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hello my name is David Cameron although
if you like you can just call me Dave a
lot of people are asking me what I've
been up to since leaving number 10 well
I've been making quite a bit of money
making speeches actually but it's not
enough so that's why I'm now presenting
sputnik over the next few weeks I'll be
inviting on board some of my old
cuttings from Eton Oxford so just George
Osborne who did such a good job in
running the British economy into the
ground sorry I mean running the economy
okay Dave I think we've all had quite
enough of you my name is neil clark and
i will be orbiting the world on Sputnik
for the next few weeks standing in for
George and gayatri 14 years after the
us-led coalition illegally invaded and
occupied her up in search of
non-existent weapons of mass destruction
the country remained in turmoil the US
and its allies are now seeking to
liberate the city of Mosul from the
Islamic state a terrorist organization
we should not exist for the previous
us-led liberation of the country in 2003
over 1 million Iraqis have died since
bush and Blair launched their aggression
but no one has yet been held to account
for what the award-winning journalist
John Pilger has called the crime of the
century joining me now to discuss the
current desperate situation interrupt is
the Iraqi born writer epidemic and
activist Sami Ramadani Sammy welcome on
board the Sputnik thanks for coming on
thank you for inviting me I think the
last time we met Sammy was about two
thousand eleven and twelve when we were
both on the platform will stop the war
we were speaking about event I think
with Lindsey German the convenience stop
the war and the chairman of the meeting
was a certain Labor backbencher call
Jeremy Corbyn yes I think thing I do
remember that yes I think things have
changed since then quite quite a few
things have changed but the situation
I'm afraid in Iraq is just as bad as it
was or even even worse the carnage
continuing out 14 years after the
illegal invasion definitely I mean
people often speak of the 2003 war again
dirac in the past is a pass sentence the
war happened in Iraq really in reality
the war hasn't stopped because the
country has been in a state of
devastation and turmoil ever since that
invasion the initial destruction of the
invasion was followed by massive
campaigns of the us-led occupation
forces in various cities of Iraq the
resistance to occupation grew and that
was met with the utmost brutality we all
heard of the torture of prisoners and
have a great prison check and elsewhere
across Iraq over a million people were
killed as your as you said in your
introduction but there are also if you
like the unseen things that don't hit
the headlines like the destruction of
the educational system in Iran the
health system massive unemployment
destruction of all productive industries
in the country the ruin of much of
agriculture and Iraq wherever you look
there has been enormous damage done to
Rocky to Iraq as a state and Iraq as a
society and I stress society because the
United States also follow the
devastating policy of divide and rule
divide and rule in its most extreme
brutal format of encouraging sectarian
terrorism Iraq did not have terrorist
organizations before 2003 but by 2005
six the us-led occupation forces got
bogged down in Iraq because people
rejected them that doesn't mean they
love Saddam but they hated the us-led
occupation and people should also
remember that before the invasion
occupation of Iraq in 2003 the Iraqi
people suffered 13 years of the most
brutal sanction absolutely economic
sanctions
not sin against any state in the world
of that severity sanctions of not
severity before and that led according
to the United station to the debt to the
death of half a million Iraqi children
between 1990 and 2003 okay and really
the continuation of these campaigns
against the Iraqi people became really
criminal and damaging even further to
society's cohesion is through the
encouragement of sectarian terrorism the
the United States 2005-6 got bogged down
and resistance to their occupation grew
across the country South Baghdad the
north and so on and this the US generals
and the CIA decided that the best way to
protect the us-led occupation forces
from total defeat like what happened in
Vietnam was to spread lease and
encouraged the rise of sectarian
terrorism targeting other Iraqis us
generals occupying Iraq so it's better
to have Iraqis Kelly Rockies and Iraqis
pointing their inner resistance against
against the us-led occupation and this
is what happened and we saw the gradual
definite rise of sectarian terrorism
with mosques being targeted popular
markets bakeries schools weddings
funerals and the story of this terrorism
goes on and was crowned by the fall of
Mosul to dash isis and jun 2014 two
years ago more than two years ago now so
you have this continuation of the United
States us-led policies of destroying
countries I cut that they cannot control
basically and once they occupied Iraq
you could see how they systematically
went about dismantling the state yeah
Saddam is gone but they wanted so they
they disbanded the Iraqi army all
security services they
disbanded all the ministries except the
Ministry of oil yes and parts of our
intelligence services buildings were
kept intact plus the Ministry of oil it
was so clear from day one bantered
Baghdad they rushed to protect the
Ministry of oil and protect one or two
too important intelligence centers that
for dummies these were the only places
they initially he protected in Baghdad
