An even bolder option would be to encourage private providers like the Circle health-care group, which took over the failing Hinchingbrooke hospital in Cambridge this year, or try to attract outsiders like Helios, a German company which specialises in improving badly managed health-care facilities, to compete for control of the weaker English hospital trusts.

ECONOMIST: Hospital takeovers

Harrington, the winner in 2007 and 2008, hit a double bogey at the first and never managed to recover on a day where his putting was badly off-colour.

BBC: The Open 2010: Rory McIlroy delighted with record round