America rose to defend healthcare. But Trump’s attack on the poor is not over | Mary O’Hara

Obamacare will be the law of the land for the “foreseeable future”, the speaker of the US House of Representatives, Paul Ryan, admitted in the aftermath of the abject failure of Donald Trump or the Republican party to “repeal or replace” Obama’s flagship Affordable Care Act (ACA) after seven years of bleating about it. The colossal and humiliating collapse of the proposals was met with jubilation last Friday by millions of people, especially the poorest and disabled, who were in line to lose access to healthcare if the American Health Care Act had been successful.

Watching the events unfold I wondered: what if there had been a similar sudden downfall of the austerity programme in the UK in those early days when the dire warnings of the harm it would unleash were being shouted from the rooftops? How many people would not now be turning to food banks or battling to access social care if austerity had been stopped in its tracks?

The political rollercoaster in the US as the new health bill failed to garner the necessary votes to be passed in the house (partly because rightwing hardliners wanted an even harsher version) was stunning. The debacle came against a backdrop of months of anxiety and fear at what would unfold if it were passed and, the closer the vote deadline got, the more it hit home how much ordinary citizens would suffer. Across the country, individuals and groups rose to oppose it, highlighting the potentially devastating consequences for access to reproductive health services and the disproportionate impact on low-income women and children. Disabled campaigners worked tirelessly to draw attention to the particular injustices they would face if the law passed. Last Wednesday, more than 50 disability rights activists were arrested in Washington DC for protesting against it.

As longtime campaigner Bruce Darling from the disability rights organisation Adapt explained, many people risked being placed in institutions rather than supported in their own homes if proposed cuts of $ 880bn (£705bn) to Medicaid, the government-funded programme that assists the very poorest and disabled people, went ahead. “Disabled people will die,” Darling told me.

Leading up to the healthcare vote I talked to people who were terrified about the impact of the new act. One of these was Marta Conner, a charity consultant from Virginia whose seven-year-old daughter, Caroline, has Rett syndrome, a neurological condition that severely limits her control over her body and means she needs round-the-clock care, expensive medication and specialist equipment. Conner was like many of those speaking out. She told me she felt “it was important to have our voices heard” because children like Caroline and millions more disabled and seriously ill people could lose a lifeline.

Paul Ryan on failed healthcare bill: ‘This is a disappointing day’

According to independent analysis from the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, the AHCA would have seen 24 million people lose health cover in the next decade – and sent insurance premiums for older people rocketing. And, just to rub salt in the wounds, it would have meant a doling out of tax breaks to the rich.

Nevertheless, despite the healthcare reprieve, if you are poor or disabled in the US right now, the fight for rights to support and quality care is far from over. For a start, the healthcare debate isn’t going to disappear: health insurance remains prohibitively expensive for many and even with the advances of Obamacare, it is not a universal system.

But there are other reasons why complacency is not an option. The attack on the poorest is coming on multiple fronts. Trump’s “blueprint” budget, which was also published this month, is a source of widespread anxiety. It has been overshadowed somewhat by the healthcare issue, but with clear echoes of cuts in Britain, initiatives that help the most vulnerable could be decimated if Trump gets his way.

In a similarly absurd vein to Tory claims of “compassionate Conservatism” while they slash budgets, preside over soaring levels of child poverty and pummel the NHS, Republicans have had the gall to argue that culling anti-poverty programmes such as after-school nutrition initiatives and Meals on Wheels are acts of compassion towards taxpayers. The question now is, can these radical proposals come crashing down as the healthcare bill did? For the sake of the most vulnerable, let’s hope so.

America rose to defend healthcare. But Trump’s attack on the poor is not over | Mary O’Hara

5 Reasons You Need Rose Essential Oil

Let’s divert for one second into the world of frequency and sound waves

If we address music on a keyboard- A 440, we understand that the tone “A” below middle “C”  vibrates 440 times per second. The “A” above middle “C” vibrates at 880 times per second.  Sound waves travel from the source, through the air as a carrier, to our ear drum, to the receiver of sound pressure moving up and down in cycles, which converts that information into information, which travels to our brain to be interpreted into identifying that as “A”   

If we break sound into it’s basic component, we discover at the foundation of all sounds, from orchestral to R2D2, are sine waves. We’ve seen examples on oscilloscopes of sine waves smoothly cycling up and down at the frequency of the sound source generating that air movement.

