Off Topic The Politics Thread
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You may say it's not a left or right issue, but I'm guessing you're not a paid-up member of the right wing, ColognePrisoners voting rights is an important issue for some liberals but few beyond that
Mark Bridger, Rosemary West, Ian Huntley and Roy Whiting - would you give them a vote? How about Michael Adebolajo who murdered the British soldier Lee Rigby and will be out in 45 years? Should he have a vote like you and me?
For me, voting is a privilege, not a right. You lose the privilege in prison, and get it back upon release. The Human Rights Act should be redrafted into the Human Rights and Responsibilities Act. Individuals that aren't insane should take responsibility for their own actions, and if they don't, they lose privileges that can include their freedom and, yes, their right to vote for the government of their choice
The Human Rights Act is exploited by every scumbag whose actions infringe the human rights of their victims, in those cases they should forfeit their human rights for the duration of their sentence...
According to the European courts civil rights for prisoners can only be limited if those limits are necessary for the prevention of crime or for prison security. This interpretation sounds fair to me - any extra curtailments of rights over and above this constitutes an extra punishment which, in my opinion, is not necessary. Why do we have to go to the extremes ? The majority of prisoners are not murderers - they are mostly people either on short or mid term sentences who will eventually return to society and have to make a living there (they are our future neighbours !) - surely the job of the prison system is to enable them to be able to integrate back into that society as well as possible - a job which is harder if all links to that society have been closed for the period of their sentence.You may say it's not a left or right issue, but I'm guessing you're not a paid-up member of the right wing, Cologne
Mark Bridger, Rosemary West, Ian Huntley and Roy Whiting - would you give them a vote? How about Michael Adebolajo who murdered the British soldier Lee Rigby and will be out in 45 years? Should he have a vote like you and me?
For me, voting is a privilege, not a right. You lose the privilege in prison, and get it back upon release. The Human Rights Act should be redrafted into the Human Rights and Responsibilities Act. Individuals that aren't insane should take responsibility for their own actions, and if they don't, they lose privileges that can include their freedom and, yes, their right to vote for the government of their choice
I note you sidestepped my question on Adebolajo, Huntley, Bridger and the rest, Cologne.
In the UK, it's extremely difficult to get yourself banged up. The courts go to extreme lengths to avoid it. There's obviously a risk for extremely serious offenders, and serial offenders may eventually reach the end of a court's tolerance.
There needs to be a deterrent effect. European courts don't seem to recognise it. Of course I'm in favour of rehabilitation during and after a sentence. Participation in education and learning work skills should lead to privileges. Sky TV, access to the Gym etc should not just be given to prisoners as part of their Human Rights.
For the most heinous offences or where there is any risk of a murderer killing again, there should be a whole life term - something European Courts don't accept . Time and time again, murderers do their time and come out to take another innocent life. The UK needs to be able to make its own laws. This is one of the many reasons why the UK needs to take control of its own destiny and leave the EU.
Out of interest, are the re-offending rates similar in other countries who are opposed to life terms for murder and the like? Perhaps it's something wrong with our system.
Not saying that is the case, I'm just hypothesising
Not saying that is the case, I'm just hypothesising
Those who commit acts against the person, i.e. GBH, rape, sexual assaults,*****s and murderers have violated the victims human rights and should not be afforded endless benefits as a result of their crime.
A perfect example is the Libyan army rapists seeking asylum quoting their crimes as one of the reasons to avoid deportation. It is beyond a joke...
How on Earth do you jump from that scenario to that conclusion?
Where do you draw the line? Should a pensioner doing 14 days for not paying council tax be not allowed to vote?
probably not in council elections
I would argue they should not be in prison and I cant imagine there are may of them. Im afraid you cant pick and choose so I would say you forfeit the right if you are incarcerated.
So the NHS is running at a ridiculous loss...
Sadly, is it time that some stuff that is currently free stops being free? Should the NHS be free for everyone regardless of wealth/health/age?
Sadly, is it time that some stuff that is currently free stops being free? Should the NHS be free for everyone regardless of wealth/health/age?
The NHS has always been a bottomless pit of money and no matter how much is thrown at it it will always remain so.
Over here it costs €50 to see a GP, but we can claim tax relief on that fee. Those over the age of 70 have a Medical Card irrespective of income which is right, that enables free medical care. If you go to A&E that is €100 and so on. Medical Insurance is available that will pay for most procedures in most public and private hospitals, costs around €260 per month depending on size of family and level of cover required.
The days of free treatment for all comes from a different era and should be viewed as such, these days some payment for services should be the norm.....
Am I understanding this correctly? You don't get free health care treatment at the point of entry?
