The Socialist 8 March 2002  [Top] [Home] [News] [The Socialist]  Do you agree? Join the Socialist Party! Donate here!  Subscribe to The Socialist   Fight the Post Office sell off Protest Against Privatisation NEW LABOUR'S fixation with privatisation knows no limits. Our postal services are next for the 'fat cat' treatment. Tony Blair and the postal regulator want all business mail to be open to private companies. Gary Clark, Communication Workers' Union (CWU) Scotland No2 branch. But this fight is not just about postal workers. It's a fight for all of us. The back door privatisation must be stopped. This will not be achieved through an appeal to common sense but through industrial action. Tube drivers in London have just shown that industrial action gets results. When the European Commission passed laws to 'liberalise' (privatise) the European market, this was limited to only 10% of the German and Dutch markets because of fear of a backlash by the trade unions. New Labour is prepared to let the privateers, mostly anti-union companies, wreck the postal service. If they get away with this, the first to go will be the universal cost of sending a letter first class. Big business will concentrate on the most profitable areas and to hell with the rest of us. Companies like Securicor, Hays, UPS and TNT are rubbing their hands at the thought of millions of pounds of profit. The Post Office will have to compete with these companies which can exploit the profitable parts of the market, whilst still having a legal obligation to deliver to every home in Britain every day. The new Tailored Delivery Service is linked to the end of the second delivery, except if you are a business customer where you could receive three deliveries a day. If you are only a residential customer you will get one delivery, in the afternoon. This would mean a new four-hour delivery span compared to the present two hours and the loss of around 30,000 jobs. The scheme is being piloted in Edinburgh and the local CWU branch is demanding maximum five-day weeks, more four-day weeks, a move towards more Monday to Friday duties and a 35-hour week. Let's get organised to stop the private profiteers getting their hands on our post.   Full support for the CWU demo - the first national trade union demo against New Labour's privatisation plans. All trade unionists, particularly public-sector workers, should attend. UNISON is backing the demo. For the postal workers' full pay claim of a £300 minimum for a 35-hour week Oppose the privatisation of the post office and all other public services For the trade unions to organise a one-day public sector strike against privatisation "CONSIGNIA CHIEF executives were offered a 10% pay rise on top of their big wages. We'd like to be offered 10%. We were disgusted when we heard about that. It's one rule for them, another for us." A Yorkshire postal worker   CWU March and Rally, Saturday 16 March, London. Assemble in Geraldine Mary Harmsworth Park, St George's Road, London SE1 (next to the Imperial War Museum). Nearest Tube: Lambeth North and Elephant and Castle. March leaves 12 noon to rally at Westminster Central Hall.     The Socialist 8 March 2002  [Top] [Home] [News] [The Socialist]  Do you agree? Join the Socialist Party! Donate here!  Subscribe to The Socialist   Education - A Right Not A Privilege ON FRIDAY 15 March thousands of students worldwide will join the International Socialist Resistance (ISR) day of action against education cutbacks. Clare James At a European Union (EU) meeting on 15 March, government ministers will discuss education. Undoubtedly they'll continue their policy of massively underfunding every level of education across Europe. ISR has called this day of action to show young people won't sit back and watch as big business make huge profits by privatising and commercialising the education system. Education should be a right for all, not just the privilege of a rich few. On 15 March, young people internationally will demonstrate for this right in their areas. lIn Brazil, the MSE (Movemento do Sem-Eduacao - Movement of those without education), the ISR's Brazilian affiliate reported that a meeting of the "National Forum of Struggle" (NFS) had voted to support the day of action. The NFS includes the MST (landless farmers), CUT (Trade Union Congress), PT (Workers Party), Communist Party of Brazil, student unions and others. There will be pickets and occupations, which will be followed by a demo in Sao Paulo. There will be action organised in five states of Nigeria. The ISR are planning demonstrations and rallies in many towns and cities of Sweden. Members in Israel are planning a demonstration outside the ministry of education against plans to privatise their education. In Northern Ireland, Socialist Youth (ISR affiliate in northern and southern Ireland), have played a leading role in setting up SSUAS (School Students United Against Sectarianism). SSUAS demands: Kick sectarianism out of schools; the right to free access to education for all, free from sectarian attacks and intimidation; unite school students to fight for more resources in schools. They're building for a picket of the EU offices on 15 March. Action is also planned in Germany, France, Belgium, Austria, Greece and the CIS and in Britain (see more reports). 15 March looks like being a huge success internationally and The Socialist will report on the protests in all the areas and countries involved. There's a lot of work to be done in the run-up to 15 March, if you want to help build action in your area please get in touch with ISR. Young people should link up internationally to fight education cuts and all attacks on our living standards. It's our education and our future - it's up to us to get organised and fight for this. Join ISR - Help organise the 15 March. To find out more about International Socialist Resistance phone 020 8558 7947 or email anticapitalism@hotmail.com   The Socialist 8 March 2002  [Top] [Home] [News] [The Socialist]  Do you agree? Join the Socialist Party! Donate here!  