FionaK |
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| www.internationalgreensocialist.org/wordpress/?page_id=1716This is an awesome paper about the lobby behind current government policy towards the sick and disabled. It is long but it is very, very clear. I urge everyone to read this because the fact is that there are corporate interests behind this "paradigm shift" and it is important to recognise the narrative which gives that lobby its intellectual figleaf. This is not confined to this country: it is spreading. Keep your eyes open, wherever you live www.meassociation.org.uk/?p=9217This is a piece reproduced from Private Eye. It outlines the activities of a company called Unum: one of the biggest health insurance providers in the US. Unum, in an earlier incarnation, specialised in not paying out insurance claims: to the extent that it was described as an "outlaw company" by a californian department of insurance commissioner called John Garamendi: and fined $36 million in 2007 after a class action. They were also banned from doing business in 13 states for a time: a restructuring thereafter allowed them to pretend that it was somebody else who did those bad things and they are now apparently "clean". Unum has been advising government here about welfare reform since 2004 at least: that is, right through the period when it was described as "outlaw"; was fined; and was called the second worst insurance company in America, by the American Association for Justice. Unum has a quite clear conflict of interest which they deny: they are advising the government to slash benefits: they are paying for the university faculty which provides all of the intellectual justification (they say they are not doing that now: but they certainly founded the department concerned); they are running advertisements which inform people how low the state provision is and how even that is increasingly difficult to access: and they are selling american style health insurance. This is described as a long game: it certainly is. Just as the long term aim of dismantling the welfare state is, IMO. The share high level personnel with ATOS as well I am off out now: going to buy a tin foil hat: I have feeling they are going to come into fashion quite soon ..... Edited by FionaK - 6/9/2012, 22:19
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