Private beds
Aside altogether from the scandalous bad manners with which she has treated the representatives of the medical profession the decision of Mrs Castle not merely to implement the Labour decision to phase out private beds in National Health Service hospitals, but to speed it up, must be deplored on the grounds that it is certain to inflict the deepest wounds on a service already staggering under the load of its obligations. In their functioning the private wings of most NHS hospitals make a net contribution to the working of the general hospital as a whole. But there is a far greater asset to be considered in the many hours beyond contract which consultants work in the service of non-paying patients. Without this work the whole tottering structure of the general hospital service would be brought to the edge of collapse and, given the envy, spite and rigidly doctrinaire attitude which the minister has adopted towards them, the consultants should not merely be forgiven for their proposal to work to rule, but praised for at last making a stand against the all-encroaching power of the socialist state.
Nor is there any way in which Mrs Castle's plan can be said to be addressed to those evils from which the NHS is suffering. The socialist concept of a medical service free at the point of use cannot, because of the infinitely escalating nature of demands for medical services be expected ever to work with anything approaching real humanity or efficiency. That the service has managed to work at all has been due to the selfless devotion over the years of many in the medical profession who have worked exceptional hours, slaved with exceptional dedication and made exceptional sacrifices for inadequate recompense. As a matter of deliberate government policy, speeded up under the influence of a handful of trade union fanatics in one or two of the big hospitals, a vital section of that dedicated community is to be forced into disillusionment and withdrawal. Mrs Castle may yet set her mark to the destruction of the NHS.
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