The Socialist 13 January 2021

Our health and livelihoods before their profits

Our health and livelihoods before their profits

Londoners suffer and Khan piles on pressure

Bosses earn workers' annual wage in three days

NHS Emergency - Fight for a fully funded, publicly owned, socialist NHS

Dispatches from the front - health workers speak out

NHS pandemic warnings ignored - renationalise our NHS

Schools: Act together to oppose unsafe numbers and rising workload

Global capitalism at most dangerous conjuncture since the 1930s

Fully resource the vaccination programme now

Covid vaccine nationalism threatens pandemic response

How should socialists respond to the 6 January attacks on Capitol Hill?

Lockdown 3.0 - fight to make our shops safe!

Ryan Aldred: Why I'm standing for Usdaw's EC

Unison get sec election shows left can win NEC

Royal mail management forced to make concessions

British Gas workers strike against 'fire and rehire' plans

Get stuck in to build a fighting, democratic PCS union

Refund student rent and fees - fight for free education and make the 1% pay

Exams scrapped again - young people need a future with jobs and free education

Help us fund the fight for Socialism

TUSC to hold local elections conference in February

Book Review: Humankind - Dispelling the myth that humans are too selfish for socialism

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NHS Emergency - Fight for a fully funded, publicly owned, socialist NHS

NHS workers protest outside Aintree hospital for a pay rise on 26 August, photo Liverpool SP (Click to enlarge)

The NHS is under more pressure than ever. Ambulances are queueing outside A&E and hospital resources running low. Millions of people are living in mortal fear of falling ill.

Everything has been made worse by successive governments, Tories and Labour, underfunding and selling-off our NHS.

The endless squeezing of NHS staff pay and conditions has led to enormous staff shortages and now, as the pandemic reaches new heights, 46,000 hospital staff are off sick with Covid-19.

The criminal under resourcing of the health service is leading to reduction in the quality of care. With a critical lack of oxygen supply at Southend Hospital, the target blood oxygen level for patients has been reduced from 92% to as low as 88%.

At least two London hospitals have cancelled urgent operations, including cancer surgery. Meanwhile, private hospitals have continued to carry out non-urgent operations for those able to pay.

The NHS bosses are reportedly attempting to 'negotiate' with the private hospitals for use of their facilities.

The Socialist Party demands that all private health and social care facilities, including hospitals, care homes and the pharmaceutical industry, be requisitioned to respond to the pandemic.

This would lay the basis for a publicly owned NHS, care sector and big pharma under democratic workers' control and management.

For those working in the NHS we demand a 15% pay rise and a scrapping of training fees for health workers, including a wiping of existing tuition fee debts. To harness the knowledge and experience of health workers we demand workers' and trade union oversight of the pandemic response. We fight for a fully funded, publicly owned, socialist NHS.

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Our health and livelihoods before their profits