markyh

Then introduce a NHS tax. 100% legally ringfenced only for the NHS and additional to the money they get from NI (or reduce NI to compensate, but the overall effect is we pay more). I would still rather pay and extra , say £50 pcm net more tax from both me and the wife for the NHS direct, than have it go private. Unfortunately in my belief only taxpayers like my family who are not eligible for any tax credits or benefits, are the only net payers of tax and support everyone else, it would be mostly down to us to shoulder the burden of the NHS. But in return I would want a citizens only Photograph ID type NHS card, not a Citizen, pay up, credit card, or provide insurance details or that tax card visa stamp foreigners have to pay for, or no treatment. Only A&E depts would be excluded for life threatening situations.

Still don't think they could manage it. It would take one election pledge from Labour to restore the NHS to full public and reform all tories laws on this, I have voted tory for 32 years now, but if they did this next GE I would immediately vote Labour.

For aheadofthecurve. Watch this, have a think, then as someone who cant afford private healthcare (mostly essentially almost non profit) in the UK, really tell me you want this for you and your family in the UK? 12 years old and still 90% accurate despite obahmacare. so many things you as a brit will take for granted. This is what you will get if you give up universal healthcare for private for profit healthcare, whichever way it's paid for, and the worlds best systems are like ours, singlepay.

It's a documentary on how the American poor are screwed over by their private for profit healthcare system! The NHS, Canadian and French healthcare systems are all in it as better & fairer ways to do it, all "socialist" systems. Your ideal system is fantasyland. A for profits system would not compete to drive down prices and increase service, they would collude, bribe government to pass laws in their favour, to ensure you pay as much as possible for as little treatment as possible, as that makes them the most profit. You want to pay 500% more for simple Asthma drugs every month because capped perscriptions costs don't exist in your private for profit healthcare system, your ill health is a machine to make the shareholders money, the laws they get passed stop you legally getting cheap drugs, bring them in from Ireland say, and you are arrested if you get caught with them and thrown in jail. Crazy, I guess you don't own a house with six figure equity or major investments to sell to cover serious ill health, and you want a private for profit healthcare system? You are terribly naïve my friend. I hope you Niece gets 100% better but I would worry for you if the UK healthcare system ever went private. For example, I have high blood pressure and early arthritis in one knee, I have 4 perscriptions of tablets every month, 3 different blood pressure drugs and naproxen for the knee. NHS perscriptions costs would mean £34.40 pcm but as its "socialist" I pay £8.shpcm for an annual PPC card and can have as many prescribed drugs as I wish. Under a pure for profit rigged private system, probably £200pcm. Don't believe me, find a USA citizen who can afford insurance how much their monthly drugs are over the counter. You will wince. Trust me older and wiser, what we pay in NI even if all of it was for the NHS is very very good value. Plus the less you earn, the less you pay, not earning, you don't have to pay. You will just become a walking ATM for a Private healthcare system, and when you cant pay, they will let to rot. But you have the right to disagree. Why not move to the USA for 5 years try it out, see how you get on if you get sick. A flight home may be cheaper than a hospital visit!

You really need to watch Sicko to see how the poorer are treated in a for profit healthcare system; you niece would be treat up to the limit of your policys wirth then left to die when they cant get anymore money out of you. And in the UK if you cant afford private healthcare on top of NHS you are in the poorer camp i'm afraid. You would have absolutely no chance in a PAYG healthcare system, one bought of cancer would bankrupt your family.

Then take her private, your family has that choice, like I said all my family is covered by private healthcare as well as the NHS, unlike the USA we have that choice in the UK. The ultimate choice between speed and cost. You choose your own route.

British Red Cross seem to have lots of Doctors and healthcare professionals, they are non profit organisation. But I guess their Doctors are all miserable after all their training working for non profit. If you ever have your way I hope you are willing to pay for any of your extended familys healthcare costs when they cant afford for profit premiums or hospitals bills and are told to bugger of home and die. Same with the EU Remainers. I wish them luck when the EU forces the UK to join the Euro Army for fight the Chinese on African soil, and in 10 years time your now primary school kids who are over 18 are drafted under a lottery from the new EU Drafting Law and forced to die fighting for the Germans to have access to resources the Chinese control and wont share.

Healthcare should be Non Profit, meaning any small profits made are legally reinvested in the company to benefit the customers not pay dividends or bonuses to owners or shareholders, because the endgame of for profit Healthcare is denial of treatment to patients, take their money but find excuses to treat them until they die. Just watch the 2007 film "Sicko".

