""NHS "reforms" under fire from pretty well everyone - spending £2.5 billion to save £2 billion and leave healthcare at the mercy of the market hardly looks like sense.""

New Labour less than transparently sanctioned the purchase of private services by the NHS, at a 14% premium.

No comment from anyone.

Tories openly plan to do the same, but only on the understanding that those services are cheaper than in house.

Fury from all directions.

To save Richard the trouble, a news item on BBC Breakfast News today revealed that the NHS have been purchasing the services of private ambulance companies to move patients.

Of course the NHS has been doing that for the last three years.

As for comments about noses in the trough, I recall the New Labour MPs being rather more than well represented in that as well as in actual fraud.

For every dodgy Tory, there's a dodgy New Labourite, but I don't feel the need to concoct obscene names and descriptions when mentioning the fact.

Don T.