Subscribe to The Socialist   ISR Day Of Action THE INTERNATIONAL Socialist Resistance (ISR) day of action on 15 March against cuts in education will see many activities throughout England and Wales. Clare James In London, protests will involve students from LSE and UCL universities against the Andersen company, and their involvement in the privatisation of education. A lunchtime walkout and protest will take place in Hackney, against recent council cuts to education, and protests and stalls will be held in other parts of London. In Merseyside, a meeting is being organised against the commercialisation of education in the run-up to 15 March. In Newcastle, there will be a stall and action at the FE (Further Education) college. There will be a lobby of the local MP in Preston and stalls and meetings in universities at Manchester and Salford. Protests at Southampton University will also involve students from local FE and sixth-form colleges. A half day strike is being organized in Bristol FE college and there will be a lunchtime demonstration at Gateway sixth-form college in Leicester, involving students from De Montfort university. There will also be action in Nottingham. In Yorkshire a rally is being organised in Sheffield University and action is being organised in Leeds University, Barnsley College and in Bradford. There is also action planned in Coventry and in Stafford-shire University. There will also be protests around Swansea College and the University of Glam-organ. There will be actions in other areas too. If you want to get involved it's not too late to help out with building these events, such as leafleting etc.   Hodge Dodges The Real Issues MARGARET HODGE, minister for universities, thinks that students have a "ruddy good time", that our debts are 'modest' and our studies wouldn't suffer if we did some part-time work.  Bristol student FIONA PASHAZADEH thinks Hodge is talking nonsense. FOR MOST students Hodge's comments just aren't true. It's very disturbing that New Labour has asked this woman to co-ordinate a high-level review of student funding. Of course part-time work affects studies - how can it fail to? Even if the contact time involved in the course is eight or nine hours a week, the need for study doesn't end when you come home from lectures. It carries on constantly and if you care about the result of your degree, which most students do, study can take up a lot of time. A part-time job severely decreases how much time a student can spend doing academic work. This obviously affects the quality of learning. I had to give up my part-time job recently as I was getting behind with study and felt there was no point in coming to university if I couldn't do my best. Many working-class students don't have this option - they need the money to survive as the student loan just isn't enough to live on. Many students have to work two jobs in order to have the amount of money they need, greatly increasing the stress they're already under. With the continued privatisation of university halls of residence and talk of introducing commercial rate loans, the financial burden which students carry will only get larger, forcing working-class students out of higher education. Margaret Hodge doesn't understand how today's students live. Maybe if she'd gone to university under such a system, she'd think twice about making such ridiculous comments.   The Socialist 8 March 2002  [Top] [Home] [News] [The Socialist]  Do you agree? Join the Socialist Party! Donate here!  Subscribe to The Socialist   US Policy Goes Up In Smoke AT LEAST seven US soldiers were killed on 4 March in Afghanistan's mountain ranges during brutal fighting when Al Qa'ida and Taliban fighters ambushed an American helicopter. Roger Shrives Over 1,000 US and allied troops are still trying to 'search and destroy' an enemy that President Bush thought had been beaten during the autumn months of aerial bombardment. US forces recently stepped up their ground offensive but also carried on bombing. US aircraft have dropped some 300 BLU-118B thermobaric bombs, "Big Blue Two", designed to kill people hiding in caves or bunkers without collapsing the structures. The blast from this bomb's cloud of solid fuel creates a fireball which sucks up oxygen, collapses lungs, breaks eardrums and pulls out eyes. Last autumn, even as the Taliban were collapsing, The Socialist warned (16/11/2001), that the US's "military successes will not necessarily be the prelude to a swift overall military victory in Afghanistan, let alone a stable peace. "If anything they compound the political problems facing US imperialism and its allies." We also warned of the dangers of a drawn-out guerrilla war with many possible casualties. Conflicts have proliferated wildly recently, particularly after the horrors of 11 September. US imperialism cannot impose by arms a worldwide Pax Americana. Their 'war against terrorism' is clearly seen as having more to do with safeguarding US interests, especially their access to oil supplies, than with opposing terrorist groupings. Now US troops are going to Yemen, the Philippines and the former soviet state of Georgia. But the US mass bombings stirred tensions in India, Pakistan, the Middle East and other flashpoints. The death toll in the Middle East conflict has risen sharply with a vicious cycle of violence affecting both Palestinians and