Thursday, April 23, 2009

Quote of the day

Mark Harper, (Shadow Minister, Work & Pensions; Conservative MP for the Forest of Dean):
Devolution has created differences in the health care available in England and Wales. I shall not go into issues of devolution itself, but I shall argue that the Government have failed to think through how to implement devolution properly and the effect of that on constituents such as mine regarding health care.

As a result of devolution, there is no national health service any more. We have health services in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland that have different policies, which, in the English and Welsh services, are decided by English and Welsh Health Ministers. The 8,000 constituents whom I have mentioned are effectively forced to use health services over which they have no democratic control because they cannot influence the policies of the Welsh Assembly Government and they have no vote in Wales. I do not think it is right that they are forced to use some of those services, and that is primarily what I want to address.

Read the rest of his speech here.

No comments: