This piece by Seumas Milne appears in The Guardian:
Unless decisive action is taken in the next few weeks, the National Health Service is heading for disaster. The battle over the coalition's plans to turn England's NHS inside out has been going on so long, the details are so arcane and claims of concessions so regular, it would be easy to imagine that the worst had been averted and common sense prevailed.
.... Cameron and Lansley insist they don't plan to privatise the NHS, of course. But that's exactly what's happening on the ground even before the bill hits the statute book. The first private company to take over an NHS hospital, the Tory-linked Circle Health, won the contract to run Hinchingbrooke hospital in Cambridgeshire in November, even as it admitted it may not be able to "provide a consistent level of service to its patients".
And the government has been in talks with international health corporations about taking over 20 more, while private companies are already running local doctors' services and preparing to administer the clinical commissioning groups of GPs due to take over the purchaser role in the coalition's new market model. Facts are being created on the ground.
You can read the whole article here.
Showing posts with label Save the NHS. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Save the NHS. Show all posts
Friday, January 27, 2012
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
The Coalition’s NHS changes ‘to cause irreparable harm’ say doctors
The BBC reports:
The overhaul of the NHS in England will cause irreparable harm, according to leading public health doctors.
In a letter to peers, who will debate the changes next week, nearly 400 public health experts said the changes must be rejected as they represented a risk to patient care and safety.
The doctors suggested it would fragment services, possibly threatening vaccination and screening campaigns.
The revelation that such influential members of the public health community have put their names to the letter comes on the day Health Secretary Andrew Lansley is to address the Conservative Party conference.
The Campaign for Public Ownership calls for peers to listen to the views of the medical profession, nurses, NHS workers and the general public and to reject the government's bill when it comes to the House of Lords next week.
The overhaul of the NHS in England will cause irreparable harm, according to leading public health doctors.
In a letter to peers, who will debate the changes next week, nearly 400 public health experts said the changes must be rejected as they represented a risk to patient care and safety.
The doctors suggested it would fragment services, possibly threatening vaccination and screening campaigns.
The revelation that such influential members of the public health community have put their names to the letter comes on the day Health Secretary Andrew Lansley is to address the Conservative Party conference.
The Campaign for Public Ownership calls for peers to listen to the views of the medical profession, nurses, NHS workers and the general public and to reject the government's bill when it comes to the House of Lords next week.
Friday, September 2, 2011
Save the NHS! Write to your MP ahead of next week's vote
There's just a few days to go before the Third Reading of the government's appalling NHS Bill.
The BMA have made clear their opposition to the bill here.
It is clear that the troubled passage of the Health and Social Care Bill reflects real concern over the future direction of the health service in England…….
the BMA continues to call for the Bill to be withdrawn or, at the very least, to be subject to further, significant amendment......
We believe there continues to be an inappropriate and misguided reliance on "market forces" to shape services.
If you haven't done so already, please sign the 38 Degrees Save the NHS petition, and also write to/email your MP ahead of next week's important vote.
As Guardian commentator Seumas Milne says, we cannot allow the abolition of the NHS in all but name.
The BMA have made clear their opposition to the bill here.
It is clear that the troubled passage of the Health and Social Care Bill reflects real concern over the future direction of the health service in England…….
the BMA continues to call for the Bill to be withdrawn or, at the very least, to be subject to further, significant amendment......
We believe there continues to be an inappropriate and misguided reliance on "market forces" to shape services.
If you haven't done so already, please sign the 38 Degrees Save the NHS petition, and also write to/email your MP ahead of next week's important vote.
As Guardian commentator Seumas Milne says, we cannot allow the abolition of the NHS in all but name.
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Neil Clark: The Coalition's Public services proposals will not mean more choice
This article, by CPO co-founder Neil Clark, appears on the Guardian's Comment is Free website.
Neil Clark: David Cameron wants us to believe that rolling back state provision will benefit the public. The opposite is true.
Thirty-two years after Margaret Thatcher swept into Downing Street promising to roll back the frontiers of the state, the neoliberal drive towards a fully privatised Britain is entering its final stages. The government's new Open Public Services white paper, revealed by David Cameron last week, may have passed under the radar somewhat due to the scandals engulfing the Murdoch media empire, but it's an important document nonetheless.
You can read the whole of the article here.
Neil Clark: David Cameron wants us to believe that rolling back state provision will benefit the public. The opposite is true.
Thirty-two years after Margaret Thatcher swept into Downing Street promising to roll back the frontiers of the state, the neoliberal drive towards a fully privatised Britain is entering its final stages. The government's new Open Public Services white paper, revealed by David Cameron last week, may have passed under the radar somewhat due to the scandals engulfing the Murdoch media empire, but it's an important document nonetheless.
You can read the whole of the article here.
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
‘A good day to bury bad news‘-full speed ahead for NHS privatisation
The Guardian reports:
The government will open up more than £1bn of NHS services to competition from private companies and charities, the health secretary announced on Tuesday, increasing fears that it will inevitably lead to the "privatisation of the health service".
Labour questioned the policy, which the shadow health secretary John Healey said was "not about giving more control to patients, but setting up a full-scale market."
His colleague Emily Thornberry, the party's health spokeswoman, added that "today is a good day to announce the policy because everyone is preoccupied with telephone hacking. (They) hope no one will notice it". This theme was picked up on Twitter with a stream of comments about "it being a good day to bury bad news"
The government will open up more than £1bn of NHS services to competition from private companies and charities, the health secretary announced on Tuesday, increasing fears that it will inevitably lead to the "privatisation of the health service".
Labour questioned the policy, which the shadow health secretary John Healey said was "not about giving more control to patients, but setting up a full-scale market."