Israelis, raising new fears of outright civil war (see The Socialist 1 March). Military escalation Bush's 'axis of evil' speech raised military action against Iraq higher up the agenda but, without a peace deal in Israel/Palestine or an end to the war in Afghanistan, any talk of finishing off Saddam Hussein's Iraqi dictatorship (created and armed by the Western powers) becomes problematical. Few people other than Prime Minister Blair seem now to support Bush's re-run of the 1991 Gulf War. Blair claims that Saddam is developing weapons of mass destruction and was capable of using them so the West should support whatever action the US took about it. People are understandably worried about claims of weapons of mass destruction, although many might ask what the US's thermobaric bombs are if not terror weapons! Many capitalist strategists, even in the US, can see that Iraq is a lot bigger than Afghanistan with 100,000 well-armed fighters. Although US forces could beat Saddam's army, the battles would be far fiercer than those in Afghanistan and the US could lose any support from the Middle East and the Muslim world. Imperialism also worries about who'd take over in Iraq if Saddam were to go and what implications that would have for stability in the region. With US policy in chaos, it is clear that these capitalist peace-keepers can't 'keep the peace'. If you want a world free of war and terror, keep fighting for a socialist internationalist solution which can bring genuine harmony to a troubled region.   The Socialist 8 March 2002  [Top] [Home] [News] [The Socialist]  Do you agree? Join the Socialist Party! Donate here!  Subscribe to The Socialist   What Future For The NHS? THE NATIONAL Health Service is underfunded, understaffed and under great pressure from New Labour to look for private-sector answers. Health workers look at the NHS's problems and propose a socialist alternative. Say no to the PFI! WAKEFIELD UNISON health branch and the local Socialist Party branch have been campaigning for six years against a Private Finance Initiative (PFI) in the new local hospital development. Wakefield UNISON's health branch secretary, MICK GRIFFITHS explains why their campaign is important for the NHS nationally. "I HAVE come to the conclusion that we need to bring about a complete separation of the NHS from the private sector, for the sake of preserving and developing the system of collectivised health care that the vast majority of the British public remain deeply committed to". That's how Wakefield's Labour MP David Hinchliffe, a UNISON-sponsored MP who chairs the influential commons select committee on health, introduced a report by the think tank Catalyst. The report argues that there's no economic case for the government's Public Private Partnerships (PPPs), and PFIs. It also says there's no evidence that private-sector involvement improves the quality of public-sector services and that guaranteeing profits to the private sector, for decades to come, won't help meet the public's health care needs. Nonetheless, despite overwhelming public opposition to privatisation, the government is determined to sell off all our remaining public assets. Members of Hinchliffe's health select committee openly disagree on whether PFI works. But the committee did agree - against Hinchliffe - that Professor Allyson Pollock (one of the report's authors) shouldn't work on the inquiry. But, they said, a special adviser from Newchurch and Co, a firm which stood to gain from PFI, would! Allyson Pollock has produced many reports criticising PFI schemes and showing that some of the deals already signed are costing four to five times what publicly funded schemes would have cost. Considering the higher interest charged on private capital loans and the fact that the private sector looks for 15-25% profit return, this is hardly surprising. PFI in the NHS will clearly lead to a Railtrack on the wards. Our UNISON health branch is determined to argue forcefully for a publicly funded, public sector comparator (PSC) preferred option as the best value for the public's money, for the local hospital's redevelopment plan. Thanks to years of hard campaigning, we already have an assurance from the Trust that certain non-clinical support services are expected to be best value for money, in in-house provided options. We won't be satisfied until we win 100% publicly funded and provided, totally public-sector development."   UNDER THE private finance initiative (PFI) scheme, private companies have signed scores of contracts to build new hospitals which they then rent back to the NHS. New Labour are mortgaging the NHS's future with these 25-30 year contacts for private companies. Services provided by PFI firms are so expensive that hospitals cut beds and jobs to pay their bills. In the Coventry hospitals, the health authority assessed the cost of refurbishment would be a one-off £30 million payment. Under PFI, a new hospital "would cost the taxpayer £36 million a year, for decades to come". All this for hospitals with fewer beds. In Bedford and Durham PFI hospitals there has been a 40% drop in beds. Union action beats privatisation IN MAY 2000 our Trust Board decided to tender its catering, domestic and portering services. UNISON organised a 200-strong lobby at 24 hours' notice and the Trust board was forced to back down. Adrian O'Malley, UNISON Wakefield and Pontefract hospitals branch chair They also agreed to terminate Initial Hospital Services' contract for the three services at Pontefract Infirmary and 200 staff were returned in-house last April. This was a major victory in our branch's campaign against privatisation, especially as we're facing a PFI hospital in the near future. Unfortunately