Master Spinmeister

Don't underestimate the power of the Dark Side

The delicious Dr Rant asks the world why nothing is happening. He has noted that the media have indeed blocked or shelved Dr Scot Jnr's story. Why should this be? Afterall, the story shows a violation of human rights and an abuse of power. The reasons are very simple indeed. Political control of the media is here to stay. There is no doubt that by now rubbish has probably fed to the media about Dr Scot Jnr. I know that was what happened in my case years ago. It is though difficult to fight against trash thrown in your direction.

I learned this very early on in life. Sadly, in the year 2000, I only have the verbatim accounts of various journalists who admitted to me at the time that the material on Ward 87 would be stopped from circulating around the media by the Department of Health. They were right. It did stop circulating. Not one newspaper featured a thing about the progress of the case.

Since the year 2000, despite being successful in a leading case against the GMC, no national newspaper featured it. I am not saying I am important in anyway, I am the least important person on this planet and I am the first one to admit that. The issues of patient care, junior doctors rights to whistleblowing important to the public and to doctors. I could only manage to get the progress of the story one local paper who has always remained faithful to the cause.

Any issue that is contrary to the interests of the Labour Party is shelved. I suspect the spin has improved slightly but those who bury bad news come from all sectors of the woods. The Department of Health are great spinmeisters. I should know, in June 2000, a room full of journalists turned up at my Human Rights in the NHS protest. Not one featured the protest. The only one that featured it was the independent Disability Times. There were rumours from all the journalists that the news had been stopped/gagged by the Department of Health. This was mentioned to me by at least 4 journalists.

I had no illusions about this great silencer that the Department of Health employed. I have the memos within my subject access request [DPA] where the Department of Health discusses"what line to take" with respect to the media and me.

This was one of the most important reasons I sent up http://www.nhsexposed.com and yes, there have been many efforts to take it down, to refuse me advertising and to keep silent about it. The media suddenly gets cramp when they are asked to mention the blog or the website. It is as if it is some sort of sin for them. It is fine for the media to lift and thieve material and ideas from there which they frequently do, but it is not good enough to mention. I find this an interesting phenomena. For the rationale of this we have to go back in time to a report about burying bad news.

Government spin was detailed here.

"Thanks to her memo suggesting the twin towers atrocity could be used as a cover to sneak out unpopular announcements, Ms Moore has come to stand for everything that is wrong with the government's media manipulation machine"

The Moore Scandal can be read here.

The details of the spinmeister email can be read on the Telegraph.

"Miss Moore's memo, written at 2.55pm on September 11, when millions of people were transfixed by the terrible television images of the terrorist attack, said: "It is now a very good day to get out anything we want to bury. Councillors expenses?"

The announcement she referred to related to a minor U-turn on pension rights for councillors."

There is no reason this sort of spin does not apply to medical news. In fact, anyone who recieves Department of Health press releases knows about the types of stories that are released to the media in response to bad news.

Dr Scot Jnr is a critic of the MMC. Dr Scot Jnr's case has to remain suppressed as it would cause public uproar if widely known. Sure, there may be one or two editors willing to take it up. They would though have to dislike the government to do so. We just have to look at the David Southall case to show how badly the government have spun the news.

It is of course all about control. The GMC and the Department of Health have the best spinmeisters. The only commodity they cannot control is the Internet. Because they cannot control the internet, they have their little scapegoats and use the NHS and GMC procedures to silence their critics. This is why there needs to be a multiplication of bloggers on this issue.

Media silence has been experienced by me many many many times. The pattern is very familiar. Dr Rant is quite right and I am not surprised at the media's reaction. We live in a totalitarian state which has a front of a so called democracy.This is the country where Jade Goody gets more media coverage than a violation of human rights or the death of patients.