As Theresa May and her Cabinet scurry across the globe – with Filofaxes stashed under armpits, and consternated grins firmly embedded on faces – the panicked desperation of our representatives to find someone to play with us after Brexit is becoming ever-clearer.
Nowhere more so than today in the House of Commons, when Theresa May flat-out refused to rule out the sale of the NHS to US companies in any forthcoming trade deal with the country.
The Lib Dem leader Vince Cable asked the Prime Minister whether she could offer a guarantee that the NHS would be excluded from the scope of any trade negotiations with the US, and whether she’d made this clear to their cotton-candy President.
Theresa then lurched into action, sputtering out her usual “look”, as she regularly does when she’s about to not answer a question:
We are… er… starting the discussions with the American Administration… first of all looking at what we can do to increase trade between the US and the United Kingdom already, even before the possibility of any free trade agreement…
No, she didn’t rule it out. She didn’t rule of the sale of NHS contracts to US companies.
Indeed, after Prime Minister’s Questions she didn’t rule out the possibility once more when journalists quizzed her on her answer.
Post-#PMQs huddle, No10 refused to add to PM's words re not ruling out NHS being included in US-UK trade deal. "It's very much a hypothetical…We are at the outset of those discussions..We don't yet have an existing position"
— Paul Waugh (@paulwaugh) February 7, 2018
The omission comes after plans were revealed to adopt an American-style system of healthcare – at least in part – through the implementation of Alternative Care Organisations, was revealed.
It is yet another sign of the danger that the public services on which we rely, which are ours and were built up by our forefathers, are in.
This follows Theresa’s wanton cowardice in once again not meeting Donald Trump’s boorishness when he tweeted that the NHS is broken and not working.
The Democrats are pushing for Universal HealthCare while thousands of people are marching in the UK because their U system is going broke and not working. Dems want to greatly raise taxes for really bad and non-personal medical care. No thanks!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 5, 2018
This is the latest hint at the mess into which Brexit is turning. Far from hoisting the Union jack from the barricades and riding a roaring lion into a colonial sunset, it seems it’s reduced our leaders to a band of begging bureaucrats.
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