walls they took it over in 2003 and this
immediately obviously revealed there
through to intentions it was to control
Iraq controller soil and and and also
because these are countries they cannot
control who ever is ruling the country
that they cannot totally dominate seems
to pose a danger to them and the sense
that that country is not compliant
number one totally at least not
compliant and secondly this country
might go into other alliances which they
don't like and these two especially in a
strategic region like the Middle East
and now summer we put the US which has
been bombing Iraq since the 1990s he's
now bombing again to liberate Mosul from
diache is group which would not be in
existence without the previous
liberation of Iraq in 2003 so the
violinist continues and continues and
you know what solution can there be what
what positivity could we see it at all
from this is there going to be any end
in sight for the nightmare the rocky
people versus in fighting Isis is
important Isis and this other terrorist
sectarian terrorist organization pose a
danger to our societies whether he
talking about Syria Lebanon Iraq Egypt
also there there are moves to disrupt
Egyptian society regardless of who rules
it but to go back to muscle the entry of
Isis the fall of muscle to Isis is very
significant to observe that when it fell
in jun 2014 the United States did not
help Iraq at all messenger legal sep
tember three months later because they
put a condition they said will come and
help you if you remove your Prime
Minister
if you bring in a new Morales action
Malachy I'm not no supporter of maliki
they accuse them of being sectarian
which is true that ISM as government of
being corrupt which is true but that's
not worried what worries them because
corruption and dictatorships go
hand-in-hand with us control and a lot
of parts of the world just look at saudi
arabia what were they worried about is
that he wouldn't go along with their
policy of backing terrorism in Syria and
he would not go along with their
suggestion of completely breaking with
Iran somebody has to go he had to go and
they waited three months until he went
before they started any activity toda
and even then they were not serious
about it and even today in fact I'll
most Iraqis think that the United States
is not genuine they are using Isis for
their strategic purpose they let it
spread similarly in Syria but they fight
it to limit its spread occasionally but
they are benefiting strategically they
have gone back into Iraq in a big way
over 6,000 u.s. occupation forces are
now in Iraq they are building new
military bases they are building them in
Iraqi Kurdistan and they are entrenching
their presence in Baghdad through their
massive embassy the biggest embassy in
the world is still present in Baghdad
and through the certain of their allies
in Iraq they try to use the threat of
Isis the threat of dodge the threat of
terrorism but to threaten Baghdad and
make it more compliant more pliant and
this is a yet another chapter in the
crimes of us-led imperialism against the
Iraqi people Sammy one final question
president Trump he made a big deal in
his election campaign he was going to
tackle Dionysus that was going to be his
main priority are there any hope there
could be a change in strategy of the US
and that they will genuinely follow this
through or is it still going to be as
you said they still going to try to sort
of pretend to fight Isis or half fight
Isis or trying to use it for its own
imperialistic sort of design so there
are any chance that i show you how i
think it is still the strategy in my
opinion because
what they are saying what temp is saying
as Iran is the main enemy well if Iran
is the main enemy then the local force
that is fighting Iran I'm fighting the
Allies of your honors Isis so so really
I still could see how the United States
might fight Isis but also use it
strategically and they are trying to
create this axis and when you add former
US generally was commander of NATO
suggested the only couple of weeks ago
forming a gulf nato what he called the
Gulf region NATO forces backed by the
United States who are they going to
fight so they are trying to to encircle
further Iran because Iran again a soft
because of human rights and so on is
because Iran has stood up against us
domination of the region well sorry
thank you very much let's hope we can
meet in a serious time and things will
have improved i hope you i also thank
you for coming on the Sputnik you're
most welcome don't go away because
coming up after the break we discuss the
crisis in the National Health Service
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welcome back to Sputnik orbiting the
world with me neil clark standing in for
George and gab tree the NHS is the most
enduring achievement of the first
post-war Labour government of Clement
Attlee but now our Health Service faces
odds with the most serious crisis in its
70 year existence forced to make 22
billion worth of savings by the
government by the year twenty twenty the
head of NHS England Simon Stephens
recently announced that waiting times
for so-called non-urgent operations
would rise meaning misery for 3.7
million people Stephen says that due to
the combination of an aging population
and the rising demand for services the
NHS simply must make choices about its
priorities but with all the welfare is
in the country should we be rationing
our health care joining me now to
discuss these issues is dr. Bob Gill a
family GP from Kent and the producer of
the great NHS heist a crowdfunded film
about the dismantling of the NHS dr.