We know how music has the power to heal, reduce stress and depression, and improve insomnia. Music impacts our life from Mozart to spa music, to old favorite songs we turn up on the radio, to screaming heavy metal. Frequency moves us to enjoy our relaxing spa session or to put on our dancing shoes at a party. And we’ve seen how the right frequency can break a wine glass which is achieved by increasing the amplitude of a frequency that resonates with the target object, the wine glass, and the result is shattered glass.

 

What we consume

Our body takes in fuel from our surrounding environment, sunshine, fresh air, walking on the ocean, energized by the waves, sand and breeze as well as what we consume.  The food we consume can be tested and measured to discover a broad spectrum of frequencies we ingest, from near zero to 90 MHz.  The higher the frequency we ingest, the higher the impact on the frequency, and vibrant health of our body.  

But one might wonder, can we find substances on Mother Earth at even higher frequencies to lift us up even higher?  The answer is Yes, absolutely!

One of the oldest medicines known to man are essential oils.  The apothecaries found in uncovered tombs in Egypt, carried various essential oils. Not a new concept at all.  

But what are they and how does this relate to frequency?

If we discover that a plant has a positive medicinal value for us, such as a rose and we can capture the essence of that plant in a cold pressed liquid distillate, we discover that every drop of that essential oil has the complex chemical constituency of the plant source.  And, as shown by the oils discovered in Egypt, even after thousands of years kept in a cool dark environment, they maintain their therapeutic integrity.  THEIR FREQUENCY!

Roses climb the top of the charts 

Roses! Women smile and move their nose towards the blossoms, taking in a deep breath as they close their eyes. A smile grows and they begin emanating sounds like:  Mmmmm…!!!!!   What’s going on and why is this a universal occurrence with roses and women?   It’s Frequency! Roses are the highest measured plant on the planet, thus far.  Someday we may discover something higher but for now…  it’s roses!    Yup…  300 MHz!   Wow!!!

However, it takes an average of 60 thousand rose petals, to produce 10ml of essential oils, a relatively small bottle.  60K petals for a small amount of pure rose essential oil.

Worth it?  Yes. Remember the reaction:  Smell.  Smile.  Mmmmmm…  By smelling the roses, or pure rose essential oil, we are taking in the essence of those molecules that are raising our own frequency up into a wonderful feel good moment!  

The power of our olfactory system is amazing!  We can smell something that triggers a good memory from decades ago!  Our bio-electrical body reacts at the speed of light to those incoming molecules that trigger part of our brain to remember the most amazing things! However,  a genuine un-adulterated rose essential oil is not cheap.

5 Reasons You Need Rose Essential Oil

Our precious allotments are being destroyed – it’s time to get our hands dirty | Rose George

In 2014, there was a protest outside the Royal Courts of Justice. The protesters were colourful: with flowery dresses, a bee costume and balloons. They had clever signs such as: “Give Peas a Chance” and “Don’t Lose the Plot”. The protest was described as a “turf war” by newspaper headline writers, because they love a pun, and because it was about allotments. Last Friday, the protesters were back, this time with wheelbarrows, pumpkins and produce, because once again Watford council had applied to close Farm Terrace allotments, and once again some of the people of Watford refused and fought back.

On paper, Watford council’s rationale for closing Farm Terrace may sound reasonable, even though the plots have been there since 1896 and have statutory protection. The council wants to build a “health campus”, an Orwellian-sounding scheme that incorporates a new hospital, green spaces and that dreaded phrase beloved of planners, a “community hub”. Watford’s elected mayor, Dorothy Thornhill, interviewed the last time the turf war got to court, said that it would bring “up to 1,300 new jobs, much-needed homes, green open spaces which can be enjoyed by all and community facilities, including a community hub with shops”. She also said Farm Terrace plots were “a really hideous, derelict site”.

