Egypt

The well-known radio personality gave an address in April, fromwhich this article has been extracted.     

THE INEXORABLE RISE IN THE UK NHS DRUGS BILL: RECENT POLICIES, FUTURE PROSPECTS

The UK National Health Service drugs bill has been the subject of controversy since the inception of the nhs . This article identifies the growth in the drugs bill and explores some of the factors driving the bill upward. The conclusions of this article are: that the drugs bill will continue to remain high on the political agenda; the government has only a limited amount of control on the drugs bill; various policies may counteract rather than complement each other; some of the policies may actually increase the drugs bill; however, many of the effects of the policies are unknown and there has been no rigorous assessment of the effects of any of the policies since 1948; and finally there is no robust evidence to suggest the drugs bill either does or does not represent good value for money.     

Catalysts and barriers: Explaining electoral reform in Western Europe

Most accounts of electoral system change tend to consider it as being driven by purely partisan interests. Political parties are expected to change the electoral rules as a way to maximise gains or minimise losses. However, little work has been done on the question of why electoral reforms are so scarce in spite of these potential benefits. In this study, a wide range of both factors that may foster (‘catalysts’) and ones that may hinder (‘barriers’) the change of electoral institutions are investigated. A statistical analysis is performed of 16 West European countries from 1975 to 2005, covering 23 reforms of the proportionality of their electoral systems. It is found that procedural barriers are more effective for explaining the likelihood of electoral reforms than (most of) the catalysts. Additionally, there are indications that courts may play a more active role in triggering reform than previously thought.