His colleague Emily Thornberry, the party's health spokeswoman, added that "today is a good day to announce the policy because everyone is preoccupied with telephone hacking. (They) hope no one will notice it". This theme was picked up on Twitter with a stream of comments about "it being a good day to bury bad news"
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Government defeats Labour challenge to NHS plans
The BBC reports:
The government has fought off a Commons challenge to its controversial plans to shake up the health service in England.
MPs rejected a Labour call for the proposals to be abandoned, but the coalition's parliamentary majority was cut by more than a third.
Labour called the changes "damaging and unjustified", and the Royal College of GPs said they risked "unravelling and dismantling" the NHS.
Ministers are promising "substantive" changes after criticism by Lib Dem MPs.
The Health and Social Care Bill would give GPs more control over NHS budgets, and give the private sector a greater role.
More here.
The government has fought off a Commons challenge to its controversial plans to shake up the health service in England.
MPs rejected a Labour call for the proposals to be abandoned, but the coalition's parliamentary majority was cut by more than a third.
Labour called the changes "damaging and unjustified", and the Royal College of GPs said they risked "unravelling and dismantling" the NHS.
Ministers are promising "substantive" changes after criticism by Lib Dem MPs.
The Health and Social Care Bill would give GPs more control over NHS budgets, and give the private sector a greater role.
More here.
Friday, May 6, 2011
Neil Clark: Privatised Britain is not a fait accompli
This piece, by CPO co-founder Neil Clark,appears on the Guardian’s Comment is Free website.
Keep standing up for the state – a leaked memo shows the coalition fears public reaction to outsourcing of public services.
"A return to the 1990s with whole-scale outsourcing to the private sector – this would be unpalatable to the present administration" Tuesday's leaked memo of a meeting between business chiefs and Francis Maude, the minister for the Cabinet Office – which reveals how the coalition is having second thoughts about the scale of its ambitious and ideologically driven programme of ending the "state's monopoly" of the provision of public services – is undoubtedly welcome.
But supporters of public ownership shouldn't be popping the champagne corks just yet.
The whole article can be read here.
Keep standing up for the state – a leaked memo shows the coalition fears public reaction to outsourcing of public services.
"A return to the 1990s with whole-scale outsourcing to the private sector – this would be unpalatable to the present administration" Tuesday's leaked memo of a meeting between business chiefs and Francis Maude, the minister for the Cabinet Office – which reveals how the coalition is having second thoughts about the scale of its ambitious and ideologically driven programme of ending the "state's monopoly" of the provision of public services – is undoubtedly welcome.
But supporters of public ownership shouldn't be popping the champagne corks just yet.
The whole article can be read here.
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Please sign the Petition to Save the NHS!
You can sign the 38 Degrees petition to Save the NHS here. Already they’ve got over 240,000 signatures- let's help them achieve the 300,000 mark!
Monday, March 7, 2011
'NHS reforms will turn health service back to 1930s'
The Daily Mail reports:
Plans to reform the NHS could return healthcare provision to the days of the 1930s and 40s, one of Britain's leading doctors has warned.
Dr Mark Porter, chairman of the British Medical Association's hospital consultants committee, criticised health secretary Andrew Lansley's plan to make NHS hospitals compete with private companies.
Opening NHS care in England to 'any willing provider' could result in the closure of local hospitals and see some patients denied care by private providers because they are expensive to treat, he said.
The Health and Social Care Bill, currently going through parliament, will see £80billion of the NHS budget handed to GPs, enabling them to commission services.
Dr Porter told the Guardian: 'Very deliberately the Government wishes to turn back the clock to the 1930s and 1940s, when there were private, charitable and co-operative providers.
'But that system failed to provide comprehensive and universal service for the citizens of this country. That's why health was nationalised. But they're proposing to go back to the days before the NHS.
You can read the full article here, and the original Guardian piece here.
Plans to reform the NHS could return healthcare provision to the days of the 1930s and 40s, one of Britain's leading doctors has warned.
Dr Mark Porter, chairman of the British Medical Association's hospital consultants committee, criticised health secretary Andrew Lansley's plan to make NHS hospitals compete with private companies.
Opening NHS care in England to 'any willing provider' could result in the closure of local hospitals and see some patients denied care by private providers because they are expensive to treat, he said.
The Health and Social Care Bill, currently going through parliament, will see £80billion of the NHS budget handed to GPs, enabling them to commission services.
Dr Porter told the Guardian: 'Very deliberately the Government wishes to turn back the clock to the 1930s and 1940s, when there were private, charitable and co-operative providers.
'But that system failed to provide comprehensive and universal service for the citizens of this country. That's why health was nationalised. But they're proposing to go back to the days before the NHS.
You can read the full article here, and the original Guardian piece here.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Neil Clark: Margaret Thatcher's extremism has already been outdone by this coalition
This piece by CPO co-founder Neil Clark, on the coalition government's free-market extremism, appears on the Guardian Comment is Free website.
Ask any genuine socialist or progressive which was the most extremist British government since the war and it's long odds-on that they'd say one of the three administrations of Margaret Thatcher. But I believe that is now an outdated judgment. For when it comes to political extremism the present government has already outdone Thatcher.
The coalition, which its supporters ludicrously claims occupies the centre ground, seems hellbent on privatising the entire British state.
Everything must go: our publicly owned forests, our postal service, our state-owned bookmaker, our air traffic control. And though the government denies that its health bill represents the privatisation of the NHS, there can be little doubt that its real aim is to open the door for profit-hungry private companies to take over surgeries and hospitals.
You can read the whole of the article here.
Ask any genuine socialist or progressive which was the most extremist British government since the war and it's long odds-on that they'd say one of the three administrations of Margaret Thatcher. But I believe that is now an outdated judgment. For when it comes to political extremism the present government has already outdone Thatcher.
The coalition, which its supporters ludicrously claims occupies the centre ground, seems hellbent on privatising the entire British state.
