The current mantra, constantly chanted, is that private
enterprise is more efficient and better than services provided by the state
sector.
As a result, newspapers and politicians who are all thinking
about the potential profits they can make, are demanding more and more NHS
services should be provided by profit making companies rather than ourselves
(the state).
Whatever – we pay anyway; it’s just that if it’s a company we
pay for the fat profits on top.
Remember SERCO? They are a massive multinational company who
started by providing security services and now do anything and everything.
They are also fraudsters – their electronic tagging of people
on bail or on community sentences turned out to be billing us for people in
prison and the dead. The Police are currently investigating.
They also had a go at health services – failing to provide
G.P. cover in Cornwall and getting exposed by Margaret Hodge in Parliament.
Meanwhile here is my award for the ‘2013 Bernie Madoff award
for Creative Public Relations’ -
"The
services we deliver in Cornwall and Braintree are no longer core to the future
delivery of our healthcare strategy."
Here’s the article in full and well done to The Guardian for
breaking the story in the first place;
.
The
Guardian
Sean Farrell
The Guardian, Friday 13 December 2013 14.29
GMT
Serco has
agreed to the early termination of its contract for out-of-hours GP services in
Cornwall after the company left the county short of doctors.
The
embattled outsourcing company also said it would stop running Braintree hospital
in Essex as it pulls out of managing GP services and large hospitals. It
follows a review of Serco's healthcare operations.
On Thursday
the company, along with G4S, was forced to hand over its electronic tagging
contracts to rival Capita following fraud allegations over the way they charged
the government.
Serco said
the Cornwall and Braintree contracts and a loss-making agreement for community
healthcare in Suffolk would cost it £17m in one-off charges.
The company
said: "Serco has agreed with NHS Kernow to bring forward the end of its
contract for GP out-of-hours services in Cornwall. Serco's operation of the contract
to date has experienced some operational challenges."
A Guardian
investigation revealed in May that Serco had falsified its performance data for
the Cornwall contract when reporting to the local NHS trust so that it appeared
to meet targets that it failed to achieve.
It had won
the contract with a bid that undercut the local GP co-operative by £1.5m.
Whistleblowers later raised the alarm over safety, highlighting an occasion
when only one GP had been on duty for the county for the night.
The
revelations triggered an inquiry by the parliamentary accounts committee. The
committee said Serco's service was substandard and was highly critical of the
company's treatment of whistleblowers.
Serco's UK
boss, who appeared before the committee, left the company in November, a month
after group chief executive Chris Hyman unexpectedly quit.
Problems in
Cornwall added to the company's woes in the UK. In July the government accused
it and rival outsourcer G4S of charging to electronically tag offenders who
were in fact dead or in prison. The Cabinet Office has barred both companies
from bidding for new state contracts while it reviews their operations, and has
ordered them to clean up their businesses.
Serco said
NHS Kernow would look for another company to provide an "integrated service"
before the contract expires in May 2015. The company's agreement to run Braintree
hospital will last until December next year.
Valerie
Michie, managing director of Serco's healthcare business, said: "The services
we deliver in Cornwall and Braintree are no longer core to the future delivery
of our healthcare strategy."
A
spokeswoman for NHS Kernow said there had been problems with Serco's service but
that it had improved. Serco will continue to run community healthcare services
in Suffolk, but the business has not produced the profits it had hoped for.
Neil Harris
(a don’t stop till you drop production)
Kernow is Cornish for Cornwall.
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