Patsy Hewitt: beggaring belief since 1948*

In any pantheon of really, really, really thick bastards, I have no doubt that Patsy Hewitt will take the Fuckwit Award without any contention: she really is a bloody stupid woman, her priorities so out of whack as to be orbiting somewhere near Pluto. This is apt because this large asteroid has been too small to be a planet, just as Patsy's brain is too small to be described as anything other than a large ganglion.

Normally, when I haven't got around to writing about something, I just let it go; but this gem, via Samizdata, just begged to be pointed to and laughed at.

"It was deplorable," pronounced our tight-lipped Health Secretary, "that the woman hostage should be shown smoking. This sends completely the wrong message to our young people."

What the fucking fuck? Seriously, this woman is an absolute arse.

Of course, we have seen evidence of her abstemious bossy, patronising nature before, most notably when the stupid fuck wanted to punish us all for the perceived sins of a few.

A swingeing increase in tax on alcopops and other alcoholic drinks favoured by teenagers is being demanded by the health secretary, Patricia Hewitt, in an attempt to stop young people damaging their health by binge drinking.

I would loathe her for that alone, and said so in no uncertain terms at the time. Patsy herself, of course, has never smoked and "allows herself only the occasional glass of wine" (though she does have very regular bowel movements), so it is asking a little much of the Commissar to appreciate our pleasures.

So, tedious to be around though she might be, one must give her kudos for coming up with some quotes that will long outlive the odious government that she is part of (although one fears that the damage that they have wreaked on this country will not, alas, be so easily expunged): pronouncements such as the smoking one above and, of course, the ultimate 2006 classic...

The NHS is enjoying its best ever year.

This was an incredible comment since we all knew that the NHS was, as the poor, wee Greek chap so eloquently put it...

...fucked as a virgin bride. Deficits were at record levels, morale at a record low, the Stalinist bureaucracy - the 'targets' - the cack-handed attempts at reform - the whole thing was a shambles. And yet there it was, clear as day.

As regular readers will know, I have ascribed Patsy's fatuous warblings to some kind of head cancer, but I am actually willing to admit that she is just terminally stupid. And probably insane to boot.

Image: Beau Bo d'Or

How else could anyone assert, with such breathtaking chutzpah, that...

"The new system of MMC I think everybody supports..."

... and seriously think that people aren't going to take a pop at her? Dr Rant had a thing or two to say about it, that's for sure.

I mean how wrong can one ignorant, evil, stupid, loathsome, lying, bitch be?
...

But one thing we do know, many doctors don't support it, and that means that 'everyone' does not support it, which means that once again Patricia has been caught lying to the public.

Say it with me: resign, resign, resign you lying evil ugly troll.

And, of course, who can forget the fucking nightmare that is the NHS Data Spine? Wat Tyler, never one for hyperbole, today called it "The Mother Of All Juggernaut Disasters" when writing about the Public Accounts Committee report [PDF].

Stalwart PAC member Richard Bacon writes about the fiasco in today's Telegraph. He reminds us how one expert described the project to the Committee:

"It was like being in a juggernaut lorry going up the M1 and it did not really matter where you went as long as you arrived somewhere on time. Then, when you had arrived somewhere, you would go out and buy a product, but you were not quite sure what you wanted to buy. To be honest, I do not think the people selling it knew what we needed."

Such juggernauts exist all over Big Government. Ill-informed grandstanding politicos commit us to some overblown nonsense like the NPfIT or the 2012 Olympics, without having a clue how much it will cost, whether the costs make sense against the supposed benefits, or how the thing will actually be delivered. It's only once we're on the motorway we find out nobody knows how to steer, and the only way of stopping is to crash a bridge parapet.

The whole thing is a total fucking disaster on a monumental scale, and its happening under Patsy's watch. It is also salutory to remind ourselves that Scotland already has a working system that cost a mere £40 million.

Patsy did say that she would be held accountable for any budget deficit in the NHS this year, so what has happened? Services have been slashed, staff sacked (and the useful ones, not the fucking paper-pushers) and operations cancelled; and all to save Patsy's job. Truly, the NHS is "enjoying its best ever year".

Only slightly more terrifying is the prospect of Patsy's inevitable replacement, a subject on which the good Dr Crippen dwelt recently.

Who will get the "Oh f**k, not health" portfolio?

It is obvious, really. It has got to be Dave “the boy” Miliband who, despite being the worst blogger in Britain (see here) is not without ability.

Why does Dr Crippen think it is obvious?

The thought process goes like this. Gordon will need to punish Miliband for allowing the speculation about a leadership challenge to continue. Of course, Miliband has denied it more convincingly than Heselitine used to deny he was going to challenge Margaret Thatcher, and he has not yet been caught installing phone lines à la Portillo, but he is still biding his time.

He may calculate that he cannot win and decide not to challenge. But Gordon will still need to slap him down, and what better way to do that than by giving him the health job? Too important to turn down, but a political graveyard.

So, it’s Miliband for Health. You heard it here first.

For fuck's sake: Miliband?! Miliband?! Fucking hellski.

Miliband, my good doctor, is entirely without ability and furthermore is imbued with a dangerous tendency towards totalitarianism. Though it was that stupendously ugly embodiment of talentless inability, Beckett, who chose the lunatic system for the Rural Farm Payments, Batshit has still not got to grips with this fuck-up, preferring instead to fly around the world giving talks on sustainability and, with breathtaking hypocrisy, criticising our future monarch for... well... flying.

Batshit simply isn't interested in anything other than his Green crusade: the poor sap really believes the crap that he's being fed and, with equal delusion, he sees himself as the saviour of the planet. He would spend his entire time at the DoH forcing hospitals to use naturally-woven grass sheets and fining patients for falling asleep with the light on. And, frankly, fuck that for a game of soldiers.

No wonder doctors believe that the NHS won't be free at the point of use in ten years' time. They are probably right. But fuck me, if we are still paying £90 billion of our tax money into it and paying at the door, there will be a fucking riot and maybe, just maybe, the government will be hauled from their comfortable chairs and hanged in the street.

I can't wait.

* 1948 was the birth year for both the NHS and Patsy. What a lovely coincidence that two such total wasters of our time and money should be born in the same year...