Link to this page: http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/483/2327
From The Socialist newspaper, 19 April 2007
NHS in crisis
Nurses' fury at cuts and attacks on jobs
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Unison and RCN lobby of parliament in 2006, photo Paul Mattsson |
NURSES AND other workers in the National Health Service are angry at cuts in the NHS. According to a Royal College of Nursing (RCN) report, the vast majority (87%) of specialist nurses say NHS cuts are having an adverse effect on patient care.
Roger Shrives
The most striking part of the RCN report claimed that more than 22,300 jobs in the NHS have been lost in the last 18 months. Almost three-quarters of newly qualified nurses have so far been unable to find jobs. The government's so-called 'reforms' have produced massive debts and deficits totalling £1.32 billion. The financial crisis has forced community hospitals to close, especially in rural areas. It has hit patient services and lengthened waiting lists.
Of course the government says that the RCN are exaggerating - that only 1,446 workers have been made compulsorily redundant and that the NHS is employing more workers than under the Tories.
But the RCN figures tie in with the Office of National Statistics figures that show 11,000 fewer people working for the NHS in the last quarter of last year. It also fits in with NHS workers' experience that even experienced staff are being made redundant by cash-strapped trusts.
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Unison and RCN lobby of parliament in 2006, photo Paul Mattsson |
The RCN is calling for investment in the NHS to be increased up to the European spending average.
New Labour, however, has the nerve to ask low-paid NHS workers to pay with their living standards for Labour's policies. The independent review body originally offered them a pay rise of just 2.5%, itself way below inflation levels. But Gordon Brown has only agreed to give 1.5% in April with another 1% in November. This stinginess saved £60 million - a minute fraction of the £94 billion NHS budget.
With their jobs being made more fraught and less secure, it is no surprise that the RCN, an organisation that forbade industrial action until 1995, is now voting on whether to go on strike against this pay insult.
New Labour's 'reforms' have one clear purpose - to demolish the NHS and to build up a privatised health service with guaranteed profits for big business.
They are building up mass opposition that must be mobilised to save the NHS and to give health workers the rewards their dedication deserves.
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In The Socialist 19 April 2007:
Kick big business out of the NHS
Nurses' fury at cuts and attacks on jobs
NHS London - delivering private health
Socialist Students
Build for national action against fees
Socialist Party election campaign
Leicester: A principled stand against opportunists
Young socialist standing for Save Huddersfield NHS
Save our NHS campaign fields five candidates in South Lakes
Making a difference in Lincoln
Vote Socialist Alternative on 3 May
Socialist Party editorial
RMT victory: Union militancy pays
Campaign for a New Workers Party
Wanted - a new mass party for workers
Campaign for a New Workers' Party Conference
Socialist Party workplace news
Tube workers win big victory over Metronet
Campaigning for a £26,000 minimum wage
Young trade unionists reject New Labour
Greenwich UNISON steps up fight against pay cuts
International socialist news and analysis
Venezuela: Will the trade unions give up their independence?
Bush's man at the World Bank in corruption scandal
Socialist Party news and analysis
Blockading Britain's warhead factory
Fighting for the right to walk in the countryside
Cuts reduce advice for the people who most need help
Bank that only serves the rich
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