Monitor 2016: Taxpayer's Investment.

Looks like all the shares you bought in Foundation Trusts will be protected until 2016!!!

Shares? What Shares? It’s Taxpayer’s Investment. You do not get shares!!!

HSJ:

Monitor's transitional role could be extended beyond 2016

1 Sept., 2011

Monitor’s existing regulatory powers over foundation trusts could be extended beyond March 2016, under plans set out by ministers today.

Amendments to the Health Bill published today say that the regulator’s “specific intervention powers” will be retained for all foundation trusts until March 2016, with the health secretary gaining power beyond that period.

Previous versions of the bill would have applied the powers for two years, and only to some trusts.

The extension is in line with recommendations by the NHS Future Forum, to give foundation trust governors the time to build capability in holding their board to account, and to enable Monitor to protect the taxpayer’s investment in foundation trusts. 

Monitor: All recent posts.

The Cockroach Catcher: Monitor & Clause 56 1(a): Competition & Cartel

May 11, 2011

In The Guardian:

“……Tom Clark our leader writer says the real problem with the bill is the fact that the new regulator has a duty to promote competition where appropriate. He points out that in a previous life as a special adviser the regulator used his powers to squeeze state bodies in order to open up the space for private providers. It's why he is so against competition.”

For my money, the most important line in the whole of the health and social care bill is found – if I have the chapter and verse citation system right – at clause 56 1(a). It lists the first duty of the regulator Monitor, which is being transformed from the Foundation Trust hospital's overlord into being the economic regulator of the whole healthcare market, as being "promoting competition where appropriate".

The Cockroach Catcher: David Cameron & Mental Illness: Monitor & Bupa

May 03, 2011

Oooops, did I say monitor? Yes, Monitor may be re-launched as a QinetiQ styled company as there is so much money to be made from fining NHS Foundation Trusts. Dr David Bennett is not a medical doctor. ...

The Cockroach Catcher: NHS & Monitor: Eggs & Enron.

Mar 06, 2011

How many scientists do they have and indeed how many doctors do they have at Monitor or do they all have to have MBAs. Instead we had 100 million fake eggs. They are not even changing the name of DEFRA this time. ...

Sonia Brown: I think we can identify areas where we can see that the Department’s analysis has not gone to the point of being able to quantify the numbers. A really good example of that is that the NHS tends to treat much more complex cases. At the moment, the NHS is rewarded at the same rate for doing that as the private sector is for treating less complex cases. 

The Cockroach Catcher: Monitor & Lansley: Numeracy & Listening Skills

Apr 04, 2011

Q466 Grahame Morris: My question is in relation, Secretary of State, to the role and the costs of Monitor. On 8th February, I received a written answer about the costs of the new economic regulator which were estimated ...

Why spend £500 million on an economic regulator-and the figures were revised last week-if we are not going to have price competition?

The Cockroach Catcher: Quantum & M: Penny & Monitor

Apr 11, 2011

Q 195 Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con): I have a couple of questions about the role of Monitor. The first is about the Mid Staffordshire trust into which the Francis inquiry is looking at the moment. It seems to me as the local Member of Parliament that Monitor approved the foundation trust status without going into sufficient detail as to the status of that trust, particularly the quality of care at the time. What assurances can you give us that Monitor’s approval of foundation trusts will be more rigorous in the future than it was in the case of Mid Staffordshire? 

The Cockroach Catcher: NHS & Monitor: Inside Job & Trojan Horse

Mar 20, 2011

Tory MP and practising GP Sarah Wollaston has set out why she wants her own party to drop plans for a radical reorganisation of the National Health Service.

“It is not Greeks that could destroy the NHS, but if Monitor, the new economic regulator, is filled with competition economists with a zeal for imposing competition at every opportunity, then the NHS could be changed beyond recognition.

It is no use "liberating" the NHS from top down political control only to shackle it to an unelected economic regulator.”

The Cockroach Catcher: NHS & Monitor: Toyota & McKinsey

Mar 11, 2011

Q115 Rosie Cooper: Yes, if I may. Under the Bill, the Secretary of State will no longer have a statutory duty to provide health services and will only have to act with a view to securing the provision of health services in relation to the Board. How accurate is it to see this as spelling the end of a state provided National Health Service?

Nigel Edwards: That is precisely what it is, is it not? That is what it says. It is there in black and white. That is my reading of it as well. In fact, when every NHS hospital is a foundation trust, apart from the fact that the state would be a residual owner of roughly £36 billion of assets which belong to the taxpayer, there is no direct state control over the provision of health care except indirectly through the commissioning process. That is my reading of it.

The Cockroach Catcher: NHS Posts: Monitor, A & E, Parliament ...

Apr 25, 2011

NHS & Monitor: Accountants, A & E & Disasters. Thursday, March 17, 2011. Dr Bennett: On the armies of accountants point, Anna is right that one of the things that is needed is a more detailed and even clearer ...

The Cockroach Catcher: NHS & Monitor: Accountants, A & E & Disasters

Mar 17, 2011

…….Dr Bennett: On the designation question, the issue there is what happens if the provider of the service is the only provider of that particular service that is available to its local community but the provider gets into difficulty. ……………..If you finish up in a situation where you define the boundaries around A&E as being the whole of the DGH, then you have somewhat frustrated the policy, but I don’t think that should be necessary.

The Cockroach Catcher: NHS & McKinsey: FSA & Monitor

Mar 05, 2011

Trust!

Emily Thornberry:  I am tempted to press you further, David, given the profound implications of what you said in relation to work force pensions. We are about to pass this legislation and you are saying, “Take it on trust, as it will all be sorted out.” But we are talking about millions of people’s pensions here, and it is difficult not to push you at this stage. 

Worse than that, you said in an incomplete answer earlier that there were other obvious distortions and advantages that the NHS had over the private sector. I wonder whether you could list anything else, on top of pensions, that you might think might of? 

Shadow Elite: Public-Private Players & The NHS

Monday, June 27, 2011

"The new breed of players," writes Wedel, "who operate at the nexus of official and private power, cannot only co-opt public policy agendas, crafting policy with their own purposes in mind. They test the time-honored principles of both the canons of accountability of the modern state and the codes of competition of the free market. In so doing, they reorganize relations between bureaucracy and business to their advantage, and challenge the walls erected to separate them. As these walls erode, players are better able to use official power and resources without public oversight."

Dr David Bennett is the current head of Monitor (a sort of health FSA!) He is not a medical doctor. He

 was a Director at McKinsey & Co. In his 18 years with McKinsey he served a wide range of companies in most industry sectors, but with a particular focus on regulated, technology-intensive industries.