Everything must go: our publicly owned forests, our postal service, our state-owned bookmaker, our air traffic control. And though the government denies that its health bill represents the privatisation of the NHS, there can be little doubt that its real aim is to open the door for profit-hungry private companies to take over surgeries and hospitals.
You can read the whole of the article here.
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Medical profession warn of the privatisation threat to NHS
The Daily Mail reports:
Dr Richard Vautrey, deputy chairman of the British Medical Association's GPs Committee, warned there was 'chaos developing around the country' ahead of the reforms to the NHS.
He said: 'We were told before the election that there would be no further reorganisations of the NHS and yet we are just about to embark on one of the biggest reorganisations in 60 years.
'We're already seeing Primary Care Trusts imploding and GP groups are having to step up to the mark to fill the gap that is being left behind just to keep the NHS running.
'This is chaos developing around the country. It's a great concern because the primary plank of the reforms is to increase competition and improve the opportunities for large multinational companies to take a stake in running and providing services within the NHS. That's not good for patients.'
Dr Richard Vautrey, deputy chairman of the British Medical Association's GPs Committee, warned there was 'chaos developing around the country' ahead of the reforms to the NHS.
He said: 'We were told before the election that there would be no further reorganisations of the NHS and yet we are just about to embark on one of the biggest reorganisations in 60 years.
'We're already seeing Primary Care Trusts imploding and GP groups are having to step up to the mark to fill the gap that is being left behind just to keep the NHS running.
'This is chaos developing around the country. It's a great concern because the primary plank of the reforms is to increase competition and improve the opportunities for large multinational companies to take a stake in running and providing services within the NHS. That's not good for patients.'
Friday, August 6, 2010
Neil Clark: Open Wide for Public Service Destruction
This column by CPO co-founder Neil Clark appears in the Morning Star.
NEIL CLARK examines the coalition government's plans to carry on the backdoor firesale of our assets.
July 6 2010 marked the 50th anniversary of the death of the great Welsh socialist Aneurin Bevan, the father of the NHS.
Just six days after the anniversary, Tory Health Minister Andrew Lansley announced radical government plans which, if carried out, will mark the end of Bevan's great, humane creation in all but name.
The extent of the reforms, which allow all hospitals to leave public ownership as well as scrapping primary health care trusts and the revenue cap on private patients, shocked many political observers. They were a clear breach of Lansley's own pre-election pledge not to introduce any major structural reform of the NHS.
But those who appreciate that the "progressive" Con-Dem government bats for capital and not for the ordinary British people would not have been surprised in the least.
In January, the Daily Telegraph revealed that Lansley, then shadow health secretary, had received £21,000 for the running of his private office from private equity tycoon John Nash, chairman of Care UK and several other health companies.
In company documents Nash, who also gave the Tories £60,000 in September 2009, enthused over "recent policy statements by the opposition Conservative Party in the UK which have substantially strengthened their commitment to more open market reform to allow new providers of NHS services and for greater freedom for patients to choose their GP and hospital provider."
For privateers like Nash the trouble with Labour was that after the fall of Tony Blair the "open market reform" of the NHS was proceeding too slowly.
Now Nash and his fellow private healthcare providers have got the fast-track "reforming" government they want. But for pro-privatisation politicians like Lansley there remains a problem.
Despite the relentless propaganda of neoliberal think tanks and NHS-bashing columns by right-wing writers such as Janet Daley, Simon Heffer and Richard Littlejohn, the NHS remains an enormously popular institution. It's loved not just by socialists and social democrats, but by Conservative voters too.
If the government announced that the NHS was to be privatised en bloc there'd be a huge public outcry. So Lansley needs to present his reforms as "liberating" the NHS and achieve privatisation through the backdoor.
The government is clearly using the destruction of NHS dentistry as its model.
From the 1990s onwards, private dental chains started buying up NHS practices and converting them to private-only practices. The value of private dentistry grew from £289m in 1994-95 to just under £2bn in 2001-2. And costs for treatments soared - on average private treatments are four times more expensive than those offered on the NHS.
Millions of Britons, unable to pay the higher costs and without an NHS practice in their area, simply stopped going to the dentist altogether. As a result tooth decay, mouth cancer and other oral diseases rose sharply.
As I highlighted in the New Statesman in 2003, "A predominantly private dental service inevitably means a two-tier service: good mouths and gleaming smiles for the rich; disease, tooth decay and emergency extraction dentistry for the rest."
What we are heading for if the coalition gets its way is a predominantly private health service. As in dentistry, that will mean a two-tier service - good health and prompt treatment for the rich, longer waiting times and a second-class service for the rest.
How Nye Bevan must be turning in his grave.
Transport failure
Back in the 1980s, a group of fanatical neoliberals calling themselves the Adam Smith Institute (ASI) called for the deregulation of Britain's bus industry and the privatisation of the state-owned National Bus Company. The government listened to their advice and today Britain has the most expensive buses in Europe.
A decade later the same group of fanatical neoliberals called for the privatisation of British Rail. Despite the warnings of wise old anti-Thatcherite Tories such as Sir Ian Gilmour, who thought privatising the rail network was "crazy," John Major's government listened to their advice and sold off the railways.
The result? Britain has the most fragmented and expensive railway system in Europe, if not the entire world.
You'd have thought that given their disastrous track record - no pun intended - the ASI would by now have done the honourable thing and disappeared from public life.
Not a bit of it. The group is still active today - and still coming out with "free market" claptrap. Their latest proposal is for the TV licence fee to be abolished and the BBC to instead become a voluntary subscription service. Such a move would, the institute argues, encourage the BBC "to compete with the big US studios."
Well I don't know about you, dear reader, but I don't want the BBC to "compete with the big US studios." I only want the state-owned broadcaster to continue to produce the good-quality programmes it has done for years.
Implementation of the earlier "crazy" ASI ideas led to the destruction of the National Bus Company and British Rail. Let's make sure it doesn't claim a third scalp with the BBC.
