Aneurin Bevan Research Paper

The NHS began in 1948 as a result of an act of Parliament in 1946, under the guidance of Aneurin Bevan, then a Minister of the incumbent Labour Government, and in response to the Beveridge Report on The Welfare State of 1942. Most hospitals in the UK had previously been operated as non-profit making concerns. About two-thirds of them had been run by Local Authorities (the bodies also responsible for local Fire Services, Schools, Roads etc), with about one third of them run independently as Voluntary Hospitals. With the NHS act, these were all compulsorily acquired and subsequently administered by the State, and all treatments became universally available at no cost at the point of provision, the

“Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in healthcare is the most shocking and inhumane” –Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The report lead to the creation of the Welfare State that includes the National Health Services (NHS). The Beveridge report was not fully implemented by the coalition government until after the general election of 1945 that gave victory to the Labour party. The new prime minister, Clement Attlee, announced he would introduce the welfare state outlined in the 1942 Beveridge Report. The report include the establishment of a National Health Service in 1948 with free medical treatment for all. A national system of benefits was also introduced to provide 'social security' so that the population would be protected from the 'cradle to the grave'. The new system was partly built on the national insurance scheme set up by Lloyd George in 1911. People in work still had to make contributions each week, as did employers, but the benefits provided were now much greater (Bbc.co.uk, 2016).

The National Health System began in 1948 with the aim to provide free health care for the English thus removing health access inequities. This essay considers two strengths of the NHS, being free health and locally responsive health care and two weaknesses being the financial burden and unprecedented pressure on health care resources.

In 1928, a national health insurance scheme was proposed but not implemented because it would have required businesses to provide contributions to health insurance for their employees (Evolution of Government Involvement in Health Care, n.d). Another national health insurance scheme was proposed in 1938 but it was also rejected (Evolution of Government Involvement in Health Care, n.d; Hilless & Healy, 2001). The next proposal was the 1945 Pharmaceuticals Benefits Act. This Act was not implemented because the Australian Medical Association challenged it in the High Court of Australia and it was decided that parliament had “exceeded its constitutional power” (Hilless & Healy, 2001). In 1946, under the Hospital Benefits Act, the Commonwealth began to subsidise public hospitals under the condition that patients would not be charged (Evolution of Government Involvement in Health Care, n.d; Hilless & Healy, 2001). This act is similar to the current Medicare system.

The NHS came around in July 5, 1948. The Health Minister Aneurin (also known as Nye) Bevan purely nationalised the existing system across the UK. The groundbreaking change was to make all services freely available to everyone. Half of Scotland’s landmass was already covered by a state-funded health system serving the entire community and directly run from Edinburgh. Additionally, the war years had seen a state-funded hospital building programme in Scotland on a scale unknown in Europe. This was combined into the new NHS. Scotland also had its own individual medical tradition, this is centred on its medical schools rather than private practice. The legislation that empowered the UK to have the NHS is National Health Service Act (1948), this despite opposition from doctors, who maintained on the right to continue treating some patients privately. The NHS ensured that Doctors, hospital, dentists, opticians, ambulances, midwives and health visitors were available, free to everybody. This Reason why we have health services is because it developments a view that health care was a right, not something given unreliably by charity, also two-party’s agreement that the existing services were in a mess and had to be sorted out, it stopped financial difficulties for the voluntary hospitals and After the second world war it ensured the creation of an emergency medical service as part of the war effort

This essay will examine how the development of the Welfare State and the NHS changed the lives of the people of Britain since its introduction in 1948. To enable me to do so, I will analyse and evaluate the key relevant aspects that happened during that period.

Later, findings from a series of reports including report from Royal commission on National Health Insurance in 1926; The Sankey Commission on Voluntary Hospitals in 1937; and reports from British Medical Association (BMA) in 1930 and 1938, all collectively indicated that inadequacy existed in the pattern of the services (Christopher, 2004; Webster, 2002). Evident were reports of conflicting care and duplication of work between the municipal and voluntary hospitals (Wheeler & Grice, 2000). Additionally, world war had a huge impact on the health services and the conditions in which hospitals, theatres, radiology and pathology department operated was very poor. Thus, no machinery existed that supported running of a coordinated healthcare system, hence a need for unified, simplified and cohesive system was felt (Smith, 2007). Furthermore, Royal Commission’s report suggested that funding for the health services might benefit from general taxation rather than its basis on insurance principle (Christopher, 2004). However, it was not until the Beveridge report in 1942, which provided a huge drive and momentum for a movement of change in the health services. And within subsequent years seen were the proposals for NHS drawn through the White Paper in 1944, then in 1946 the National Health Service Act and at last in 1948 the establishment of the NHS