Gill welcome on board they support Nick
it's great to have you here Simon
Stephens has said that basically if the
NHS wants to prioritize on cancer
treatments then they're going to make 1
billion pounds of savings and that the
the waiting list for so-called
non-allergic operations has to rise
probably beyond the 18-week limits at
the moment but is that really fair I
mean it surely the crisis is that we're
not getting enough money in the NHS in
the first place in visiting this 22
billion the nations have got to say the
inevitably means that waiting list would
rise any way any fact they're already I
read that the waiting is for nan og
operations it is at its highest for
seven years well you know what people
have to realize is we are entering the
end stages of a 30 year long
privatization plan and what Simon
Stephens is outlining is to create
longer waiting lists and to use that as
a driver for the insurance industry
because what is happening behind the
scenes is the NHS have gone from a
public service which has been largely
publicly provided and funded through
taxation to a system based on the
American model which is run by the
insurance industry driven for profit not
based on patient care but your ability
to afford insurance and in order to
drive that market you
to create waiting list because waiting
was work relatively low weren't they
back in 2010 but they've shot up now the
government's Health and Social Care Act
of 2012 which basically d national
identity attended how is that it
impacted on this well the 2012 act which
you mentioned did several things it
removed the duty of the secretary of
state to provide comprehensive universal
health care effectively abolishing the
NHS and what we've seen since 2010 under
the cover of the austerity agenda is a
deliberate b funding of the NHS for the
settlement for the NHS which which was
historically around four percent growth
per year I spoke to less than one
percent per year so in effect we have
built into the NHS severe underfunding
and we're seeing that in deterioration
for the staff working conditions and
we're also think that in the poorer
service that patients are getting and to
include on top of that preparing the
public for longer waiting lists well who
will benefit from all this bad news the
insurance companies waiting in the wings
and of course is this dichotomy really
between not so called non-urgent
operations and cants operations really
fair because these not operate non
urgent operation many of the patients
are in extreme pain my mother of example
is in a late 80 she's waiting for a hip
replacement she's in great pain and of
course the danger is isn't it that
actually health would get worse of
people who are who are waiting for these
operations which could create more cost
in the longer term with any of these
proposals the government have to put
forward a plausible narrative it might
now reasonable on the surface to
prioritize cancer and who could argue
against that but what is lying behind
this is the agenda to convert to an
insurance company citizen insurance
system but you're right patients who are
on waiting lists or suffering they're in
pain some of them may develop
complications for example a hernia that
might strangulate and you end up with a
very serious operation we've got a lot
more costs a lot more puts the patient
at jeopardy and for hip replacements
patients are in pain they're at higher
risk of falling so the government's are
quite prepared to increase the
unnecessary suffering of patients to
force through their privatization agenda
why isn't there more of an outrage about
this dr. Gill because this is pretty
scandal
isn't it the lead we put he 500 billion
to save the bankers the bankers bailout
in 2008 and the NHS is being forced to
make 22 billions of savings why isn't
there more public outrage and what can
we do what practical steps can people
who support the HST well there is a
large a degree of public and awareness
and ignorance this is fueled by lack of
coverage of these issues or lack of
analysis particularly on the BBC get a
superficial analysis and the solution
tends to be propagating the
privatization so we have to break out of
the collective silence and try to
educate and inform the public that's the
first thing but the other important
thing is to understand how this fits in
to the grand scheme of the insurance
conversion and that takes a little bit
of understanding an explanation that's
why we've embarked on this film project
about the film yeah well there are three
elements to the film there are three
things that the private sector are after
first of all the budget 120 billion
recurring NHS budget they want that
secondly there's a land and the
buildings that's a terrific asset which
most of which is planned to be sold off
and handed over to property developers
and then finally you have the data NHS
data is comprehensive 50 plus million
people within any two things and this is
a treasure trove of data to companies
like Google and other companies who are
waiting in the wings to get their hands
on in fact the Royal Free Hospital in
London have done a deal with a company
owned by google deepmind which they have
handed over 1.2 million patient records
arise unknown oh yes but the other the
other thing that people need to realize
is their safety their future king is
being put at risk in the meantime
effectively the healthcare providers
like doctors and nurses are being gagged
by a culture of bullying and
intimidation if they raise concerns and
one case that I wish to highlight me I
can is that on dr. Chris day who raised
concerns about under starting in his
hospital he raised this with a body
called health education England which
looks after the training and appointment
of doctors and later he found that his
training number which is crucial to
progress in your career was removed
false allegations are made against him
and he's been fighting a two year long
legal battle through which it turns out
a loophole in employment law excludes
whistleblower protection for all 54,000
junior doctors in the country and the
government have refused to close this
loophole public not really aware this
are there because the BBC as you say the
coverage is very superficial isn't it