Energy rip-off
"Why does NO-ONE step in and do something about these big companies robbing customers. I struggle with my gas especially when it's cold and it really at times has been a choice between being warm and buying food/paying other bills etc ... it's criminal and something really should be done about it," wrote a commenter on the Daily Mirror's website.
They were responding to news that British Gas had almost doubled its profits to £583m in the first six months of 2010.
Public anger with the corporate profiteers is certainly growing. It will continue to grow as living standards for the majority fall, due to the government's swingeing cuts in public spending. More and more people are waking up to the fact that the battle is not between the middle and working classes, but between a small gang of corporate profiteers and everyone else.
This gang of profiteers is screwing all of us and it will continue to do so until we make a clean break with neoliberalism and bring back into public ownership all the assets which have been privatised in the last 30 years.
NEIL CLARK examines the coalition government's plans to carry on the backdoor firesale of our assets.
July 6 2010 marked the 50th anniversary of the death of the great Welsh socialist Aneurin Bevan, the father of the NHS.
Just six days after the anniversary, Tory Health Minister Andrew Lansley announced radical government plans which, if carried out, will mark the end of Bevan's great, humane creation in all but name.
The extent of the reforms, which allow all hospitals to leave public ownership as well as scrapping primary health care trusts and the revenue cap on private patients, shocked many political observers. They were a clear breach of Lansley's own pre-election pledge not to introduce any major structural reform of the NHS.
But those who appreciate that the "progressive" Con-Dem government bats for capital and not for the ordinary British people would not have been surprised in the least.
In January, the Daily Telegraph revealed that Lansley, then shadow health secretary, had received £21,000 for the running of his private office from private equity tycoon John Nash, chairman of Care UK and several other health companies.
In company documents Nash, who also gave the Tories £60,000 in September 2009, enthused over "recent policy statements by the opposition Conservative Party in the UK which have substantially strengthened their commitment to more open market reform to allow new providers of NHS services and for greater freedom for patients to choose their GP and hospital provider."
For privateers like Nash the trouble with Labour was that after the fall of Tony Blair the "open market reform" of the NHS was proceeding too slowly.
Now Nash and his fellow private healthcare providers have got the fast-track "reforming" government they want. But for pro-privatisation politicians like Lansley there remains a problem.
Despite the relentless propaganda of neoliberal think tanks and NHS-bashing columns by right-wing writers such as Janet Daley, Simon Heffer and Richard Littlejohn, the NHS remains an enormously popular institution. It's loved not just by socialists and social democrats, but by Conservative voters too.
If the government announced that the NHS was to be privatised en bloc there'd be a huge public outcry. So Lansley needs to present his reforms as "liberating" the NHS and achieve privatisation through the backdoor.
The government is clearly using the destruction of NHS dentistry as its model.
From the 1990s onwards, private dental chains started buying up NHS practices and converting them to private-only practices. The value of private dentistry grew from £289m in 1994-95 to just under £2bn in 2001-2. And costs for treatments soared - on average private treatments are four times more expensive than those offered on the NHS.
Millions of Britons, unable to pay the higher costs and without an NHS practice in their area, simply stopped going to the dentist altogether. As a result tooth decay, mouth cancer and other oral diseases rose sharply.
As I highlighted in the New Statesman in 2003, "A predominantly private dental service inevitably means a two-tier service: good mouths and gleaming smiles for the rich; disease, tooth decay and emergency extraction dentistry for the rest."
What we are heading for if the coalition gets its way is a predominantly private health service. As in dentistry, that will mean a two-tier service - good health and prompt treatment for the rich, longer waiting times and a second-class service for the rest.
How Nye Bevan must be turning in his grave.
Transport failure
Back in the 1980s, a group of fanatical neoliberals calling themselves the Adam Smith Institute (ASI) called for the deregulation of Britain's bus industry and the privatisation of the state-owned National Bus Company. The government listened to their advice and today Britain has the most expensive buses in Europe.
A decade later the same group of fanatical neoliberals called for the privatisation of British Rail. Despite the warnings of wise old anti-Thatcherite Tories such as Sir Ian Gilmour, who thought privatising the rail network was "crazy," John Major's government listened to their advice and sold off the railways.
The result? Britain has the most fragmented and expensive railway system in Europe, if not the entire world.
You'd have thought that given their disastrous track record - no pun intended - the ASI would by now have done the honourable thing and disappeared from public life.
Not a bit of it. The group is still active today - and still coming out with "free market" claptrap. Their latest proposal is for the TV licence fee to be abolished and the BBC to instead become a voluntary subscription service. Such a move would, the institute argues, encourage the BBC "to compete with the big US studios."
Well I don't know about you, dear reader, but I don't want the BBC to "compete with the big US studios." I only want the state-owned broadcaster to continue to produce the good-quality programmes it has done for years.
Implementation of the earlier "crazy" ASI ideas led to the destruction of the National Bus Company and British Rail. Let's make sure it doesn't claim a third scalp with the BBC.
Energy rip-off
"Why does NO-ONE step in and do something about these big companies robbing customers. I struggle with my gas especially when it's cold and it really at times has been a choice between being warm and buying food/paying other bills etc ... it's criminal and something really should be done about it," wrote a commenter on the Daily Mirror's website.
They were responding to news that British Gas had almost doubled its profits to £583m in the first six months of 2010.
Public anger with the corporate profiteers is certainly growing. It will continue to grow as living standards for the majority fall, due to the government's swingeing cuts in public spending. More and more people are waking up to the fact that the battle is not between the middle and working classes, but between a small gang of corporate profiteers and everyone else.
This gang of profiteers is screwing all of us and it will continue to do so until we make a clean break with neoliberalism and bring back into public ownership all the assets which have been privatised in the last 30 years.