everything comes with a price. The Trust board have cut £31 million from the non-clinical budget and the staff brought back in-house were put back in on their pathetic Initial Terms and Conditions. This has meant department restructuring, new rotas and savings programmes whilst at the same time the union argues for more money for the staff. All this under the guise of "Best Value" and "Value For Money". So far the staff have gained NHS pensions, sick pay, lieu days for Bank Holidays and a 25p an hour pay rise but they are still way short of full NHS pay and conditions. The fight for full equality continues. But we have proved that you can beat privatisation if you are organised and determined to win. Our Trust now say they want to keep staff in-house under the PFI and threats of privatisation have disappeared. There's no reason why this cannot be repeated nationally. UNISON has a big responsibility in achieving this. Unfortunately branches are being left to fight alone. Despite victories such as ours and in Hull, Lothians, Edinburgh and elsewhere we still hear of examples such as Grimsby where contracts are retendered without an in-house bid going in. The scandalous exploitation of NHS ancillaries continues with no national coordination of ancillary activists. The contractors are vermin and need to be eradicated from NHS hospitals just as we get rid of bugs and infections! New Labour have betrayed NHS ancillaries. UNISON wastes £31.5 million a year on the Labour Party while they should be supporting their members fighting privatisation.   THE GOVERNMENT are giving private firms an even bigger opportunity to make money from poor health. Health provider BUPA is getting government funds to run and manage a surgical unit next to an NHS hospital. NHS patients will use it, taxpayers will pay for it and BUPA will pick up the profits. Private-sector contractors are hired to clean many hospitals but four out of the five trusts which run Britain's ten dirtiest hospitals get their wards cleaned by private contractors - hardly a recommendation! Private sector wrecks community care UP UNTIL the 1970s the vast majority of hospital beds were provided for chronic patients who needed long-term care - elderly, mentally ill, learning and physically disabled persons. Anne Creavy This care, usually in large institutions, was criticised because individual needs were often ignored. The responsibility was transferred from the NHS to local authorities. New smaller homes were opened but community care was more expensive. The main cost was for staff wages and conditions. Staff were entitled to shift allowances, unsocial hours payments and a pension scheme. A political commitment to providing and paying for better quality care was needed but it wasn't there. The sites of old hospitals were sold off to developers who made enormous profits building new housing but they were not required to provide affordable housing to vulnerable people. In the 1980s the Conservative government changed the rules. Local authorities were required to spend 85% of their community care budget paying arms-length providers outside of the public sector. This marked a major change to private care. New Labour has not altered this requirement. A significant proportion of the cost of care is no longer used to provide direct care but is taken out as profit by the owners of the business. Staff wages and conditions have been cut ruthlessly. They are often paid the minimum wage with no sick pay. There is minimal training with home owners relying on public-sector trained staff to manage the homes. There is no effective system to monitor the standard of care; local registration departments were advised to adopt a 'light touch' as new homes were set up. There is no planning of the number and type of homes needed. The private sector can decide where to buy houses, they accept residents from any part of the country. They don't plan with local health providers and councils on the local services' capacity to meet extra demand. In Wakefield, where housing costs are less than in large cities or areas further south, many homes have opened for people with complex health needs. Most people there have moved in from elsewhere, often from London and the south-east. Charges are levied from £1,400 to £2,000 per week. These 'care' companies are now being sold for many millions of pounds. Many families take on the care themselves rather than pay this sort of money, whilst some people are simply left to fend for themselves with no support in the community because they can't afford care. The most vulnerable people in society, who depend on community care, are liable to exploitation and abuse. Money from local health services and local councils, funded from taxation and the council tax, is being used to boost business profits instead of being used for quality care. Privatisation is not progress. Public Health Another tale of wasted opportunities PUBLIC HEALTH and health promotion are undervalued. Most of the greatest improvements in the Victorian era came from better public health provision.  The same could be true today as poverty and inequality are still the biggest causes of ill-health in Britain, having a devastating effect on the poorest communities.  