you have a NHS story every every six
weeks or so a normal as you said it's
pushing a sort of pro privatization
agenda I'd often well and then what the
what they're also doing is painting
Simon Stevie's CS evils are some
innocent intermediary but in fact if you
look as past history with he was the
chief executive of UnitedHealth global
which is one of the Americans business
insurance companies and he's heading up
and it is England this really should
ring alarm bells mighty a bit of the
1980s and British Rail the way that the
government they're willfully underfunded
British Rail they got the public to turn
against British world in a way so that
they could then come along in the 90s
and say look British Royal isn't working
the trains aren't working we've got a
privatized and hopefully the public
would think yes when it's got to be an
improvement is an element of that here
that's exactly what's happened we're now
in the defunding stage then you get to
making people angry and the solution
will be presented well the only way to
save this is top-up insurance so that's
why you've got this waiting list
announcement that they will increase you
and also have the restriction of
services such as restricting care for
people who are overweight or smokers who
drink alcohol so you have this narrative
of the undeserving sick yes I they said
it's coming more and more prepare the
ocean or social cohesion softening us up
for the final privatization steps and
it's interesting isn't it that the
opinion polls show that that saving NHS
comes very high on people's priorities
yet when we get to general elections
even by-elections he sees people vote
for parties or candidates and actually I
haven't got a good record on the NHS how
can we make sure that the NHS which is
probably the biggest issue that affects
all of us we're all going to need it we
all do need it how can we make sure that
stays at the top of it of the agenda
well I think it would be a mistake to
wait for the next election like lots of
damage is being done in the mean
time we need to put pressure on the
political representatives to actually
act in the public's interest
unfortunately labor Liberal Democrat and
the Tories have actually colluded with
this plan along date the labor
opposition are still very weak they are
not flagging up as I have done with you
the end game which is insurance
conversion so there has to be a genuine
ground swell of opinion amongst the
public to put pressure and say we're not
having this we've had privatisation of
our utilities our transport we're having
privatisation of our education system we
do not want that to happen to the NHS
we're going to end up with an insurance
system which is concerned with
generating profit at the expense of
providing patient care and that's not
something we want to go any teachers
because you talk about labor but their
savings that you know began under Labour
didn't need 2008-9 wasn't it when the
Labour Party put forward this plaid plan
for savings in HS and the Conservatives
have actually increased it as well it
made it worse well lately Labour
fragment of the nhf it set up hospitals
as foundation trusts which are like
independent arms length businesses and
they also brought in this fake
insolvency regime in 2009 and could
justify the closure of hospital based on
the debts of neighboring hospitals but
the other thing that label did before
they left office was commissioned equip
report which was written by the
management consultants for kennedy's and
in very outlined the sale of two-thirds
of NHS sites and also a 50-percent
productivity game within the staff now
how do you do that how do you make them
work twice as hard or you get rid of
half of them or you down skill them so a
cheaper workforce which would generate
more profit and this was Labour's legacy
I'm afraid can the NHS be say this is
the big question I mean it's probably on
life support now it's still doing a
great job you know hundreds of thousands
of doctors and nurses are doing
fantastic work every day can it be say
these are still time dr. Gill there is
time to save it the insurance companies
haven't taken it over yet we need to
flag up to the most self interest as
amongst us that an insurance will not
protect you in your time of need when
you become seriously sick and expensive
they will look for any
using to dump you and you are left
without care that's how the insurance
company works that's how private health
care works so we need to look after each
other's interest because in fact that
will be serving our own interests as
well I mean I have to look at the u.s.
don't we to see the nightmare of private
insurance healthcare over there yeah so
still in the US is about 30 million with
no insurance they have to take the risk
of out-of-pocket expenses to become ill
and it's a major course of a household
bankruptcy in the u.s. we do not want to
go to that system and in fact there's a
low pressure growing and English for
coming to a system closer to ours and
we're going in the opposite direction
and the funding question because is it
simply a question of warmer having more
money and reversing these savings or is
it also structural changes to end
privatization to end outsourcing we need
to focus on where the energy phys
hemorrhage hemorrhaging money my vet
finance initiative is a major financial
scandal which needs to be addressed and
also the running of the internal market
and the market bureaucracy would save
something upwards of 10 billion a year
well so there isn't a reason to
increased taxation or pretend that we
can't afford it anymore nor Daniel
English country in the world aren't we
we are and when the NHS to set up after
the war we were in much worse financial
situation than we are now very naughty
need to increase funding we need to
restore the NHS as a public service to
be publicly provided well thank you very
much dr. Gilbert our mothers button
again all the very best of luck with
your fill the great NHS I heist and
people can kind of relate to the
crowdfunding page on the website that's
right go to go fund me calm and if the
grey tentative five well unfortunately
that's all we have time for on the
sputnik this week I've been your Clark
standing in for George anger tree and as
George would say HB marvelous