Thursday, July 15, 2010
We cannot allow the end of the NHS in all but name
In reality, Lansley's health white paper opens the door to the comprehensive privatisation of healthcare and the end of the NHS as a national service. If the plans are taken to their logical conclusion, by 2015 the NHS will be little more than a brand. From a major public service with a million employees, it will have become a central fund with a minimal workforce, commissioning services from a string of private companies in a fully-fledged healthcare market.
"The bottom line of this is the abolition of the NHS," Dr David Price of Edinburgh University argues. "It will remove the government's duty to provide a universal healthcare service." His colleague, Professor Allyson Pollock, believes it will lead to "full privatisation".
You can read the whole of Seumas Milne’s article on the threat to the NHS posed by the Coalition government’s new reforms, here.
"The bottom line of this is the abolition of the NHS," Dr David Price of Edinburgh University argues. "It will remove the government's duty to provide a universal healthcare service." His colleague, Professor Allyson Pollock, believes it will lead to "full privatisation".
You can read the whole of Seumas Milne’s article on the threat to the NHS posed by the Coalition government’s new reforms, here.
Monday, March 8, 2010
The Final Chapter for Libraries?
This column on public ownership, by CPO co-founder Neil Clark, appears in the Morning Star.
The NHS is a great example of socialism in action. Public libraries are another. The idea of a place where all members of the community can go to borrow books which are communally owned is a quite wonderful one and totally at odds with neoliberal ideology, which prefers private - and not public - provision.
This is probably why, in this age of neoliberalism, public libraries in Britain are under grave threat.
A new report by the Valuation Office Agency showed that Britain has lost nearly 200 public libraries since 1997.
The number of books available to be borrowed has fallen dramatically - by 13 million in the period 2003-9. And worse could be to come, with swingeing cutbacks in local government spending likely to reduce the library service still further.
Part of the problem with the decline in libraries is that a new generation of people, brought up in an age obsessed with private ownership, prefer to buy books from bookshops rather than borrow them free of charge from their local library.
In 1979, by contrast, two-and-a-half times as many books were loaned by libraries than were bought at bookshops.
It's revealing that older people - brought up in a more collectivist era - use public libraries much more than younger Britons whose formative years were in an acquisitive society where private ownership became our country's new religion.
To reverse the decline in public libraries, therefore, we don't just have to increase spending on them. We need to change the whole ethos of our society to one where people once again relish sharing communally owned goods.
Hoping for change in Germany
One of the most disappointing political events of the last year in western Europe was the return to government in Germany, after an 11-year absence, of the fanatically pro-big business Free Democratic Party (FDP).
The FDP, a partner in the current Christian Democrat (CDU)-led coalition, favours massive cuts in public spending, cuts in the top rate of income tax and further privatisation.
The new German government has stated its intention to proceed with a partial privatisation of the country's state-owned railway Deutsche Bahn.
But the good news is that the plan has met opposition from within the government itself.
Transport Minister Peter Ramsauer - a member of the Christian Social Union party, the Bavarian sister party of Angela Merkel's CDU - said he was not prepared to "squander economic assets" and blamed privatisation plans for the deterioration in services on the Deutsche Bahn-owned S-Bahn in Berlin.
The battle going on within the German government is one between fanatical neoliberals - the FDP - and the more moderate conservative protectors of the Rhineland model.
Let's hope the latter, with help from unions and the German left, can defeat the former and keep Germany's excellent publicly owned railway on track. And let's hope too that the stay in government of the extremist FDP is extremely short-lived.
Tackling the real problem in the NHS
The script is a familiar one. Before a state-owned enterprise is privatised, it is necessary to convince the public that the enterprise in question is failing to deliver the goods and is in urgent need of "reform."
That's what happened in the 1990s with British Rail. And it's what's happening today with the NHS.
Anti-NHS propagandists have made great capital out of a recent report on the failures at Stafford hospital, where at least 400 patients were held to have died due to substandard conditions and care in the period between 2005-8.
But as Unite's national officer for health David Fleming has pointed out, Stafford's problems were not caused by public ownership but by the obsession with what he describes as the "target-obsessed privatisation culture."
Stafford hospital was run by the Mid-Staffordshire Foundation Trust. The Department of Health claims that foundation trusts are "at the cutting edge of the government's commitment to the decentralisation of public services" - which is neoliberal-speak for "they are a great back-door way to achieve privatisation of the NHS."
With their commercialised, profit-obsessed approach - and their £180k chief executives - foundation trusts are inimical to the very ethos of Nye Bevan's NHS.
Last month it was revealed that Royal Surrey County NHS Foundation Trust made a profit of over £300,000 in one year by selling abroad £4m of drugs intended for use in Britain.
The best way to make sure that the deaths at Stafford are not repeated is to scrap foundation trusts and restore the NHS to its original, 1940s socialist ideals, where the needs of patients are put before profits. And that also means bringing all ancillary services, such as cleaning and catering, back in-house.
End the annual energy profits charade
It's become an annual event. Britain's privatised energy companies announce enormous profits having failed to pass on the reduced price of gas to consumers.
Cue harsh criticism from Ofgem and expressions of shock and outrage from politicians and media commentators.
Meanwhile things carry on as before, with the privatised companies continuing to fleece the public.
The one thing that will put an end to this annual charade is the measure that none of our three major parties, still wedded to Thatcherite dogma, will even contemplate - the renationalisation of Britain's entire energy sector.
Public limited companies will always put the interests of shareholders before the interests of the general public. If we want the interests of the public to come before profits, we must have public ownership. It really is as simple as that.
The NHS is a great example of socialism in action. Public libraries are another. The idea of a place where all members of the community can go to borrow books which are communally owned is a quite wonderful one and totally at odds with neoliberal ideology, which prefers private - and not public - provision.
This is probably why, in this age of neoliberalism, public libraries in Britain are under grave threat.
