Alistair Tice
About 50 protesters attended the lobby of Ed Miliband’s Doncaster North surgery on 25 April called by TUSC in support of the Care UK strike.
The strike is against cuts being made by this private company which was awarded a contract to run a service of care for people with learning disabilities, which had previously been provided by the NHS.
Around 30 Care UK workers were there and about a dozen of them went in to discuss with Ed Miliband. They said he was supportive, didn’t think Care UK should have been given the contract and was going to speak to Labour Mayor Ros Jones about it. But he still won’t publicly come out in support of the strike.
We finished off with an impromptu march up and down Bentley high street, which stopped the traffic. On the same day, TUSC supporters held protests at Care UK offices in London, Southampton, Leeds and Cardiff.
Having already taken 20 days of strike action, the Doncaster Care UK workers will start a two week strike on 5 May. Doncaster TUSC is going to the council cabinet meeting on 30 May. We want to know what Miliband said to Ros Jones and what she will do about it.
Pariahs and cronies
This is an extract of a speech at the lobby made by one of the strikers, Roger Hutt:
“It is with great sadness that a predominantly Labour voting workforce, once employed by the NHS, now feels that you have allowed these pariahs and the cronies that feed off them to buy and sell our careers.
A hard-working, professional, caring group of people will have to leave their chosen professions due to the crumbs Care UK are willing to pay us.
The people that we have cared for could have been our brothers or sisters, aunties or uncles. How we care for the most vulnerable people in society is how we define ourselves as human beings.
By acting now, by standing side by side with the Care UK strikers both verbally and physically, you’d be making a stand against the return to Victorian values of the have and have nots that the Tories represent.”