But public health worker LEE ADAMS explains how the government's proposed changes in health authorities take no steps towards making the service democratic and accountable. SWEEPING CHANGES are happening in the NHS and in public health structures. From April the government is replacing the existing health authorities with far fewer new bodies called Strategic Health Authorities (SHAs). Their role will largely be performance management of another new set of bodies - Primary Care Trusts (PCTs). The PCTs will do most of the old health authorities' "commissioning" work ie buying health services from NHS Trusts, the voluntary sector and increasingly from the private sector. These changes are important for health ie illness services and for public health. The bodies that commission, run and 'performance-manage' illness services are not accountable to the general public but to the Department of Health. New Labour has missed the opportunity of yet another reorganisation to democratise the NHS. The PCTs are run by boards and professional and executive committees. The SHAs have boards appointed by the Department of Health and far removed from local people. Despite the rhetoric about increasing public and patient involvement, New Labour are abolishing the community health councils (CHCs), the NHS watchdogs, from 2003. Many community groups and NHS staff think these new proposals will mean that community and patient reps won't have any power to change things. Public health faces a major reorganisation - many existing local public health departments are being split up amongst PCTs. Some at least won't have enough staff to cover the work. Many staff also fear that primary care organisations heavily influenced by GPs won't support broad programmes of public health that have to challenge inequalities in society to be effective. Public health directors at PCT level won't have to be from a medical background so we might now see some public health programmes which try and address more social and economic issues. However, public health directors at regional level will still have to be doctors - another missed opportunity. Public health staff there work with government offices and will have influence over many strategic planning issues, so a social, economic and environmental perspective could be more important than a medical one. This major upheaval has already demoralised public health staff - some have been moved five or six times through past reorganisations. Staff from the old health authorities have been expected to keep the NHS going, despite knowing that their roles would cease. Blair now tells NHS workers we're doing a good job but we're still experiencing a "heads will roll if you don't deliver" culture. This reorganisation is a massive experiment. Will the new PCTs be able to run the NHS? Certainly they won't be the driving force for public health that's so needed now with rising inequalities in health. A socialist programme for the NHS IT'S CLEAR to most people that the push towards privatisation of the NHS benefits no-one but big business. However after decades of under-funding it's also clear that there has to be a radical improvement in the way the health service is run. Jackie Grunsell The NHS needs to be better integrated (between hospitals, primary care, community care, social services, public health, occupational health, dentistry etc) with better communication and co-operation between the different sections in order to give people the best possible service. It is essential that this is publicly funded and trade unionists and communities must step up the campaign for the elimination of profiteering from the NHS. We need a fully accessible service which provides for everyone equally, not the postcode lottery we have at the moment. There's no doubt that extra funding is required. This could be raised by the re-nationalisation of the pharmaceutical industry, which makes billions in profit from people's illness. At the moment several different companies make similar drugs to compete against each other for the same market. Nationalisation would mean that research would actually be directed at finding cures for diseases and developing treatments for less common diseases which don't make companies a profit at the moment because they don't constitute a big enough market. Recruiting and keeping staff would be far easier if pay and conditions were improved and people felt they were achieving something useful for society rather than constantly 'fire-fighting'. All charges should be completely abolished. Elected teams of health workers and patients should plan and manage the NHS making the service democratic and accountable. Of course, under capitalism, the bosses would try to stop many of these measures because they cut across their profits. Past governments have proven incapable of running the NHS to provide for our basic needs. That is why the transformation of society along socialist lines is the only way foreward. Under socialism, not just the NHS, but the banks and industry would be under democratic workers' control. This would allow society to tackle the very causes of ill health - poverty, poor housing, pollution - and give people the opportunity to lead productive lives in the knowledge they will be cared for properly by society in return.   The Socialist Party says: Fight for a fully publicly funded NHS with immediate cash to end the crisis of underfunding and stop cuts and closures. Eliminate the profiteers from the health service. End health privatisation. Abolish the wasteful private finance initiative (PFI). Scrap the Trusts. Stop the pharmaceutical companies' profiteering by nationalising them under working-class control and management. Rebuild the NHS as a service free at the point of use. Bring health management and medical services under democratic control. Fight for a socialist society where poverty and inequality - the biggest killers and the greatest causes of ill-health - could become problems of the past.   More from The Socialist 8 March...   The Socialist 8 March 2002  [Top] [Home] [News] [The Socialist]  Do you agree? Join the Socialist Party! Donate here!  Subscribe to The Socialist