We pay to see the doctor here
Hospitals are free
I had an operation on my back done privatly for 17 grand
Would have been a long wait otherwise
I pay 1500 per year for insurance
Company pays about 3500
It should be made tax deductible
Is it still true that about 10% of all free gp visits are missed
Hospitals are free
I had an operation on my back done privatly for 17 grand
Would have been a long wait otherwise
I pay 1500 per year for insurance
Company pays about 3500
It should be made tax deductible
Is it still true that about 10% of all free gp visits are missed
What was 'different' about that different era was that we then had a consensus that the 'mixed economy' was the best type of system. If there was not enough money coming in through taxation then the health system could be subsidised from other industries which were making a profit. That has all gone, unfortunately, I would dearly love to see a situation in which the 'state' sector had those resources again. In Germany I pay just under € 400 per month for my health insurance (If I'm a good boy and don't claim on it then I get some of it back in a rebate every year). The reason why health insurances are very high in Germany is because the government leaves it to the pharmaceutical companies (like Bayer) to regulate their own prices.
As somebody who works in the Pharma industry I can categorically say that that is bollocks Cologne. The German Pharma pricing system has become in the last few years one of the toughest in Europe, which is already the toughest region in the world. And besides drug costs are at most 15% of overall health care costs, the majority of which is staff and buildings.
The crisis in healthcare funding is worldwide. In the case of pharmaceuticals the rest of the world should be very grateful that the prices achievable in the U.S. effectively subsidise everyone else.
The UK in fact has the most cost effective health care system in the developed world ie as a % of GDP it's cheap. We also have shut outcomes for many diseases.
No 'bollocks' was intended sb. German drug manufacturers were introducing new drugs onto the market in the knowledge that they would be reimbursed by insurances - these medicines being in no way an improvement on existing ones. The results being increases in prices - spending on prescripted drugs in Germany rose by 6.03 % in 2009 alone. Now, they must be able to prove the superiority of new drugs before the insurances will cover for them - but, as I said, the whole thing is not regulated by price setting by the government (as, I think, the situation is in France). There are also so many cases of GPs here who have prescribed drugs which were unnecessary because they themselves have deals going with the producers.
Apologies Cologne, the 'bollocks' was a little strong. You hit a nerve because this really is my job (pricing, reimbursement and access for my company's products worldwide) and your statement was true of the past but definitely not now.
The AMNOG process in Germany (like the Transparency and Economic Committee process in France, AIFA in Italy and now, with 'Patient Access Schemes' NICE in the UK) is ultimately a price setting approach (it's called a negotiation but doesn't feel like one). In the past you are absolutely right, Germany and the US (and to a lesser extent the UK) were the only places where the pharma industry had free pricing, and Germany and the US the only places where you could put prices up over time. But no longer, now you can put something on the market after it has got through European regulation (which covers safety and efficacy) at your hoped for price for one year before AMNOG review/negotiation, which may drag the price down to generic levels if AMNOG do not deem it 'innovative' enough.It's a system choice. I have no problem with the concept, it's fair and sensible although stunningly bureacratic (I have heard of submissions of hundreds of thousands of pages) and can be really expensive if it needs new trials to take into account the sometimes strange choices taken in Germany regarding what the true comparator drugs are. And ultimately it will mean that some products are never made available in Germany (as happens now in the UK).
Unnecessary prescribing of drugs and 'deals' between manufacturers and prescribers (i.e. doctors) are illegal from both sides, as is any hint of promoting a drug for use in a disease it has not been tested on. Any US company doing that runs the risk of being fined billions of dollars (it has happened), no matter where in the world it happened. It's not worth it. There is bad and illegal practice in this industry and I have highlighted a couple of examples in the past on the 'Conspiracy' thread.
The reason pharma prices are being targeted is that it is easy to target them, and politically popular, rather than address the core issues of service configuration which every country needs to. We have just gone through a period when an unprecedented number of expensive drugs have lost patent protection, meaning cheap(er) generic versions of these products are available, but many health systems are really poor at switching from the expensive branded versions (which the big pharma companies actually want them to do, as it should free up budget for spending on new drugs). Even so, 70% at least of spending on drugs in most western countries is on generics, so in effect AMNOG and their counterparts are targeting 30% of the overall max 15% total healthcare spend on drugs.
And finally (apologies to all for the tedium and technicality of this post) it is sometimes right to spend more on drugs. A competitor last year launched a treatment for hepatitis C. It's actually a cure (a vanishingly rare thing) It costs about $80k per patient in the US. But it is cost effective -i.e. it saves a lot more than that in the costs of hospital treatment that would be incurred without it.
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