Rescue the health service from Tory cuts and privatisation
As we kick off Heart Unions Week, here’s a good reminder of the work unions do.
Unite is fighting to save the NHS from cuts, closures and privatisation, with a huge national demonstration planned for March 4 in Tavistock Square, central London.
As the union said in a statement:
“Hospitals, GPs, mental health, ambulance and community services are on their knees. Private companies are gaining an ever greater foothold within the NHS.
Years of pay restraint has seen the value of NHS staff salaries reduce by 14 per cent since 2010.”
It adds:
“The government’s Sustainability and Transformation Plans (STPs) are a smokescreen for a massive programme of hospital and community service closures, and are its latest instrument for privatisation.”
As Dr Onkar Sahota, Labour’s London Assembly Health spokesman, wrote for Left Foot Forward in November, STPs have failed where they have been tried, but Jeremy Hunt wants them all across the counrty anyway.
Dr Sahota wrote:
“We need long term investment and a significant shift to preventative measures if the NHS is to meet the modern, changing, health and care needs of our country. Sustainability and Transformation Plans will achieve anything but.”
After the women’s march and the protest against Donald Trump’s travel bans, people will gather in London on March 4 to defend the NHS, its staff and its patients.
As the Unite statement said:
“The NHS is one of our greatest achievements. We cannot allow it to be undermined and ultimately destroyed.
Our NHS needs you to fight for it. We must march together, sending a clear message to the government – ‘the NHS will last as long as there are folk with the faith to fight for it.'”
For more on the Our NHS national demo click here.
For more on Heart Unions Week, click here:
See: Want to really ‘take back control’? Join a trade union
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