‘The Farm Terrace case matters because it is a fight about what is of value.’ The campaigners in 2014. Photograph: Cathy Gordon/PA Archive/PA Images

It’s difficult to object to a new hospital or 1,300 new jobs. But anything that uses the expression “green spaces” raises my hackles, because it means that the rest of the project is hard spaces and concrete. The council’s “master plan” is actually unclear: even the hospital doesn’t know what it will use the site for yet (Sara Jane Trebar, a Farm Terrace campaigner, thinks it will become 68 houses and a car park for Watford football club). But if it were to be built without allotments, as the mayor’s comments imply, it would be an own goal. Gardening, as a Social Care Institute for Excellence review of evidence showed in 2013, reaps “a range of benefits across emotional, social, vocational, physical and spiritual domains”. Allotments are as good for the people of Watford as that community hub with shops (which Watford presumably already has plenty of).

‘Five minutes at my allotment, kneeling to weed, putting my hands into soil, and my spirit lifts.’ Photograph: Sam Frost for the Guardian

I support the Farm Terrace fighters because I’d fight for my plot, even though I’m a haphazard gardener. Slugs have eaten more this year than I’ve managed to grow. But when I’ve struggled with depression, when even getting out of the house seemed like the hardest thing in the world, I still sometimes walked five minutes to my plot, past the neat and flourishing allotments that shame me; past the scruffy ones that comfort me, to my higgledy-piggledy plot with its rose bed, sturdy greenhouse and pathetic tomato plants, my glorious collard greens and magnificent roses.

Five minutes there, kneeling to weed, putting my hands into soil, and my spirits lift. There are other riches there too: the businessman who arrives stressed and leaves less so; the young families who leave with children clutching sweetcorn or potatoes, now knowing that not all fruit and vegetables come wrapped in plastic; the old boys who offer advice, wanted or unwanted. Growing your own isn’t always cheaper, but it’s always better. It is one of the best counter-balances that remains to our cult of lonely, commerce-driven individualism.

In law, allotments are apparently well protected, from the 1908 Small Holdings and Allotments Act that instructed councils to supply allotments to meet demand, to further strengthened legislation in 1925. Allotments on statutory land, such as Farm Terrace, can’t be disposed of without ministerial consent. But pressure groups such as Save All Allotments and Don’t Lose the Plot think the Localism Act of 2011 and recent 2014 guidelines that supposedly simplified the law only made it simpler for plot land to be turned into building sites. In a freedom of information request, Save All Allotments found that between 2007 and 2014, 194 of 198 applications to close allotments were granted by the secretary of state. The National Allotment Society is more sanguine, pointing out that of the 65 of 87 applications for disposal that were granted between 2010 and 2013, most were for small bits of land for access or flood alleviation, or land that had long been disused.

But Farm Terrace isn’t disused, nor derelict, nor hideous. The case matters because it is a fight about what is of value. Of course hospitals and houses are needed. The problem with Farm Terrace is that Watford council can’t see the worth of the plots, nor that a proper health scheme can be more than a community hub, shops and a bit of green space. The judicial review adjourned on Friday with no decision reached, but my grubby allotmenting fingers are crossed that peas will be given a chance. I hope that there is room, still, in our era of cat-calling, spite and profound uncertainty, for the simple, humble act that is putting your fingers into the earth, and reaping what you sow.

Our precious allotments are being destroyed – it’s time to get our hands dirty | Rose George

Sydney"s "Rose of Tralee" shakes up Irish pageant with abortion rights speech

For almost six decades the Rose of Tralee – a pageant “which brings young women of Irish descent from around the world to County Kerry, Ireland for a global celebration of Irish culture” – has managed to avoid anything more political than expressing a desire to help the less well off.

That cozy consensus changed this week, when the Sydney entrant to the competition, Brianna Parkins, told presenter Dáithí Ó Sé, live on television: “I think we can do better here in Ireland. I think it is time to give women a say on their own reproductive rights. I would love to see a referendum on the eighth coming up soon. That would be my dream.”

Parkins was referring to the eighth amendment to Ireland’s constitution, passed in 1983, which guarantees the “right to life of the unborn and, with due regard to the equal right to life of the mother, guarantees in its laws to respect, and, as far as practicable, by its laws to defend and vindicate that right.”