A new report by the Valuation Office Agency showed that Britain has lost nearly 200 public libraries since 1997.
The number of books available to be borrowed has fallen dramatically - by 13 million in the period 2003-9. And worse could be to come, with swingeing cutbacks in local government spending likely to reduce the library service still further.
Part of the problem with the decline in libraries is that a new generation of people, brought up in an age obsessed with private ownership, prefer to buy books from bookshops rather than borrow them free of charge from their local library.
In 1979, by contrast, two-and-a-half times as many books were loaned by libraries than were bought at bookshops.
It's revealing that older people - brought up in a more collectivist era - use public libraries much more than younger Britons whose formative years were in an acquisitive society where private ownership became our country's new religion.
To reverse the decline in public libraries, therefore, we don't just have to increase spending on them. We need to change the whole ethos of our society to one where people once again relish sharing communally owned goods.
Hoping for change in Germany
One of the most disappointing political events of the last year in western Europe was the return to government in Germany, after an 11-year absence, of the fanatically pro-big business Free Democratic Party (FDP).
The FDP, a partner in the current Christian Democrat (CDU)-led coalition, favours massive cuts in public spending, cuts in the top rate of income tax and further privatisation.
The new German government has stated its intention to proceed with a partial privatisation of the country's state-owned railway Deutsche Bahn.
But the good news is that the plan has met opposition from within the government itself.
Transport Minister Peter Ramsauer - a member of the Christian Social Union party, the Bavarian sister party of Angela Merkel's CDU - said he was not prepared to "squander economic assets" and blamed privatisation plans for the deterioration in services on the Deutsche Bahn-owned S-Bahn in Berlin.
The battle going on within the German government is one between fanatical neoliberals - the FDP - and the more moderate conservative protectors of the Rhineland model.
Let's hope the latter, with help from unions and the German left, can defeat the former and keep Germany's excellent publicly owned railway on track. And let's hope too that the stay in government of the extremist FDP is extremely short-lived.
Tackling the real problem in the NHS
The script is a familiar one. Before a state-owned enterprise is privatised, it is necessary to convince the public that the enterprise in question is failing to deliver the goods and is in urgent need of "reform."
That's what happened in the 1990s with British Rail. And it's what's happening today with the NHS.
Anti-NHS propagandists have made great capital out of a recent report on the failures at Stafford hospital, where at least 400 patients were held to have died due to substandard conditions and care in the period between 2005-8.
But as Unite's national officer for health David Fleming has pointed out, Stafford's problems were not caused by public ownership but by the obsession with what he describes as the "target-obsessed privatisation culture."
Stafford hospital was run by the Mid-Staffordshire Foundation Trust. The Department of Health claims that foundation trusts are "at the cutting edge of the government's commitment to the decentralisation of public services" - which is neoliberal-speak for "they are a great back-door way to achieve privatisation of the NHS."
With their commercialised, profit-obsessed approach - and their £180k chief executives - foundation trusts are inimical to the very ethos of Nye Bevan's NHS.
Last month it was revealed that Royal Surrey County NHS Foundation Trust made a profit of over £300,000 in one year by selling abroad £4m of drugs intended for use in Britain.
The best way to make sure that the deaths at Stafford are not repeated is to scrap foundation trusts and restore the NHS to its original, 1940s socialist ideals, where the needs of patients are put before profits. And that also means bringing all ancillary services, such as cleaning and catering, back in-house.
End the annual energy profits charade
It's become an annual event. Britain's privatised energy companies announce enormous profits having failed to pass on the reduced price of gas to consumers.
Cue harsh criticism from Ofgem and expressions of shock and outrage from politicians and media commentators.
Meanwhile things carry on as before, with the privatised companies continuing to fleece the public.
The one thing that will put an end to this annual charade is the measure that none of our three major parties, still wedded to Thatcherite dogma, will even contemplate - the renationalisation of Britain's entire energy sector.
Public limited companies will always put the interests of shareholders before the interests of the general public. If we want the interests of the public to come before profits, we must have public ownership. It really is as simple as that.
Friday, February 19, 2010
The NHS under threat: the first private operator of a general hospital
Will Stone in the Morning Star reports:
One of five firms is set to carve a damaging scar onto the face of the NHS by becoming the first private operator of a general hospital - a prospect experts have labelled as "the last nail in the coffin" for the health service.
Hinchingbrooke in Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire, lost its only NHS bidder earlier this week in the Cambridge University Hospitals Trust, whose withdrawal has opened the way for one of five private health providers to take control.
Once the contract is awarded by the East of England health authority, Hinchingbrooke will become the first NHS hospital of its kind in Britain to be operated by a private firm.
The hospital has been labelled as "debt-ridden" with a deficit of around £40 million, but Unison head of health Karen Jennings claimed the debt is "no worse than many other trusts" which are bogged down in private contracts.
She described plans to hand over the running of the hospital to a private company as a "dangerous experiment" which flew in the face of the government's insistence that the NHS is its preferred provider.
One of five firms is set to carve a damaging scar onto the face of the NHS by becoming the first private operator of a general hospital - a prospect experts have labelled as "the last nail in the coffin" for the health service.
Hinchingbrooke in Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire, lost its only NHS bidder earlier this week in the Cambridge University Hospitals Trust, whose withdrawal has opened the way for one of five private health providers to take control.
Once the contract is awarded by the East of England health authority, Hinchingbrooke will become the first NHS hospital of its kind in Britain to be operated by a private firm.
The hospital has been labelled as "debt-ridden" with a deficit of around £40 million, but Unison head of health Karen Jennings claimed the debt is "no worse than many other trusts" which are bogged down in private contracts.
She described plans to hand over the running of the hospital to a private company as a "dangerous experiment" which flew in the face of the government's insistence that the NHS is its preferred provider.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Private Health Companies milking the NHS for £1bn for work they did not carry out
From the Sunday Express
PRIVATE health companies have milked the NHS for £1billion for operations and treatments that were never carried out.