Beveridge believed there were 5 Giants that were the basis for poverty and social problems in the UK. These were Want, Disease, Squalor, Ignorance and Idleness. During the wars in the UK people were unable to take care of themselves if they had any physical illnesses. There was very little money and any extra money that was found was not enough to cover those who were supposed to benefit from it, they had to spend in on food to survive. Poor people were criticized for smoking and drinking but poor people looked at is a something to look forward to as they had no other pleasures. "Needs become stronger the longer they are denied" (Maslow - Psychologist) People were trapped in low paid jobs unable to leave for training to progress as leaving would

Before the National Health Service (NHS) came into force in 1948, there was the Poor Law which was introduced in 1601 and was paid for by imposing property taxes. In 1834 the Poor Law Amendment Act was brought in and was designed to reduce the cost of looking after the poor, and to encourage poor people to work. In 1942 Sir William Beveridge unveiled the Welfare Foundations, the plan offered care to all from birth through to death. The NHS was established as a result of the 1944 White Paper. The 1946 NHS Act came into effect on the 5th July 1948, and was founded by Health Secretary Aneurin Bevan. 1962 saw the publication of the Porritt Report, which raised concerns about the NHS being separated into three parts – hospitals, general practices and local health authorities. Enoch Powell’s 1962 Hospital Plan approves the development of district general

The NHS has grown to become the world’s largest publicly funded health service system since 1948(Nhs.uk, 2015).There are many issues and disputes in NHS. Nowadays,some people believe that the NHS should be abolished or privatized,because it can solve many issues with NHS.This essay agree that the NHS should not be abolished or privatized.

The Secretary of State for Health, Andrew Lansley, has set out the government’s plans to reform the NHS in England. The plans, documented in a new white paper entitled ‘Equity and Excellence: Liberating the NHS’, state that more power will be given to patients and professionals in the design and delivery of health and social care. This briefing outlines a summary of the key reforms. Please note, some terms which require further clarification are explained in a glossary at the end of this document. The white paper focuses on four key areas: 1. 2. 3. 4. Putting patients and the public first Improving healthcare outcomes Autonomy, accountability and democratic

The writer of the article, Jim Mcllroy, is a member of the political party Socialist Alliance, and has a different view on the selling of the Medibank Private that set the tone of the article. The Medibank Private will be privatised within the next financial year upon an agreement among the state treasurers and Joe Hockey, the current federal treasurer. In return the states will be given a fund consisting of 15% share of the sale to invest in new infrastructure projects. The author claims that this fund is a mere trick to cover up the fact that Medibank Private will be sold off to profit-seeking multinational companies. As such, welfare could also be affected due to such companies looking for profitable customers instead of providing services for the whole society; only the rich could afford better health care. This is already happening in the expensive US health care system, whose health care costs are 18% of GDP as compared to 9% in Australia. It should be pointed out that the former Liberal Prime Minister, Malcolm Fraser, who advocated abolishing the original publicly owned Medibank universal health system, was also against the sale of Medibank Private in 2006. He believes that the government could rein in the costs and provide a better outcome than if the Medibank is in the hand of private firms. Furthermore, the government also intends to propose a co-payment scheme for every GP or emergency department visit to fund Medicare. However, this is strongly repudiated by the

In 2000, an effort was made by the UK government to resolve certain inequalities that had developed within the NHS by releasing the “NHS Plan of 2000.” This plan greatly increased spending on employee pay, infrastructure, and access to services. Despite almost doubling spending in a ten year period,

Daly’s paper; The curse of the Irish Hospitals’ Sweepstake: A hospital system, not a health system. Daly argues in this paper that the Irish health service has been moulded by historical forces, some of which are now forgotten, even though their legacy is evident in Ireland’s health service today and in current policy debates. These forces include the Irish hospital sweepstake, Catholic social teaching and the principle of subsidiarity, and political patronage. (Daly, 2012) The other noteworthy characteristic of Irish hospitals at this time is that they tended to be small. A report published in 1970 described the Irish hospital system as ‘one of a large number of small institutions scattered throughout the country’. This statement was an understatement, at the time a total of 169 hospitals provided medical, surgical and maternity services. Only three hospitals, all in Dublin, had more than 300