Can Gerry Robinson fix the NHS?

You can't name a programme that and then say "Er, no".

You can imagine the programme proposal, can't you?  You can imagine the memo to the commissioning editor saying: "We hope that Mr Robinson will find some ways to make the NHS better. It is quite likely, unfortunately, that he will be unable to do so. But  will you give us a big budget to make the programme, just in case we find that he can."

So it was always inevitable that the programme would be edited to make it appear as if Mr Robinson had found some sort of way forward.

Chris Dillow suggests that the solution they proposed resulted from the BBC's "managerialist ideology". I think it arose from a journalistic requirement to find some solution.  There they were, sitting in a circle and someone said: "Mmmm, let me think, let me think. I know!  What if the problem Gerry found was that they needed more people like Gerry? Yes that's it. Brilliant."

I agree, however, with Chris, about the real problem - structure and incentives. How can a nationalised industry with no competition, no prices and no consumers possibly work efficiently?

Comments

[Jim Symcox]

I've already commented on Sir Gerry's labour of Hercules at The NHS on my own blog.

I worked in the NHS for 12 months, it seemed like 5 years forced labour.

The one aspect I missed from my comments was that almost everyone I met in the NHS believed they were doing the best they could.

I'd come from dirty commerce and it was immediately clear that in the NHS you had lots of chiefs and reporting structures and little real responsibility or authority.

And budgets? They had to be spent up to the amount you'd calculated or you'd have less the following year - talk about encouraging inefficient (and costly) behaviour.

[Allan Bradford]

Now Gerry Robinson has fixed the NHS, please can he fix the railways and educashun?

[Brian Willis]

I enjoyed the program and I think it demonstrates that there would need to an least one Gerry Robinson's in each Trust across the country to make a significant difference.
I have been working in the NHS for four years having worked in the private sector for over 40 and have realised that more teamwork coupled with a can do attitude is needed. One person alone can make very little differnce, but I haven't given up yet.