— Marian Keyes (@MarianKeyes) August 27, 2016

Oh lads! This is an AMAZING article from @parkinsbrea. I’m in awe of her courage

Sydney"s "Rose of Tralee" shakes up Irish pageant with abortion rights speech

Is £90m sufficient to support Alzheimer"s sufferers? In your dreams | Rose George

‘We have found far better and kinder approaches of dealing with dementia sufferers than sectioning them under the Psychological Overall health Act.’ Photograph: Alamy

Often I have a dream. It is eight many years ago and there is my mom, Sheila, and my stepfather, John, sitting in front of a neurologist. They have been referred by their GP as my mom is anxious that my father can’t place a cup on a saucer any much more.

In my dream, the neurologist, alternatively of saying what he really stated – “Excellent information, it is not a brain tumour, it really is Alzheimer’s” – says “I’m so sorry. You have Alzheimer’s, but will not fret. I will quickly assign you a specialist nurse, anything equivalent to what Macmillan nurses do for those with cancer.”

This nurse will be obtainable to you each at all hrs. He or she will guidebook you by way of the incredibly complex social care method, even though it appears created to make you as puzzled as possible, no matter how educated or confident you are. He or she will aid you fill in forms that are a dozen pages prolonged, which you are supposed to complete while struggling with the terror and fear of your diagnosis, and questioning what type of hell your lifestyle will become, but even your worst imaginings cannot see this beloved husband right here snarling at you with hate, or pooing in the shower, when he was an immaculate guy. This professional helper will advise you on drugs, and as the study into dementia is finally funded at the right ranges to deal with an illness that influences one.seven million people, we no longer want to experiment with drug combinations almost blindly, so that your husband will be rushed to A&ampE with angina from a single blend, or he will fall and slice his head open because another mixture has stolen his stability. The new medicines will calm his rages and terror with out dulling his brain additional.

Whereas the preceding policy was to get in touch with dementia “mental sickness”, which meant it was not classed as a primary care require and so residential care wasn’t funded by the state: we’ve now noticed that this is nonsense, and we get in touch with dementia what it is: brain injury. And we fund it accordingly. Of program it started when Jeremy Hunt announced he would give £90m to early diagnosis and better care. He was not genuinely talking about the individuals who care for dementia sufferers, which is their wives, husbands, children, cousins, in-laws, buddies, most struggling in isolation. But it was a commence. And of program we have discovered far better and kinder techniques of dealing with aggressive dementia sufferers than sectioning them beneath the Psychological Wellness Act and locking them up for years in assessment centres, in which employees can be inadequate in variety and potential, and exactly where most sufferers deteriorate swiftly in 6 months or so, ending up with sepsis, then in hospital on the Liverpool Care Pathway and their family will watch, befuddled by stress and grief, as their relative dies without ever becoming officially terminally sick.

The neurologist continues: “Since we recognise it as a primary care need, your husband will be confined but in a risk-free and calm environment with satisfactory staffing and professional health care care, with appropriate stimulation rather than a Television and a corridor to wander all around. He will die of Alzheimer’s – we haven’t yet located a cure – but his death will be dignified.”

I wake up then. In the light of day, I do my calculations. I welcome the £90m, however I don’t much see the benefit of early diagnosis when the care program that follows the diagnosis is so shambolic and inadequate and frequently a disgrace, although Alzheimer’s associations disagree. They believe early diagnosis is “empowering”. I wonder how that £90m can compensate from the £2.7bn slashed from council care budgets. I wonder why Wakefield CCG, in whose “care” my stepdad died with out dignity, still refuses to countenance Admiral Nurses, individuals Macmillan nurse equivalents who do exist in real lifestyle, when up coming-door Kirklees council has eight and keeps receiving a lot more. I wonder if I am getting churlish to be cynical when dementia is finally in the headlines. Then I re-study the dozens of emails I acquired when I wrote about how my stepfather died, all from folks suffering and coping in isolation as we did, in excellent distress, and I know that can not be fixed by £90m or only in dreams.

Is £90m sufficient to support Alzheimer"s sufferers? In your dreams | Rose George

Let us hope Stuart Rose helps make the NHS much more like M&S

Drafting in Sir Stuart sets a thought-provoking precedent why not place up Lord Kitchener-type posters in each boardroom in the land?

