Link to this page: http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/467/1890
From The Socialist newspaper, 15 December 2006
NHS crisis
Turn anger into action
NEW LABOUR Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt has not only pledged to 'balance' the National Health Service's books this year. She also wants it to make a £250 million yearly surplus! Would the government demand that the Army in Iraq make a profit? No. But the NHS, apparently, is different.
Lois Austin
The London Strategic Health Authority, for example, met recently and talked in a clinical, coded way about reducing the NHS's 'financial risk' from 'in the red' to 'turning to amber'. How would they do that? By more bed and ward closures, huge job cuts and even hospital closures!
The government's crazy NHS policies - based on creeping privatisation and the market - are ruining many hospitals nationally. The crisis is deepening nationwide, as shown by the crisis facing Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Woolwich, south London (see article right).
The anger is being felt around the country, too. Last weekend, an estimated 4,000 people marched in Whitehaven in Cumbria to warn the local health trust to keep their hands off local hospitals.
The campaign is on to make sure this anger is turned into action. UNISON, Britain's biggest health workers' union, has been surveying its members about a national demonstration on the NHS.
The most important next step is to rally health workers, community campaigners and others on a national Saturday demonstration through the streets of central London. People United Saving Hospitals (PUSH), the national umbrella group for local 'save the NHS' campaigns, has agreed to call a demonstration on Saturday 3 March, 2007.
Health campaigners must tell UNISON and the TUC to organise urgently for a national demonstration against attacks on the NHS on 3 March.
National demo 'Save Our NHS' - 3 March 2007
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In The Socialist 15 December 2006:
NHS Crisis: Turn anger into action
Teachers support day of action against health cuts
QEH Hospital - a victim of privatisation
War and terrorism
Frankenstein kills out of control monster
Violence against women
Ipswich murders lifts lid on violent world
Workplace news and analysis
PCS: Vote 'Yes' against job cuts and low pay
Heroic struggle scores victory for Visteon workers
Victory for Glasgow's Council Workers in the Fight for Protection
Special feature
Privatisation, but not as we know it
Socialist Party Marxist analysis
International socialist news and analysis
Good riddance to the 'butcher of Chile'
Obituary
JOHN HAMILTON – Blairites re-write history
Socialist Party news and analysis
Private companies rule - and ruin
BNP fiasco but vigilance essential
Workplace analysis
TWGU merger: Build a fighting union
Mass meeting prepares for action
Protesting against fare increases
Leeds workers on strike to defend pensions
The Socialist Xmas quiz
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