Thank Goodness for Honesty and Trust!

Do you need new -- lateral -- thinking for your own problems? email nick leth at gmail dot com. Need solutions? No worries. Now.

Gosh, it's nice to be reassured that there is no possibility of bribery in the health services. Right there, on the front page of The West ($745,000 in gifts to health officials, 25 May 11):

Health director-general Kim Snowball yesterday said the companies paying for trips signed a letter acknowledging that the trip did not place any obligations on doctors or the health service.

What a relief!

Yeah, right. As if.

Is Snowball stupid? Or ridiculously naive? Or does he believe that readers of The West are simpletons.

Weasel words?

In the same article we are given several examples of freebies provided to state health officials by major companies. One example is -- by implication -- perfectly alright because the company has "no existing relationship with the department":

Three North Metropolitan Health Service employees each accepted return business-class flights and three nights accommodation in Los Angeles worth a total of $28,488. It was paid for by health-care conglomerate Abbott Australasia, which has no existing relationship with the department. [my emphasis]

Have a look at Table 1 from a research paper published online:

I've chopped out the boring (ie irrelevant) bits. You can find the entire table online. It's simply the first result of a Google search which showed what I already knew to be true:

Abbott is one company that supplies analysis equipment to Royal Perth Hospital and (the group name) PathWest.

Abbott supply multi-million dollar equipment to health. There is a clear existing business relationship... So why did I use the heading, Weasel words?

The freebies were provided by Abbott to North Metropolitan Health employees. Oh, but Royal Perth Hospital is run by South Metropolitan Health! Plausible deniability? Weasel words.

Alston gets it wrong

Inside the same paper is Alston's take on the bribery allegations. Sorry, Alston, you're way off the mark!

The cartoon shows an airline traveller luxuriating in first class. "I'm a level 3 purchasing clerk at the department of health," he says.

If only...

The level 3 clerks may get muffins, perhaps even chocolates at Easter. First class flights? If only!

Business sweeteners target the customer's decision-makers. That's the higher-ups, those in charge.

You can bet that the three free flights -- and all the other expensive "no obligation" gifts -- went to managers. Senior managers, preferably.

Why buy friendship from the drones -- when you can buy decisions from the chiefs.

Independent thinking & independent analysis of your problems by Agamedes Consulting. Support for your thought: email nick leth at gmail dot com