How the NHS works, if you are powerful

Our beloved Prime Minister, Tony Blair, has just undergone a minor operation in a NHS hospital for a heart murmur. Of course, I am pleased that it seems to have gone well and that he is likely to make a full and speedy recovery (if what we are being told by the Downing Street propaganda machine is accurate). However, it is interesting to note just how quickly Tony has been treated, for what is essentially a non-critical complaint - again if what the propaganda machine is telling us is correct.

But what if you are not Prime Minister, but you have exactly the same medical complaint and you are exactly the same age - well, here's what happens. It's not the first time our so-called egalitarian Labour government has tried this kind of joke on the British people; I recall years ago an interview with the late Barbara Castle MP who justified her treatment in a private ward by saying "as a government minister it would obviously be inappropriate for me to be treated in a public ward". Yes, the nomenklatura still look after themselves first.