Published: October 10th 2011 - at 12:01 pmLeaked email shows McKinsey is still interfering at the NHS
contribution by Sarah Shoraka
Earlier this year, as MPs geared up for 2 days’ debate on the controversial NHS Bill, the management consultancy McKinsey was at the centre of a row about the role of private companies in health care provision.
Obtained documents showed McKinsey’s role in what Labour MP John Healey called a “well-worked secret plan for privatising hospitals.” They were revealed when McKinsey organised a workshop at the NHS London’s offices in December 2010.
But a leaked email I received last week, from as recently as August 2011 shows their continuing interference NHS policy on private sector involvement.
The email (below) references a McKinsey workshop on “improving core CSO [Commissioning Support Organisations] functions and to consider what functions we might want to provide, share, or outsource.”
Outsourcing has been criticized by the Royal College of General Practitioners, who say it is not compatible with patient choice.
An outraged NHS staff member comments on the leaked email:
incredible stuff in here…especially an acknowledgement the structures are wrong, they need external support to produce information (informatics team is over 30 I think, and they are busy asking us for performance information that has already been asked for by others in the cluster) How much was spent on redundancies again?
It’s OK though – there is a McKinsey workshop on the horizon.
Why would the Government spend huge sums of money on management consultants in the current climate?
McKinsey
McKinsey poses as a neutral analyst when in fact they have the power to determine public policy without taking any responsibility. In a recent US healthcare scandal, they had to release hidden data on their report when the results were diametrically opposite to most other studies.
McKinsey is used to brushing off huge scandals having recently survived an insider trading row and managing to remain untainted despite advising Enron for years.
Its influence has also spread to environmental issues, where it has repeatedly refused to release assumptions behind their advice to governments, or to put in place policies that guard against conflict of interest.
The company is accused of reducing everything to a market and a cost without factoring in essential values such as local people’s rights or biodiversity protection.
McKinsey exemplifies a culture where public policy is subsumed to the illogic of market forces without public oversight.
Like the monster that is News International and elites, this consultancy needs to be held accountable if we care about the future of life support machines like rainforests and the NHS.
—
Sarah Shoraka is a Biodiversity campaigner at Greenpeace
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Reader comments
incredible stuff in here…especially an acknowledgement the structures are wrong, they need external support to produce information (informatics team is over 30 I think, and they are busy asking us for performance information that has already been asked for by others in the cluster) How much was spent on redundancies again?
So, on the strength of that email, management in the NHS is inefficient and structural changes need to be introduced. I wonder why they instructed a management consultancy?
McKinsey poses as a neutral analyst when in fact they have the power to determine public policy without taking any responsibility.
If you mean that sentence literally, then it’s tin-foil hat time.
@1
Would that be the same management structure that the management consultants the last Tory Government brought in to restructure the NHS cooked up?
You’ve got to admit it’s a good wheeze – spend 18 years in Government paying vast quantities of public money to your mates to try to wreck the NHS from within by installing a bloated management structure at the expense of training and hiring more healthcare professionals (after all, the “management class” is far more likely to vote Tory), spend 13 years out of government attacking said bloated management structure as “wasteful”, and finally once back in power, paying the vast quantities of public money to the next generation of your mates to rework said bloated management structure.
There are exceptions, but in my experience management consultants come in two main varieties – complete charlatans from any social class and wealthy scions who haven’t been bothered to find a career actually doing anything useful. After all, management consultancy is usually just a way of finding excuses to fire people (preferably non-managers) to increase savings (in the public sector) and/or profitability/shareholder dividends/executive bonuses (in the private sector), and installing more managers to make the ones that remain “work more efficiently”, and then dressing the act of doing so up in flowery “positive thinking” language.
Yes, I did read “Smile Or Die” recently, and it was quite the eye-opener.
Would that be the same management structure that the management consultants the last Tory Government brought in to restructure the NHS cooked up?
Yes dear, all problems in the NHS are John Major’s fault. We skipped seamlessly from 1997 to 2010 without any intervening period of government.
@3
If it hadn’t been for Thathcer and Major, the NHS would have still been run by healthcare professionals and a small number of healthcare management specialists. The glut of public sector managerialism was pure Thatcherite “jobs for the boys”. The fact that it was not reduced under Blair (indeed, it was extended not because of a desire to create waste, but because the private sector was shipping more and more administrative work overseas) is immaterial.
Reactions: Twitter, blogs
- Mark Donne
My article @libcon on how McKInsey is interfering on #forests and the #NHS http://t.co/feXKjFHG
- Sarah Shoraka
@JohnnySaxophone Whether it 's #NHS or #rainforest marketisation #McKinsey and private sector are the only winners http://t.co/feXKjFHG
- Andy S
Leaked email shows McKinsey is still interfering at the #NHS http://t.co/kLkZiRil (via @libcon)
- Alex Braithwaite
Leaked email shows McKinsey is still interfering at the NHS | Liberal Conspiracy http://t.co/5orVJFXk via @libcon
- Simon Kelly
Leaked email shows McKinsey is still interfering at the NHS http://t.co/w1SQNOLm
- Georgina Lansbury
Leaked email shows McKinsey is still interfering at the NHS | Liberal Conspiracy http://t.co/5orVJFXk via @libcon
- liane gomersall
Leaked email shows McKinsey is still interfering at the NHS | Liberal Conspiracy http://t.co/bGqVTsfl via @libcon
- Mark Carrigan
Leaked email shows McKinsey is still interfering at the NHS | Liberal Conspiracy http://t.co/ANNKzOIu via @libcon
- Arun Chopra
Leaked email shows McKinsey is still interfering at the NHS | Liberal Conspiracy http://t.co/l9eThD54 via @libcon
- dinesh patel
Leaked email shows McKinsey is still interfering at the NHS | Liberal Conspiracy http://t.co/l9eThD54 via @libcon
- Sarah Shoraka
Surprise surprise #McKInsey recommending private hospitals saying they are better managed http://t.co/GdhT3ldP http://t.co/feXKjFHG
- David Ritter
Surprise surprise #McKInsey recommending private hospitals saying they are better managed http://t.co/GdhT3ldP http://t.co/feXKjFHG
- Lawrence Carter
Surprise surprise #McKInsey recommending private hospitals saying they are better managed http://t.co/GdhT3ldP http://t.co/feXKjFHG
- Sarah Shoraka
#McKinsey fail on conflict of interest over #NHS privatisation http://t.co/KoPwHe8J also a problem for #forests http://t.co/feXKjFHG
- David Ritter
#McKinsey fail on conflict of interest over #NHS privatisation http://t.co/KoPwHe8J also a problem for #forests http://t.co/feXKjFHG
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