The findings, gathered through Freedom of Information requests, have led to calls for an inquiry into flagship Independent Sector Treatment Centres.
Last night new Health Secretary Andy Burnham faced demands to disclose the Government’s deals.
The ISTCs were launched five years ago to allow private companies to help reduce NHS waiting lists.
Allyson Pollock, a finance expert who undertook the research, found some were under-used due to problems and other were unpopular because of their location.
She said: “There is nothing efficient about the NHS paying for thousands of operations that have not been carried out and the private sector pocketing the money.”
PRIVATE health companies have milked the NHS for £1billion for operations and treatments that were never carried out.
The findings, gathered through Freedom of Information requests, have led to calls for an inquiry into flagship Independent Sector Treatment Centres.
Last night new Health Secretary Andy Burnham faced demands to disclose the Government’s deals.
The ISTCs were launched five years ago to allow private companies to help reduce NHS waiting lists.
Allyson Pollock, a finance expert who undertook the research, found some were under-used due to problems and other were unpopular because of their location.
She said: “There is nothing efficient about the NHS paying for thousands of operations that have not been carried out and the private sector pocketing the money.”
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
The Battle for Our NHS
This article, by CPO co-founder Neil Clark, appears in the Morning Star.
You can be fairly sure that when neoliberals tell us that such and such a "reform" will be good for us, they really mean that "reform" will be good for capital and not for the majority of the public.
The neoliberals said that selling off the railways would lead to better service and lower fares. They also said that privatising gas, electricity and water would reduce household bills. And now they would like us to believe that the establishment of polyclinics will improve health care.
Don't believe a word of it.
A 2008 King's Fund report said that polyclinics could pose "significant risks for patient care." It also found that "there is no evidence that larger GP practices deliver higher quality care than smaller ones and that "there is ... evidence that quality may be decreased in certain cases."
The report also warned that "a major centralisation of GP services into polyclinics would make it more difficult for patients to visit their GP, especially those living in rural areas."
In addition, a new study by Kent GP Dr Hendrik Beerstecher has found that average-sized GP surgeries are just as good as "super-surgeries" at providing extra services. He looked at 384 practices and found no difference between the range of extra services offered by standard surgeries and polyclinics.
"I am not sure why the government is pushing ahead with polyclinics. As the study shows, there is no evidence that they provide more services so why are we having them set up all across the country?" he asked.
Why indeed? The answer to Dr Beerstecher's question is that polyclinics make it easier for the government to further its objective of privatising the NHS by stealth.
Big corporations will be able to put in multiple bids to run the new polyclinics and, if the government's plans are allowed to go through, GP services will soon be in the hands of multinational corporations, such as the US company UnitedHealth.
Corporate-run polyclinics will put profit maximisation ahead of the interests of patients - dealing a fatal blow to the whole ethos of the NHS.
We must not let it happen.
DON'T think the neoliberal ideologues who have dominated the public discourse over the past 30 years will go down without a fight.
Despite the total discrediting of the "free market" economic system they advocate, a group of influential neoliberal think tanks are still trying to persuade us that the answer to the problems we face today is yet more "market-based solutions." One such think-tank is Reform.
Reform says its mission "is to set out a better way to deliver public services." And the director of Reform, a former Conservative policy wonk called Andrew Haldenby, wants "smaller government."
In a recent article, he enthused over a sentence in the new government white paper on public-sector reform which said that "a responsive state should withdraw from areas in which it is no longer needed."
There's no prizes for guessing which area Haldenby and his fellow neoliberal fanatics think the state should withdraw from.
In a recent report, Reform called for "radical change" in health-care provision in Britain, with "other insurers" allowed to join the system and the NHS replaced with a National Health Protection Service.
We all know who would benefit from such "radical" changes - it certainly wouldn't be you or I, dear reader.
Another fine mess...
WHAT would you do with £97 billion? You might have thought that any government or country which received such an enormous sum would be quite a prosperous place, with no need for IMF bail-outs or other rescue packages. Think again.
The Hungarian state has received 105bn euros in privatisation revenue for the years 1990-2007, a period during which thousands of publicly owned assets were sold off.
Pro-privatisation ideologues argued that selling off "inefficient" state-run enterprises and fully embracing a programme of "economic reform" would make Hungary a more prosperous country.
In fact, after 20 years of privatisation, Hungary's economic situation has worsened.
Despite the huge bonanza of privatisation revenue, the country's finances are in a parlous state.
Last autumn, the country received a 20bn euros (£18.6bn) international rescue package. Now, Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany is calling for further help to bail-out his near-bankrupt country.
With the Hungarian health service in crisis due to a lack of government investment, the Hungarian people are, understandably asking a very simple question. Where did all the money go?
Still milking our railway
RECESSION? What recession? For British bus and train operator Arriva plc, the money keeps rolling in. The company, which runs public transport in 12 European countries including Britain, made pre-tax profits of £150m last year.
Its rail franchises, which now include the CrossCountry Aberdeen to Penzance route, brought in £837.8m - up 160 per cent on the previous 12 months - while its bus revenue jumped by 13 per cent to £922.4m.
Arriva is just one of a small handful of companies which has made extraordinary amounts of money due to the privatisation of public transport in Britain and abroad. And much of the money has come from public subsidies the company, in common with other private transport providers, receive from the taxpayer.
Around £2.5bn is handed over each year to Britain's bus companies, leading to the companies being labelled "subsidy junkies" by Graham Stringer MP of the transport select committee.
Instead of subsiding private companies, wouldn't it be more logical - and more economical for taxpayers - if the government simply brought back British Rail and the National Bus Company?
You can be fairly sure that when neoliberals tell us that such and such a "reform" will be good for us, they really mean that "reform" will be good for capital and not for the majority of the public.
