It can be healthy to profit from the state To listen to the more hysterical voices on the Left, the various measures legislated for by the Coalition that came into force yesterday - chiefly the NHS commissioning reforms, the cut in the 50p rate of tax and various adjustments to the welfare and benefits system - represent a watershed in British history, a Year Zero as wrenching and revolutionary as anything contemplated by Robespierre or Pol Pot. In truth, as we argued yesterday, the real problem is that the Government has done too little, rather than too much, to wrench the state leviathan from its course. Indeed, there is one area in particular where the Coalition's enemies have been allowed to make too much of the running, and that is on the nature of profit. This has been particularly noticeable when it comes to the private sector, where making money has been recast, in many cases, as a sign of iniquity rather than ingenuity, and where tax breaks and regulatory changes designed to stimulate wealth creation have been condemned as handouts to the rich. Yet the problem is also acute in the public sector. Take, for example, the recent revelation that some doctors are using the NHS to support their own bank accounts by directing patients towards services in which they have a personal financial interest. Such behaviour is indeed, in the words of Sir Bruce Keogh, the health service's medical director, "utterly abhorrent." Everyone can agree that conflicts of interest of this type should and must be declared. Yet Labour appears keen to use this as a launch pad for a wider assault on competition of provision, condemning as "full-blown commercialisation" what is actually a long-overdue attempt to get proper value for money for patients and for taxpayers. Such rhetoric plays to an ancient belief, which Tony Blair never quite eradicated from his party, that government should not just fund services, but where at all possible provide them, too. The persistence of this creed is admirable, given the weight of evidence over many decades to disprove it. Yet it is also damaging. For example, Michael Gove, despite his courage in taking on the educational establishment, has stopped short of allowing for-profit companies to run schools, even though they would only succeed if they pleased the consumer, by attracting more pupils due to their higher standards. It is a similar story in health, where private firms could save money and increase patient satisfaction by driving down costs and improving performance. What matters should not be who is providing a public service, but how well they are doing it, and at what price. If there are those who can offer better provision and make a profit while doing so, then they should be embraced, rather than shunned.