have been largely absent
from the STP process so far.
Where good relationships already existed, these provided a positive foundation for joint
working on the STP. Some areas were able to draw on pre-existing plans
for service changes to take forward in their STP, and have made progress in
developing a sense of ‘common purpose’ between leaders. Where relationships
were poor, securing engagement in the process was a challenge in itself.The geographical context and the complexity of the system have also been
important factors.