You can pay skilled people high wages and still operate not for profit, the NHS does, BUPA is a good example of a healthcare company with now shareholders that reinvests any profits into looking after it customers.

Healthcare should never be "for profit" , because at its most basic when you get as efficient as you ever can the only way you can then make a profit is to find reasons to deny treating people. Watch Micheal Moores 2007 film "Sicko" for the mess that is the USA with a for profit shareholder based healthcare system. No thanks. If we ever had private healthcare their must be a law passed saying all Private UK healthcare providers must be "Non-Profit" organisations that are overseen and regulated by a Government body , something like "OfHealth"". I don't see what is wrong with the system now, we all have free , high quality 1st world healthcare for part of out NI payment that no one misses as it's PAYE. The poor who don't work are taken car of via the money paid in by the working. If you cant pay, slow but eventual is far far better than either "never" denied, due to cost, or constant delays and stalling to approving knowing you will die before your claim needs to be paid out on like in the USA. And like my Family, if you want choices and que jumping you pay for an additional private healthcare plan for you or your family and get treat asap privately. I don't want to get to retirement age knowing one major costly treatable health problem could bankrupt me as the health system will make me pay due to a policy £ Ceiling payout amount.

I imagine loads of FTB would take on their new HTB mortgages @ 3.375% if it was a 30 year fix. Where is the risk apart from loss of job. If you can make the payments any inflation in wages just makes your life easier and easier. Last year I took a 5 year fix @ 2.3% 2 months before the BOE IR rise. Had I not my previously cheaper tracker rates would have cost me £30pcm more than my new fixed rate, which was on a £15 pcm increase. But you try getting a cheap rate on a 10 year fix in the UK, and I don't believe a 30 year fix exists? I have never seem one and if a specialist broker can do one it will be nowhere near 3.37%. I'm not sure how the penaltys for early exit apply on 30 year USA fixes but if they are the same as my 5 year fix god al mighty it would be expense to finish a mortgage early. They must all be fully portable?

She has hit me in anger a few times in our 17 years together and each time I hit her back harder, once flooring her. That was 2013, she has not tried it since. I never understand these men bullied physically by partners, man or woman, you attack me and i will hurt you more. But I rarely start anything physical.

She could have a divorce whenever she wants one, A) she earns more than me and has a final salary pension, I will be kept as I am accustomed, after I change to a dossy job, and have a nice chuck on that pension cash in my old age. And I would adapt to my new lower income and she and the kids would implode into poverty within 2 years, house would have to be sold as she would be 45% short on the monthly running costs budget without my input and budgeting. I would fight her to the point of bankrupting her for my share of the house equity and it would destroy her to move into a 2 bed ex-council house surrounded with the people I grew up with. She knows which way her bread is buttered, she willing pays her wages into my account, and she cars not what any bill costs, just when she gets het next £500 monthly "pocketmoney" allowance on her PAYG Monzo credit card for hair, makeup and her socialising money. she can be good though, has just surprised me with a trip for us to Venice to three days for my birthday (somewhere SHE has always wanted to go, hmmmmm, what happen to the Northern Lights trip I hinted at!!!)

Yah i'm in my 50's now, happy days. "More than £77 in every £100 of housing equity is held by the over-50s, says Savills"

What? I invested £2k in 2013/14 that is now worth £20k, and £9k of SIPP pension money in 2018 which is 40% underwater. Even combined i'm well in the black, plus pension money cant be touched for 5 years and cant be used to pay the mortgage. I am perfectly happy for it to either all go to the moon or all go to zero. As long as the mortgage is cleared for my retirement which is the term and the wife can work another 3 years until hers, all is good. Traditional model, upgrade to a bigger houses until you get "Forever House" (2 bed in town, 5 bed terraced-in town, 5 bed Detached in village ), hope you don't get divorced! , retire mortgage free with huge equity. My wife is not the don't have a summer holiday and pay of the mortgage early type, she is the "I have a final salary pension type" , lets have a holiday every year and when can we borrow more for a big extension on our tiny 200m2 house! It was a fight, and I mean real fight, crossed words and slammed doors, to get us to stay within our £1200 saved Xmas budget this year, usually we are £500-£1000 over. Frugal for her was buying a 2 year old £17k EV in 2014 to replace her BMW so save £250 petrol each month. If I wasn't money minded and tough she would bankrupt us and we would arrive at retirement having to sell the house for sure.