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Link to this page: https://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/1073/30254
From The Socialist newspaper, 12 February 2020
NHS debt so high it can't be repaid - so don't pay it!
- Scrap the debt, reverse the cuts, kick out the privatisers
Nurses marching for the NHS, photo Paul Mattsson (Click to enlarge)
Mayola Demmenie, Basingstoke Socialist Party
Cuts and privatisation mean NHS trusts now have debts so high they might never be repaid, according to the National Audit Office (NAO).
The NAO recently published two damning reports on the state of the NHS's finances. One was on the debt, totalling £10.9 billion in March 2019.
The other was on the capital budget, which covers replacement and maintenance of equipment and buildings. The Department for Health and Social Care is using money earmarked for upkeep as loans to NHS trusts to pay for the day-to-day running of hospitals.
This results in a backlog of maintenance work - worth £6.5 billion - and increased risk of harm to patients. It also adds to the dangerous amount of debt.
These debts must be scrapped immediately, and full funding to save the NHS from complete collapse urgently restored. Much of the money could be found within the pharmaceutical industry and other private companies supplying the NHS while raking in unimaginable profits.
Those companies should be nationalised, with compensation only paid on the basis of proven need, not to super-rich owners. A state-owned pharmaceutical and supplies industry could also provide the NHS with cheap medicines and equipment.
Boris Johnson says austerity is over - so where's the money? Trade unions in the NHS should demand the money back and the outsourcers kicked out - and build for protests, strikes, and occupations if necessary to win the needed change. This could stop the government deliberately running the NHS into the ground and privatising more and more of it.
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The coronavirus crisis has laid bare the class character of society in numerous ways. It is making clear to many that it is the working class that keeps society running, not the CEOs of major corporations.
The results of austerity have been graphically demonstrated as public services strain to cope with the crisis.
The government has now ripped up its 'austerity' mantra and turned to policies that not long ago were denounced as socialist. But after the corona crisis, it will try to make the working class pay for it, by trying to claw back what has been given.
- The Socialist Party's material is more vital than ever, so we can continue to report from workers who are fighting for better health and safety measures, against layoffs, for adequate staffing levels, etc.
- When the health crisis subsides, we must be ready for the stormy events ahead and the need to arm workers' movements with a socialist programme - one which puts the health and needs of humanity before the profits of a few.
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In The Socialist 12 February 2020:
News
Tackling climate change: Johnson emits huge quantities of hot air!
Windrush deportations: end the hostile environment
Streatham attack: Johnson's bill can't stop terror
NHS
Unnecessary surgery scandal shows need for democratic control of NHS
NHS debt so high it can't be repaid - so don't pay it!
Callous Tory cuts to children's speech therapy in Nottinghamshire
Trade unions
Trade unions - new decade, new challenges
Workplace news
Big Unison south east regional meeting votes for anti-cuts position
PCS union: Uniting the left around a leadership that can win for members
Westex workers win increased pay offer in 11th week of strike
University strikers walk out for better pay and pensions
East London school strikes against academisation continue
Foreign Office workers' strike
Solidarity with Turkish workers
Solidarity with victimised bus rep Moe
Cuts
How to resist tory attacks on local communities
Cuts councillors are the real problem
Council houses - not private property developers
International
Sinn Fein harnesses working-class anger to top poll
Lebanon - mass protests cut across sectarian division
Campaigns
Build independent workers' media with May Day greetings
Building a working-class movement for Tamil rights
Hackney: We don't want homes and retail units working-class people can't afford
Universal Credit
New BBC series - Insight or whitewash?
Nottingham: death of vulnerable claimant
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2020