Nanny's Prescription Glasses

Nanny is very proud of her work, yet she knows that not everyone shares her pride.

In fact she knows that some people, eg journalists, go out of their way to criticise what she does.

Now I know that this may come as something of a surprise to some of you, but Nanny has feelings too.

Prick her, does she not bleed?

Anyhoo, Nanny is getting fed up with the constant criticism of her "management" of the country; and has decided to go on the counter offensive.

She wants all of us to see the world as she does, through special rose coloured glasses (coming soon on the NHS).

In order to ensure that we see the world as she does, her first action will be to improve the reporting techniques of journalists; so that they only tell us the good things about Nanny.

To this end Nanny has commenced a special study of the media, to weed out all those nasty negative journalists who are criticising her. Nanny's Department of Health has begun publishing statistics on the output, and perceived "slant", of the journalists who write the most frequently about the state of the NHS.

Nanny has hired media consultants Millward Brown to assess every article published by the media according to whether it is positive, negative or neutral.

The results of the survey have highlighted 21 correspondents who reach the most readers, either because they wrote a lot or because their papers had the biggest circulations. Within these, 9 of them were very naughty; they had nothing positive to say about the NHS.

Ooh!

Seemingly Nic Cecil of the Sun has been identified as the journalist with the "highest reach", is he an orangutang?.

Most worryingly for Nanny, the Daily Mail is the paper with the "highest reach". The overwhelming majority of its 59 articles on the NHS during the month were negative or neutral, with only about 7% carrying a positive message about the NHS.


Now "clever" little exercises like this don't come cheap. The cost came to £200K.

No need to worry though, Nanny is not paying for it.

You are!

When questioned about the apparent waste of money, Nanny's Department of Health said:

"It was important to have this established on a scientific basis rather than hunch".

In further good news, Nanny is going to continue spending more money on this, the department will publish regular reviews of journalists' output over periods of six months.

Needless to say, no one would be penalised for taking a negative approach.

Do you believe that?

Additionally, it is expected that Nanny's other departments will also follow suit.

Well, as I said, it's not Nanny's money is it?