Maybe not with a headshot of Wellness Secretary Jeremy Hunt, nevertheless he barely appears old enough to increase a milk moustache, never ever thoughts emulate Kitchener’s luxuriant whiskers.

Instead of the normal suspects, appointed by way of the established route of old-school-tie cronyism, government departments may well really be headed by men and women who could do the occupation.

Given a choice, flooded householders would far desire a web site pay a visit to from bish-bash-bosh Pimlico Plumbers boss Charlie Mullins, who knows what he’s speaking about, than Eric Pickles wringing his hands.

The economic climate? Give it to that nice Peter Jones of Dragon’s Den. Rural affairs? Cath Kidston, your nation needs you. Justice would be Judge John Deed, Wales can have Gavin and Stacey, Andy Murray can armwrestle Alex Salmond for Scotland and, for every little thing else, there’s John Lewis, who isn’t a man or woman but ought to be.

Never ever knowingly undersold on the globe stage, we could all be stakeholders, a buzzword that as soon as on a time was continuously utilised in connection with the NHS, but looks, like providing sufferers adequate water to drink and treating the elderly with dignity, to have slipped off the agenda.

But I have large hopes for Sir Stuart, who has constantly struck me as a can-do type of chap. He started on the shop floor and worked his way up swept the warehouse, folded the pyjamas, emptied tills and served customers.

The enterprise of bringing the NHS back to complete well being will be a special challenge, but the truth he didn’t go to school with the PM is a vote-winner in my guide.

Given his hands-on strategy, ahead of he begins employing and firing the generals, it may be an thought for him to go undercover – join the infantry as a well being-care assistant and uncover what’s truly taking place on the wards and why standards of care are nosediving in as well many hospitals.

Of program, the NHS is not about profit margins, even though fees are essential in identifying the top quality and extent of care people are at its heart. But as executive chairman of M&ampS, Sir Stuart’s achievements have been exceptional, and he is really significantly a men and women individual.

I wish him luck – lives depend on him. In distinct, the lives of people inside an ambulance trip of Colchester Hospital University, Sherwood Hospital, Northern Lincolnshire and Goole Hospitals or any of the other failing trusts, the place, by way of bitter irony, trust is just about the last issue sufferers come to feel when they are wheeled in the front door.

———————————————————

Stars make us all want to have a go in the snow

_{Winter Olympics medal-winner Jenny Jones}

Haven’t we come a prolonged way because Eddie the Eagle symbolised our comical inadequacies when it comes to winter sports activities? Sochi, which I previously considered was some kind of martial art, is proving to be a actual revelation.

Britain’s female competitors, in particular, glow with overall health, emanate strength and radiate this kind of rosy-cheeked enthusiasm that they ought to be on the reverse of our banknotes.

These are precisely the type of role models our daughters are crying out for in 21st culture of pneumatic physique-conning celebrities and half-dressed starlets who resemble harlots.

There’s also one thing egalitarian about possessing a go in snow, even if Jenny Jones, who bagged a bronze on her snowboard, did a lot more odd jobs than Del Boy in order to pay her way on the slopes.

Lizzy Yarnold, whose glittering smile outshone the Olympic gold she won in the skeleton yesterday, received to the top by dint of hard work, application and her faithful sled, Mervyn.

Sochi runs until February 23 and I’m loving every minute of it, even however I’ve in no way ski-ed or skated or snowboarded.

I’m off with my loved ones to Scotland next week for the half-term vacation, where there is snow. We’ll be packing the normal thick socks and boots and pullovers, and, if there is room I may slip a tea tray into the roof box – just in case the mood will take me.

—————————————————————–

He’s spared me a bunch of worries

_{Say it with flowers… or save yourself the needless cost}

So women, just how hearts-and-flowers wonderful was Valentine’s Day for you?

Yeah, me also my husband handed me a card made by our eleven-12 months-previous but did not really get round to signing it. I gave him a shop-purchased 1 but did not very get round to getting rid of the wrapper. Nonetheless, they’ll be excellent for following 12 months.

And, offered the new research revealing that an income of £50,000 almost ensures that you will discover really like, then the cash we saved could be construed as an astute investment rather than a tragic indictment.

