Thought Id start this one going because its rather dead on this board at the moment and I suppose all my usual muckers are either at the Stella tennis event watching Dim Tim (lose again) or at Henly Regatta eating cucumber sandwiches (they wish,...NOT).

Anyway please feel free to just talk to yourself blast away and let it go on any company or subject you wish. Just wish Id thought of this one before.

cheers GF.

i'll let you know if i make any money :-)

Good luck if you are dabling the latest version of the great game

i'm not that brave!
however, i've been making a bit of splosh on ftse and dow shorts

Private firm wins NHS contract despite charging £7m MORE than NHS 03/01/2014

The government has awarded an £80 million NHS contract to a private firm despite the company charging taxpayers £7 million more than an NHS consortium bidding against it:

Stoke NHS hospital scanning contract won by private firm

More proof – if any more were needed – that the Lib Dem/Tory government’s mad dash to privatise eveything in its sights is a purely political aganda and nothing to do with saving taxpayers money.

The government – of course – have not said why the private firm won the contract despite its bid being more expensive.

That’s because the bidding process was – of course – secret:

“This whole process has been shrouded in secrecy. We don’t even know who – expert adviser or public representative – were on the panel.“

.

That sounds a bit fishy gf.

Do you have any more info, like what your source is?

BTW, they cant hide the figs forever, also what is the gov doing awarding contracts?

That's for the trusts concerned.

Price is not always the determining factor. When choosing suppliers, I often chose one that was more expensive. It could well be that there are reasons to believe that the chosen supplier would provide a better service than the NHS one.

The wording implies tech stuff, how would a nhs consortium be able to compete?

This is old news from 8 December. The lefty blogs have just started to moan about it.

The NHS bid involved staff trained by the company who won the bid and also currently run the service. The company have run the service since November 2013 and will continue to use the NHS staff. It is clear that the bid winners have far more expertise than the NHS bidders. It looks like a lot of fuss about nothing.

So why the secrecy?

I wonder to whom those hands belong to?

I don't think there is any secrecy. It is a fiction dreamed up by activists.

A trust spokesman said: “The procurement process is still active and until completed we are unable to provide any information.”

And an Alliance spokesman added: “Until any standstill period is over we will be unable to provide any further information.”

Of course there is secrecy. Stop talking rot Hays.

Its a cover up by the sleazy Tories once again.

Ask yourself why do they have 3 times more money to fight the election with?????

Because they are selling OUR services off to THERE CHUMS and getting preferential treatment. (back handers to you and me)

They have 3 times more money because the people with brains in this country realise that the Labour party are not worth investing in. Simples.

By Telegraph View
6:35AM GMT 06 Jan 2015
The Tories have promised to tackle the astonishing payouts awarded to some public sector workers - and it's about time, too.

The public services need to attract talent, and may well have to provide competitive salaries and benefits as a result. But when people are being paid out of the taxpayers’ pocket, they should not expect to live like King Midas.

Yet when it comes to redundancy payments, some public servants have been doing exactly that. The largest sums involved are astonishing. Mark Byford, the BBC’s former deputy director-general, got £949,000 when he left; Caroline Thomson, the corporation’s former chief operating officer, got £670,000. In the NHS, Karen Straughair, the former chief executive of the South of Tyne and Wear Trust, got £605,000 when it was wound up; Jayne Brown, the former chief executive of the North Yorkshire and York one, got £414,000.

The Conservatives have let it be known that if they form a government after the May election, they will cap such payouts at £95,000. The party calculates that had such a policy been in place in 2011/12, more than £125 million would have been saved. Not only is this a fiscally sound idea, but it might also help restore some of the public’s faith in institutions that all too often seem to have a cavalier attitude towards spending. In today’s climate of austerity, people rightly expect value for money.

Just before the last election, David Cameron tried to strike a bargain with the public sector. He said that he would reduce bureaucracy and give its staff greater autonomy if, in exchange, they would give their “help in solving Labour’s debt crisis by keeping the cost of public sector pay only as high as the country can responsibly afford”. This is a perfectly reasonable thing to ask and ought to be universally welcomed. Good government in the 21st century must be competent, compassionate – and prudent.

"Because they are selling OUR services off to THERE CHUMS and getting preferential treatment. (back handers to you and me)"... Oh no not again surely, old habits and all that -):

How many "administrators" of the NHS under the given have had "compensation packages" of over £100000 and rehired by this government.

Just rehiring their condoms, sorry mates.

I hope the gravy trains come to the stops in March.

And I hope there is an investigation into contracts handed out by the present No 10 comedy act.

4 years of "you fill my hands and I will fill yours".

Good old tory politics.