Comments on: John Prescott: David Cameron should ‘back or sack’ Daniel Hannan

By: Wolf Tone

Wolf Tone — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 00:46:34 +0000

Hannan appears deluded if he thinks slagging off the NHS is a vote-winner. It’s hard to find a Tory voter who doesn’t support the NHS, let alone an elector at large.

He’ll have to do better than this if he wants to stay in the limelight. Though it was a good speech he made.

By: Grytpype-thynne

Grytpype-thynne — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 12:35:46 +0000

Greg,”easy to be populist if you are extreme”.How can a policy that is popular be dubbed extreme?You talk as if Hannan has proposed slaughtering the first-born, whereas it is merely one of the Left’s sacred cows.You will be saying the NHS is the envy of the world next.
My wife and I sprang my aged mother-in-law from Hereford Hospital in October 2007.The female Geriatric Ward was placed at the rear of the hospital, in what had been condemned accommodation,Staff were uncaring, the ward shared toilets with male geriatric,the ward was dirty, patients’ pleas for assistance ignored and the nice shiny facade of the hospital, intended to make it look like a total rebuild, was occupied by Finance and Management.Behind the facade, the place was decrepit gloomy

By: Tom

Tom — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 09:51:20 +0000

Letters from a Tory: If you think he is just a “footnote” why has Party Chairman Eric Pickles announced that he would be inviting Daniel Hannan to give a keynote speech at the Conservative Spring Forum in Cheltenham, 25-26 April:

http://conservativehome.blogs.com/torydiary/2009/04/dan-hannan-to-address-spring-forum.html

By: Letters From A Tory

Letters From A Tory — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 08:50:13 +0000

Hannan is one bloke in the European Parliament who is totally unable to influence party policy. When it comes to Cameron’s political agenda, Hannan is at best a footnote. His attack on Gordon Brown was a one-off little showpiece and, while I enjoyed it immensely, it doesn’t make him any more important in terms of where the Conservative Party in the UK are heading.

By: Angelina

Angelina — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 08:12:36 +0000

Because the NHS is now over 60 years old we have come the take it for granted. In recent years I have had a number of friends and family require hospital treatment. Upon visiting them I am amazed at the equipment that we now have to treat people. I am also aware that without modern medicine which is free at the point of use that some of the women who are closest to me and thier babies would have been lost during childbirth. We now take for granted that if someone has an accident that they are taken to hospital and treated. My Granddad told me a horrific story of when he was growing up in the 1930′s of a neighbour who had an accident working for a local oil refinery where he got badly burnt. This gentleman was not taken to hospital and was left to die of gangrene. When I asked why he had not been taken to hospital he replied that people weren’t back then. The people who wish to do away with our National Health Service seem to think that they will never have an accident or long term illness and that they will always be fortunate enough to be in a well paid job.

By: Grytpype-thynne

Grytpype-thynne — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 22:08:50 +0000

The last few posts have seen the left (Derek Draper?) rallying to a hopeless cause.They even attempt to parody Frank Field, a labour MP who was appointed to “think the unthinkable” by Blair, did so and was sacked, along with his cypher “boss” Harriet Harman, who never thought at all

By: Nick

Nick — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 21:10:30 +0000

The problem is with hospitals like Stafford. With 400-1800 deaths due to errors at one hospital, its gets very hard to defend the NHS.

By: Depressed

Depressed — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 20:28:04 +0000

If and when David Cameron becomes PM I think we can confidently predict his government will be the most right wing since the war. They plan to slash spending, they fete people like Redwood and Hannan, they will engage in a head on collision course with the EU.

Don’t let anyone say they weren’t warned.

By: Greg

Greg — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 16:08:28 +0000

Hannan is pretty good evidence that it’s easy to be populist if you’re extreme. The reason his attack on the Prime Minister went viral was that it went beyond social norms. Video of someone looking someone else in the face and laying into him is highly appealing if you happen to agree with the layer-in, but is not conducive to substantive debate and not normally considered acceptable in social situations. Let’s face it, most videos which get to the top of youtube are not great debate – but kittens, sex, skateboards, people breaking the law, etc. Hannan was similarly popular not because he was right but because he was unusually rude – right in someone’s face.
It’s his self-same lack of acceptance of social norms which meant that he made such a crass statement about the beloved NHS.
I suspect that, like his previous speech, it also speaks to what’s going on in the minds of many Tories. That’s why Cameron needs to repudiate it quickly. All the more so because Hannan is widely being talked about as a future Tory leader (and more popular with Tory grassroots than Cameron).
It’s not a clause IV moment (they’ve still got that to come) – but it is a showdown between Cameron and the Party traditionalist. It’s a moment to find if Cameron’s got modernising substance or whether he is all glossy PR spin.

By: Frank Owen and his Paint Brush

Frank Owen and his Paint Brush — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 15:57:44 +0000

We’ve written an open letter to Hannan – his views on the NHS aren’t just immoral, they’re economically illiterate too.

http://frankowenspaintbrush.wordpress.com/2009/04/06/making-me-iller-an-open-letter-to-daniel-hannan/