Funds, of course, cannot get enjoy, but it absolutely generates the circumstances for fondness to flourish. All the same, I’m not certain the super-rich are any happier than the £50k brigade. Definitely a straw poll of Lottery winners would recommend they aren’t.

As Mr Micawber so succinctly place it: “Annual revenue twenty pounds, yearly expenditure nineteen, nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual revenue twenty lbs, annual expenditure twenty lbs ought and six, result misery”.

So, would I have wished my husband or wife to fritter his sixpence on flowers? No. Yes. Really, no, since they are so evident. Or am I just becoming a cynic and a sourpuss? Yes. Or no.

Anyway, it is academic, actually, as my husband has spared me the horrible cognitive dissonance by not presenting me with a huge bouquet to agonise above. Now that is what I get in touch with the best gift of all.

——————————————

My pension is going to pot

_{The middle lessons have been pushed into buying poorly performing annuities}

As if there weren’t sufficient to fret about in life, now we find out that, getting shopped close to for auto insurance and house insurance coverage and mortgage loan prices and utility suppliers, we must include pensions to our ever-lengthening checklist.

In accordance to sector watchdog, the Economic Conduct Authority, the middle classes are being fleeced by unscrupulous pension companies that push them into getting poorly executing annuities. And because an annuity – do pay out focus at the back, even if you are beneath thirty and thus immortal – can’t be modified, retirees locate themselves locked into dismal returns for the rest of their daily life.

Shedding £10,000 of cash flow on a £100,000 pension fund is scandalous, but the excellent news is it is avoidable – if you place the hours in by investigating the industry and buying around.

I’m hoping by the time I attain retirement I will not only have one thing resembling a pension pot, but that there will be a whizzy annuities comparison web site to do the challenging graft for me.

Then once again, it’s most likely only a matter of time just before the comparison internet site sector watchdog blows the whistle on nefarious practices in that discipline, also, so exactly where does that depart us? Apart from duped and broke, certainly.

I concern the single lesson we can discover from all this is deceptively straightforward: believe in no one.

Let us hope Stuart Rose helps make the NHS much more like M&S

Pay attention, NHS. Stuart Rose isn"t just any retailocrat. This is an M&S retailocrat | Marina Hyde

‘I preserve imagining individuals currently being wheeled into theatre for a bypass only to learn that this week it is a world foods cafe.’ Photograph: Bloomberg/Bloomberg via Getty Photos

You’ve quite much admitted to ruling by dare the minute you hire Philip Green to publish a report on government profligacy. (The Topshop boss’s most current birthday celebration reportedly value £6m.) So it’s not the best shock to understand that Stuart Rose, former M&ampS chief executive and recent Ocado chairman, is now to be tasked with fixing the NHS.

Sir Stuart has been engaged by Jeremy Hunt, and will advise the overall health secretary on transforming the management of failing hospitals, on the tantalisingly intangible basis that he is “one of the country’s most inspirational leaders”. And maybe he is – sadly, his tenure at M&ampS coincided with my neighborhood store’s apparent insistence on moving every single stock item to a different place every number of days, so I keep imagining individuals currently being wheeled into theatre for a heart bypass only to learn that this week it truly is a planet meals cafeteria.

When did it take root, this bizarre concept that the fantastically complex apparatus of the state is analogous to a store? The observation popularised by Napoleon, that England was “a nation of shopkeepers”, has grow to be a governmental axiom. They’ve all had a crack – or rather, the main crossover stars have: the ones of whom governments imagine Ordinary People may well have heard. There was Mary Portas off the telly, and the aforementioned Philip Green.

Now there is Stuart Rose, who is reduce from equivalent cloth. Relatively above-optimistically, Ordinary Folks are deemed to know about him, simply because he was as soon as the chief executive of Marks &amp Spencer, a keep which is usually mentioned as although it had been one of the cornerstones of British life. It really is a bit like Manchester United these days. Each have to be addressed as even though a dip in their fortunes have been a dip in all our fortunes, akin to the country’s whole harvest possessing failed. A run of poor final results is not merely a run of bad outcomes – it have to be swept up into wider and grander factors about the standard loss of believe in in our best institutions: politicians, police, banking institutions, the media, United’s back 4. And, certainly, M&ampS hosiery. Do you sense a gathering darkness, serfs? That would be your lodestars currently being extinguished.