The neoliberals said that selling off the railways would lead to better service and lower fares. They also said that privatising gas, electricity and water would reduce household bills. And now they would like us to believe that the establishment of polyclinics will improve health care.
Don't believe a word of it.
A 2008 King's Fund report said that polyclinics could pose "significant risks for patient care." It also found that "there is no evidence that larger GP practices deliver higher quality care than smaller ones and that "there is ... evidence that quality may be decreased in certain cases."
The report also warned that "a major centralisation of GP services into polyclinics would make it more difficult for patients to visit their GP, especially those living in rural areas."
In addition, a new study by Kent GP Dr Hendrik Beerstecher has found that average-sized GP surgeries are just as good as "super-surgeries" at providing extra services. He looked at 384 practices and found no difference between the range of extra services offered by standard surgeries and polyclinics.
"I am not sure why the government is pushing ahead with polyclinics. As the study shows, there is no evidence that they provide more services so why are we having them set up all across the country?" he asked.
Why indeed? The answer to Dr Beerstecher's question is that polyclinics make it easier for the government to further its objective of privatising the NHS by stealth.
Big corporations will be able to put in multiple bids to run the new polyclinics and, if the government's plans are allowed to go through, GP services will soon be in the hands of multinational corporations, such as the US company UnitedHealth.
Corporate-run polyclinics will put profit maximisation ahead of the interests of patients - dealing a fatal blow to the whole ethos of the NHS.
We must not let it happen.
DON'T think the neoliberal ideologues who have dominated the public discourse over the past 30 years will go down without a fight.
Despite the total discrediting of the "free market" economic system they advocate, a group of influential neoliberal think tanks are still trying to persuade us that the answer to the problems we face today is yet more "market-based solutions." One such think-tank is Reform.
Reform says its mission "is to set out a better way to deliver public services." And the director of Reform, a former Conservative policy wonk called Andrew Haldenby, wants "smaller government."
In a recent article, he enthused over a sentence in the new government white paper on public-sector reform which said that "a responsive state should withdraw from areas in which it is no longer needed."
There's no prizes for guessing which area Haldenby and his fellow neoliberal fanatics think the state should withdraw from.
In a recent report, Reform called for "radical change" in health-care provision in Britain, with "other insurers" allowed to join the system and the NHS replaced with a National Health Protection Service.
We all know who would benefit from such "radical" changes - it certainly wouldn't be you or I, dear reader.
Another fine mess...
WHAT would you do with £97 billion? You might have thought that any government or country which received such an enormous sum would be quite a prosperous place, with no need for IMF bail-outs or other rescue packages. Think again.
The Hungarian state has received 105bn euros in privatisation revenue for the years 1990-2007, a period during which thousands of publicly owned assets were sold off.
Pro-privatisation ideologues argued that selling off "inefficient" state-run enterprises and fully embracing a programme of "economic reform" would make Hungary a more prosperous country.
In fact, after 20 years of privatisation, Hungary's economic situation has worsened.
Despite the huge bonanza of privatisation revenue, the country's finances are in a parlous state.
Last autumn, the country received a 20bn euros (£18.6bn) international rescue package. Now, Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany is calling for further help to bail-out his near-bankrupt country.
With the Hungarian health service in crisis due to a lack of government investment, the Hungarian people are, understandably asking a very simple question. Where did all the money go?
Still milking our railway
RECESSION? What recession? For British bus and train operator Arriva plc, the money keeps rolling in. The company, which runs public transport in 12 European countries including Britain, made pre-tax profits of £150m last year.
Its rail franchises, which now include the CrossCountry Aberdeen to Penzance route, brought in £837.8m - up 160 per cent on the previous 12 months - while its bus revenue jumped by 13 per cent to £922.4m.
Arriva is just one of a small handful of companies which has made extraordinary amounts of money due to the privatisation of public transport in Britain and abroad. And much of the money has come from public subsidies the company, in common with other private transport providers, receive from the taxpayer.
Around £2.5bn is handed over each year to Britain's bus companies, leading to the companies being labelled "subsidy junkies" by Graham Stringer MP of the transport select committee.
Instead of subsiding private companies, wouldn't it be more logical - and more economical for taxpayers - if the government simply brought back British Rail and the National Bus Company?
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Dr Branson will see you now
From The Sunday Express, 20th July 2008
VIRGIN tycoon Sir Richard Branson is being courted by health chiefs planning to privatise hospital casualty units.
Tens of thousands of patients walking into Accident and Emergency departments could be treated by the private sector in sweeping reforms of the NHS.
Billionaire Branson and his 26-year-old daughter Holly, pictured, who recently qualified as a doctor, plan to bid to run the new generation of GP super-surgeries called polyclinics.
Health chiefs in north London have confirmed that a meeting was held with senior officials from Bransonís fledgling firm Virgin Healthcare.
Discussions took place about closing four GP surgeries in Camden and merging them to form a polyclinic at University College Hospital, pictured right.
The clinic, in a disused casualty wing, would treat all emergency cases except those brought in by ambulance or referred by GPs ñ about 70,000 patients a year.
VIRGIN tycoon Sir Richard Branson is being courted by health chiefs planning to privatise hospital casualty units.
Tens of thousands of patients walking into Accident and Emergency departments could be treated by the private sector in sweeping reforms of the NHS.
Billionaire Branson and his 26-year-old daughter Holly, pictured, who recently qualified as a doctor, plan to bid to run the new generation of GP super-surgeries called polyclinics.
Health chiefs in north London have confirmed that a meeting was held with senior officials from Bransonís fledgling firm Virgin Healthcare.
Discussions took place about closing four GP surgeries in Camden and merging them to form a polyclinic at University College Hospital, pictured right.
The clinic, in a disused casualty wing, would treat all emergency cases except those brought in by ambulance or referred by GPs ñ about 70,000 patients a year.
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