Eve Miller, Delegate to Unison health conference, personal capacity
Under the Tories, 14 years of austerity shattered and bled our NHS dry through underfunding and privatisation. But now we have a Labour government, has anything changed?
The small increase in funding announced in last year’s Budget is a drop in the ocean compared to what is needed to fully fund and staff our crumbling sector. Health Secretary Wes Streeting is opening the doors to further privatisation. Even more public money will be spent paying into private companies so they can profit from our healthcare needs.
Our pay has been cut by 40% in real terms over the last 15 years. Now we’re being offered a measly below-inflation 2.8% ‘rise’ – in reality yet another pay cut. At the lowest bands, our vital porters, health care assistants, admin staff and more are only a few pence above the pittance minimum wage, leaving them to struggle in the cost-of-living crisis and feeling undervalued for the important work they do.
And now Labour has announced that up to 30,000 jobs could be cut through the abolition of NHS England and from the Integrated Care Boards. With many Trusts freezing recruitment in order to balance their books, thousands of healthcare staff will be fearful for their future.
Labour chancellor Rachel Reeves admitted that last year’s 5% pay offer was only given due to the potential “cost of further industrial action”. This shows that Labour is afraid of trade union power and that striking gets results.
Coordinate
Unison should be coordinating with other unions for a strike ballot to fight for a fully funded inflation-busting pay rise and for pay restoration for all health and care staff, including those in privatised sectors.
We must fight to implement Unison’s policy of a £15-an-hour minimum wage to boost staff retention and attract staff into the hundreds of thousands of vacant positions.
Student fees should be abolished and nursing bursaries restored to encourage nurses into the NHS.
We need a fight to oppose all job losses. If reorganisation is necessary to improve how things are run, workers should be transferred with union agreement to other useful roles with no attacks on terms and conditions.
And we must urgently fight any escalation in privatisation; for the reversal of those privatisations already carried out; for the scrapping of PFI schemes and the cancellation of the debts.
We have to fight for a fully publicly funded NHS and care system free at the point of use, under democratic control. Nationalise the private health care sector, medical supply industry and the pharmaceutical companies.
We need a proper debate about political representation
Labour politicians locally are choosing to attack members’ jobs rather than fight for the money we need for our services. Labour politicians in Westminster are choosing to attack the living standards of working-class people as they slash benefits and disability payments rather than take the money from the rich.
We don’t need politicians who take our money, attack our members and won’t fight for the wealth in society to be under democratic control to build our public services. We need a party that fights for our interests, not those of the super-rich and the bond markets!
We need a proper debate among members about what our union should do to achieve genuine political representation – not a debate confined to the minority of members who pay into the Labour Link fund.
Unison should only support candidates in elections that support us, and build up a group in parliament of MPs who will actually fight for our union’s policies. We should begin to discuss with other unions how we can build the new workers’ party we need.
- Eve is speaking at the Socialist Party Unison Health Conference fringe meeting
Fight Labour’s austerity!
Tuesday 8 April, 5.30pm/close of conference
Leonardo Hotel, 31 Keel Warf, L3 4FN
(5 min walk from conference)