As for the form guide on shopkeepers possessing a go at government, it does not augur immensely well for individuals hoping the Rose commission will be the response. We have already dealt with the savage self-parody of a government employing Philip Green to lecture it on wastefulness, but I suppose the nicest point you could say about that appointment was that it scrupulously averted costs of a conflict of interests. Ninety-two per cent of Sir Phil’s Arcadia Group is in his wife’s name, and she is resident in Monaco, so you could hardly say he had any influence over how her taxes would be invested.

As for Phil’s conclusions, nicely, the ones that hadn’t been advised in at least 3 preceding reports have been both pointlessly evident or plainly unscalable. Centralised procurement was his massive notion – who knew he was a Marxist? – but the apparent total failure to grasp the chasm in between the state and a shoe division was boggling.

Mary Portas was subsequent, and however the former inventive director of Harvey Nichols would seem to have accomplished her really best, a You and Yours investigation for BBC Radio 4 last yr located that ten of the 12 “Portas pilot” towns – which obtained government funding to regenerate their high streets according to the suggestions of Portas’s report – had truly noticed a fall in the variety of occupied retail units.

Rose has at least differed from his retailocrat predecessors in that he acknowledged the distinction among his old life and the job that will occupy him for an unspecified proportion of the next couple of months. “Obviously the NHS is a very distinct institution from M&ampS,” he stated, in case any person was under the impression that the latter also employed 1.3m staff (even which includes self-service tills).

Still, just as soon as, maybe as a humorous experiment, it would be wonderful to believe we were appointing someone who was actually considered an professional in the discipline. Forgive the repetition in this space, but I can’t support feeling that David Freud should actually have been the final hurrah of this concept that being aware of naff-all about a topic was a plus, due to the fact you deliver that fabled “fresh point of view” to it. David Freud – now Lord Freud, of program – was the former investment banker charged by the Blair government with solving welfare. Shortly following the publication of his report, he defected to the Tories, and is now the government’s minister for welfare reform.

“I did not know anything at all about welfare when I started out,” he breezed just after delivering that initial report, “but that may have been an benefit … In a funny way, the answer was obvious.”

Without a doubt it is humorous, is not it, that anything that has tied up the best political minds since its inception could have appeared so transparently simple to Freud – and to view the triumphant dealing with of universal credit score, or his lordship’s faintly clueless physical appearance before the operate and pensions pick committee into housing costs final week, it is clear the fruits of his labour have left welfare thinkers from Adam Smith to Beveridge with historical egg all more than their faces.

You could recall it took Lord Freud just the three weeks to analysis and compose his report, but let us hope that Sir Stuart will indulge the wellness service with at least double that. Following all, these are not just solutions. These are M&ampS answers.

Twitter: @MarinaHyde

Pay attention, NHS. Stuart Rose isn"t just any retailocrat. This is an M&S retailocrat | Marina Hyde

M&S meets the NHS as Stuart Rose is handed mentor position for hospitals

Jeremy Hunt needs Stuart Rose to advise on how his good results at M&ampS can be transplanted to the NHS. Photograph: Rex

Sir Stuart Rose, who was credited with rejuvenating Marks &amp Spencer during a turbulent six years as chief executive, has been employed to support revive the fortunes of failing hospitals in England.

In a move dubbed in Whitehall as “M&ampS meets NHS”, Rose will advise the well being secretary Jeremy Hunt on how to build up a new generation of managers to transform failing hospitals. There will be a distinct target on the 14 NHS trusts positioned in “particular measures” final yr.

Hunt will also announce that Sir David Dalton, the chief executive of the Salford Royal NHS Basis, is to advise him on how successful trusts can take charge of failing hospitals. This will be modelled on Michael Gove’s “superheads” programme, in which successful headteachers consider in excess of failing schools, and follows the introduction of Ofsted-fashion inspections for hospitals.

The appointment of Rose, who served as the M&ampS chief executive between 2004 and 2010 and as executive chairman among 2008 and 2011, is probably to be seized on by Labour, who say that the Tories are trying to boost the position of the private sector in the NHS. But Hunt, who will say he hopes that one of Britain’s “most inspirational leaders” would help the NHS entice the brightest and ideal managers.

