6 Comments

• Eddie Sammon 8th Oct '14 - 7:39pm

  The people who see Norman’s work seem to take notice. These are all the good things I see:

  1. Honest, he doesn’t seem to like spin.
  2. Hard worker. Masters his brief and gets things done.
  3. Correct principles. Pragmatic, yet idealistic.
  4. Isn’t seen to be too close to the Tories or Labour and is popular within the party…

• Stephen Donnelly 8th Oct '14 - 9:30pm

  Eddie you are a little naive.

  The commitment to mental health is very good. On the other hand it is also raw politics with plenty of top spin.

  None of the political parties are being honest about the way that we will tackle the £30 billion funding gap in the NHS caused by an ageing population, and the increasing cost of health care. All three main parties have therefore focused on some other issue at their conference, and made commitments that do not meet the expected cost.

  The Lansley changes, which we enabled, have paved the way for wide scale reconfiguring of the health service after the election. Services will be lost. Hospitals may close. There will be little local accountability. The savings from these changes may square the financial circle, but none of the political parties are being honest with the electorate about the challenges ahead.

  I do not agree with your over the top praise of our spokesman on the subject, whilst accepting that he has a real commitment to mental health, I hoped for more from Liberals in government.

• M Harvey 8th Oct '14 - 9:31pm

  In agreement with your findings Eddie.

• M Harvey 8th Oct '14 - 9:38pm

  “None of the political parties are being honest about the way that we will tackle the £30 billion funding gap in the NHS caused by an ageing population, and the increasing cost of health care.” Actually, mental health problems are more likely to cause further physical problems down the line. One of the biggest known causes of cancer is stress. The brain functions the body not the other way around. Cause the head less problem and the body is most likely to follow.. it is the human condition. Oh and guess what the burden of the pysical health is lessened in the longer term which equals.. less money needed for the NHS!!!

• Eddie Sammon 8th Oct '14 - 10:57pm

  Hi Stephen, I understand it is raw politics too, which is partly why I like it so much :). I’ve never felt it was a good idea to have a top-down market orientated re-organisation of health and education, but ministers have to work with what they are given.

  I understand there are funding concerns about this, but I’m also skeptical about talk of an “aging population”. Getting rising graphs and extrapolating them in a straight line going upwards is a favourite tactic of lobbyists.

  We probably won’t agree, but we don’t have to. 🙂

• Allan 9th Oct '14 - 6:50pm

  I watched Norman on the daily politics show with Andrew Neil he was extremely good full marks for his presentation and humility what a refreshing change from a politician

  Full marks Norman