Assessing relative spending needs of devolved government: the case of healthcare spending in the UK

The system used to allocate resources to the UK's devolved territories, known as the Barnett formula, takes no account of the relative expenditure needs of the territories. In this paper we investigate the prospects of developing a needs based model for allocating healthcare resources to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. We compare the method used by the National Health Service in England to allocate resources geographically within England with the method used by the NHS in Scotland to allocate resources to territorial Health Boards. By applying both approaches to the UK's devolved territories, we are able to examine similarities and differences in the two methods, and explore implications for an assessment of the relative healthcare expenditure need of each territory. The implications for the way in which revenue is distributed to Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland are discussed

What a girl’s gotta do: the labour of the biopolitical celebrity in austerity Britain

This article debunks the wide-spread view that young female celebrities, especially those who rise to fame through reality shows and other forms of media-orchestrated self-exposure, dodge ‘real’ work out of laziness, fatalism and a misguided sense of entitlement. Instead, we argue that becoming a celebrity in a neoliberal economy such as that of the United Kingdom, where austerity measures disproportionately disadvantage the young, women and the poor is not as irregular or exceptional a choice as previously thought, especially since the precariousness of celebrity earning power adheres to the current demands of the neoliberal economy on its workforce. What is more, becoming a celebrity involves different forms of labour that are best described as biopolitical, since such labour fully involves and consumes the human body and its capacities as a living organism. Weight gain and weight loss, pregnancy, physical transformation through plastic surgery, physical symptoms of emotional distress and even illness and death are all photographically documented and supplemented by extended textual commentary, usually with direct input from the celebrity, reinforcing and expanding on the visual content. As well as casting celebrity work as labour, we also maintain that the workings of celebrity should always be examined in the context of wider cultural and real economies

The Control of Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Blood Stream infections in England

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) blood stream infection (BSI) is a major healthcare burden in some but not all healthcare settings, and it is associated with 10%–20% mortality. The introduction of mandatory reporting in England of MRSA BSI in 2001 was followed in 2004 by the setting of target reductions for all National Health Service hospitals. The original national target of a 50% reduction in MRSA BSI was considered by many experts to be unattainable, and yet this goal has been far exceeded (∼80% reduction with rates still declining). The transformation from endemic to sporadic MRSA BSI involved the implementation of serial national infection prevention directives, and the deployment of expert improvement teams in organizations failed to meet their improvement trajectory targets. We describe and appraise the components of the major public health infection prevention campaign that yielded major reductions in MRSA infection. There are important lessons and opportunities for other healthcare systems where MRSA infection remains endemic

Demand-led programmes: challenging labour market inequalities or reinforcing them?

Demand-led programmes have been a key feature of US welfare-to-work and are being enthusiastically embraced by UK policymakers. The author, drawing upon findings emerging from the evaluation of the New Deal Innovation Fund (round three), discusses the extent to which such interventions are capable of meeting the needs of disadvantaged groups. The key findings are that pilots are primarily benefiting groups closest to the labour market and need to engage community-based organisations if they are to become more inclusive. Yet the risk remains that in using the hiring requirements of employers as a basic standard of job readiness such interventions may legitimate discriminatory behaviour which is a significant cause of the inequalities that some groups face in the labour market.</p