1 supply stated: “There is no private sector involvement. Sir Stuart’s remit explicitly excludes ownership structures, use of the personal sector and outsourcing. It is not the personal sector carrying out much more. It is all about NHS leaders.”

Hunt desires Rose to advise on how his achievement at M&ampS, exactly where he was credited with bettering relations between managers and personnel, can be transplanted to the NHS. The overall health secretary is keen for a better injection of managers from the personal sector on the clear basis that they will be delivering a public service cost-free at the point of delivery. Rose will conduct a series of hospital visits and will mentor NHS leaders.

The well being secretary mentioned: “The variation among good and negative care can often lie in leadership, which is why I am delighted that one particular of the country’s most inspirational leaders has agreed to advise me on how we can attract and retain the brightest and ideal managers into the NHS so we transform the culture in below-carrying out hospitals.”

Hunt stated that Dalton would advise on making a new tier of “NHS super-heads” to consider over struggling trusts. 1 instance could be the Christie Hospital in Manchester – 1 of the country’s best cancer hospitals – which could consider over numerous hospitals across England.

The wellness secretary stated: “Sir David Dalton is one particular this kind of leader, who with his crew has turned the Salford Royal into 1 of the very best hospitals in the nation. He will advise me what much more we want to do to allow our best hospital leaders to consider over the operating of hospitals in difficulty without having compromising the good results of their personal trusts.”

M&S meets the NHS as Stuart Rose is handed mentor position for hospitals

Stressed? Consider Rose Crucial Oil

Anxiety is rampant these days, from extended work hrs and mounting expenses to site visitors and emails overflowing with tasks . . . due yesterday. Add to it the stressors of the vacation season and our nervousness (and blood strain) is very likely greater than typical, placing our mental and physical health in jeopardy.

Even though massages and yoga courses are encouraged, often they can be pricey and time-consuming, a stressor in itself. So, if you are searching for a far more affordable, less complicated and efficient way to lower your tension amounts, look no even more than rose essential oil (affiliate link – Amazon).

Rose Essential Oil to Alleviate Anxiety

Research displays that rose oil is effective when it comes to relieving anxiety. In one particular review, published in Normal Solution Communications, individuals who utilized rose oil topically have been not only more relaxed than people who received a placebo, but they exhibited a lowered breathing and blood stress price.

Studies in Pharmacology, Biochemistry, and Behaviors have shown a correlation between use of rose important oil and decreased anxiety.

In The Aromatherapy Book: Applications and Inhalations, aromatherapist Jeanne Rose says that rose oil assists soothe nerves and the nervous program, while also assisting to relive signs of depression.

The oil is typically used in aromatherapy and invokes good thoughts and feelings of happiness, putting adverse ones on the back burner. In reality, essential oils, such as rose, have even been utilised to treat those who have knowledgeable extraordinarily higher levels of stress such as soldiers or these with Submit-Traumatic Pressure Disorder (PTSD).

Two Typical Rose Important Oils

Rose Otto and Rose Absolute are two common sorts of rose important oils. Otto is normally applied to the skin, although Absolute is the preferred selection for those who get pleasure from a fragrant release into the air, generally diffused in a room. Whilst Rose Absolute is more fragrant, it is reduced in price than Otto.

Even so, both are advised for diminishing anxiety and depression, which are frequently linked. According to the Centers for Condition Handle &amp Prevention (CDC), about one in ten Americans report depression which can negatively influence well being even though also disrupting workplace productivity. In every instance, even basically inhaling them is regarded as extremely advantageous their capacity to positively affect the limbic program, the portion of the brain that controls the nervous technique and feelings.

Other Utilizes for Rose Vital Oil

Rose oil is also commonly utilised for people seeking relief from menstrual cramps, menopause and other hormone-connected problems.

It is also been touted as an aphrodisiac, given that most aromatherapy oils that produce a sense of calm and enhanced mood can encourage sexual interest and arousal. Legend has it that Cleopatra took baths infused with rose petals to entice lovers. In some remedies today, rose oil is utilized to stimulate feelings of enjoy and devotion that may improve libido.

Sources for this write-up include:

Stressed? Consider Rose Crucial Oil