Played For Fools

Pretty soon we will get a last chance to decide whether to break away from the bear like hug of the European Union or finally fully accept the ever closer union. I say last, because the Tories will never offer another referendum, and the Labour Party would never even have even offered this referendum.

EU Brexit Referendum .... Last Chance To Leave?

 

The Labour Party used to be very 'Euro sceptics' in the 1970's, but have since realised what a generally 'Socialist' organisation the EU really is, what with all those federalists, spouting on about ever closer unions. The EU, with its unelected Euro-leadership, unbalanced budgets, corruption, graft and anti-democratic power structure, has made the Labour Party a real convert, and now it campaigns for the EU, with all the zeal that only a true believer and convert can muster .... well apart from its current leader, Jeremy Corbyn who is still lukewarm about it, having been forced by his new role to publicly adopt a more pro-EU stance.

  

This is also the last chance, because the EU doesn't do 'accountability', nor true democracy (when was the last time you were asked by the EU about any of its policies e.g. Immigration?). As I have pretty much nailed my colours to the 'Out' mast after failing to be convinced by the stay arguments, I can hardly claim to be open to all views, but unlike the 'In' campaign, I can at least leaven my opinions with real facts, as opposed to the half truths and innuendo that they have put into their propaganda.

So here's something real, tangible, and checkable, for you to consider when you ponder how to cast your vote.

We all know that under the EHIC insurance scheme, we Brits can claim some basic health care in the EU if we get injured on the continent, but that if your British, you have to also have to have travel insurance to cover any major medical costs. However foreigners visiting the UK will get 'free at the point' of delivery health care whilst they are inside the UK. The idea is that for non EU citizens, we get money back from their insurance companies, and from EU citizens we claim it back from their governments. It should, all things being equal, all sort of balance out ..... except it doesn't. The latest figures I could find were for 2015 ....

There are two types of foreign NHS user:

• 'Deliberate': Those who use the NHS in this context is likely to be Non EU visitors, who come here specifically to receive free treatment, or who come for other reasons, but take advantage of the system when they're here. It's thought to be costing us roughly between £110 million and £280 million a year, but frankly that's a very low estimate as most GP's and Hospitals make no effort to determine this.

• 'Normal': Those foreign visitors who use the NHS by being treated while in England (and the rest of the UK), and who are estimated to cost us around £1.8 billion a year. I'll repeat that £1.8 billion a year .... The majority of these costs aren't currently charged for from their governments. But even if we did try and get it back, only about £500 million is thought to be recoverable (or even chargeable at the moment).

 NHS EU Fraud - Deliberate?

Now with the EU citizens, you would think that this would be a much a more balanced affair, whereby we charge Germany for their citizens, and they charge for any of ours, and the same with the other EU states ..... well you would be horribly wrong. The other EU states screw us over, year after year, after year, and have done so ever since we joined the EEC/EU.

For example, in 2015 we refunded the other EU states a total of £674 million for their medical treatment of our citizens ..... this is what was under the EH1C scheme, and actually ignores all the money our insurance industry pays on top of this, as UK travel insurers actually pay out an average of £4 million plus every week, to cover holiday makers medical treatment. So at least £208 million pa.

• The average cost of a claim for medical expenses on a UK travel insurance policy in 2013 was £930, this is compared to £616 in 2004.

Now have a guess how much we recovered from those same EU states for their citizens health care whilst in the UK? Wrong ..... what ever you thinking it was wrong. It was actually the grand total of £50m in total. So we subsidise other EU states health services to a grand total of £614 million per annum, and in relative terms have done so every year since the 1970's.

This is such a scandal that you would think it would be on every newspaper and TV screens, but no, I spotted this story in a side column in one of the more popular tabloids. Apparently the information is so buried away by the Department of Health, that it only emerged at all after a parliamentary question raised by Labour MP John Moran.

Rightfully he described it as "a scandal" .... obviously correcting this decades ago would have put may billions more into the UK Health Service, but successive governments have closed their eyes to what is essentially, an EU fraud, perpetrated on the UK taxpayers (one of many I suspect), by them applying the rules to suit them, and us being unable to do the same.

Just for the record, last year:

• Spain took £223m from us and returned just £3.4m.
• France took £150m from us and returned just £6.7m.
• Germany (as you might have expected) took a more modest £25.9m, but returned just £2.2m
• The rest of the EU took the rest and returned a pittance.

Its fairly obvious who are inflating medical claims against the UK, and who isn't ..... they have all been robbing us blind for decades, and now are so wedded on it, that they can't even be shamed out of this habit. Not even when the story comes out.

The hapless health minister currently in charge of this fiasco, Alistair Burt, didn't even promise to try and address the robbery, merely commenting that the 'UK reimburses the cost of providing treatment to people we are responsible for under EU law, irrespective of nationality' ..... in other words that the EU will continue, as the MP described, it to "play us for fools".

EU Health Care Frauds Creates Headlines

As the headline story in this UK newspaper makes clear, EU citizens have also found a loophole in the EHIC scheme, whereby if they get a UK issued card, they can then claim for medical treatment in their own countries, and the UK pays for it. You couldn't make this stuff up, because you don't have to, as its all real.

As for the Non EU visitors, well we are almost as generous .... In what's known as healthcare tourism, West African pregnant women regularly fly into the UK, and even overstay their visas, knowing that once in labour, the NHS can't refuse them treatment, and they can skip the UK without paying a penny (they can even visit the UK later, with no repercussions) .... this is because only those services provided in, or linked to a hospital in England, are required to charge for overseas visitors. This excludes services like A&E and walk-in centres while in General Practice surgeries, GP's in England have the discretion to register overseas patients (in theory only, as virtually none do so).

Remember all this when you vote in the EU referendum .... we are just "played for fools" by the EU.