A campaign group have invited all the city’s MPs. councillors and election candidates to sign a pledge opposing the dismantling of the NHS.
The Pledge campaign to oppose the privatisation of the National Health Service starts in Brighton and Hove ahead of the 2015 general and council elections.
Sussex Defend the NHS and local Keep our NHS Public campaigners are urging all city MPs, councillors and election candidates to sign the pledge to “protect one of our country’s most treasured institutions”.
By signing the Pledge campaign organisers say politicians are making a public commitment:
• to the repeal of the 2012 Health and Social Care Act,
• to oppose the dismantling and privatisation of NHS services and
• to support NHS workers fighting reduced pay, terms and conditions.
Madeleine Dickens, from Sussex Defend the NHS, said: “Before the last election, David Cameron promised an NHS ‘safe in our hands’ with ‘no top-down re-organisation’. Once in power, Cameron and his coalition partners lost no time in doing the exact opposite.”
“Our NHS in Brighton & Hove and across Sussex is in danger with proposed hospital closure; community and hospital – based services run by private companies; critical shortages of mental health beds; former NHS staff employed by private companies facing job losses, drastically reduced pay and conditions; some local GP practices threatened with cuts or closure; A and E and ambulance services under escalating pressure.
“Locally and across the country £ billions in former NHS services are now being provided by the private sector. Over 200 private companies now run former NHS services. But the rate of privatisation is being concealed with privatised services continuing to display the NHS logo.
“Why is a much-loved service, which has saved the lives of millions of people, now fighting for its own?”
The NHS Pledge Campaign is being launched at 7.30pm on Wednesday, September 24, at a public event in the main hall of BHASVIC in Dyke Road.
Invited speakers are Caroline Lucas MP for Brighton Pavilion, Nancy Platts Labour party parliamentary candidate for Brighton Kemptown, Kevin Day, stand up comedian “passionate about the NHS”, Carl Walker – candidate for the National Health Action party in West Sussex and Stephen McClean, a mental health nurse and Unison activist.
As well as members of the public, all local politicians and candidates have been invited to this meeting to give their public support, to sign up to a massive version of the pledge and to get involved in discussion about these crucial issues which affect everyone.
A former Royal Sussex hospital bank nurse explains why the pledge is so important: “I loved working in the hospital so I was really sad to leave. Cuts in salary are a betrayal of loyal staff who have worked here for years. The biggest concern is that wards are becoming increasingly unsafe with under-staffing.”
A Hove pensioner added: “In previous generations, the parents in my family frequently lost children, and the children lost parents. For example, my grandfather lost his mother for want of a sixpence: in those days, the doctor wouldn’t come out unless you could pay… and after the war came the NHS. Since then, none of my family have died prematurely: my sisters, our children and our grandchildren are all alive and well. Having survived cancer twice, I wouldn’t be alive today if it were not for the NHS.”
Campaign organisers claim the NHS is facing its most serious crisis since its creation in 1948. The crisis is life-threatening. With local politicians and candidates committed on our side, residents of Brighton and Hove can take this fight to save to the highest levels and safeguard our NHS for our children.
Simon Kirby, MP for Brighton Kemptown and Peacehaven who battled to secure funding for the redevelopment of the Royal Sussex County Hospital, said: “I have always believed the NHS should be free at the point of use, available on the basis of medical need and not ability to pay. That has been my stance in this Parliament and would be my approach in the next, if I am returned as MP for Brighton Kemptown and Peacehaven. The £420m investment I helped secure for a brand new Sussex County Hospital shows the Government’s commitment to the local NHS in the future.”
Cllr Graham Cox the Conservative Parliamentary candidate for Hove & Portslade, added: “Even with the economic difficulties it inherited the current Government has protected spending on the NHS. To use a wide variety of providers chosen by GPs is a sensible policy which gives patients wider choice and better care. To not do so risks repeating the mistakes made at Stafford and Morecambe Bay, which we all know had terrible consequences. If a private provider can, for example, do hip replacements more quickly and efficiently, then that is good for patients waiting for their operation and makes sure there is more money left to pay for other services.
“I am keen for a wide variety of providers to deliver services at Hove Polyclinic, and these reforms open up that possibility. This is something which would be welcomed by patients in Hove and Portslade who currently have to travel into Brighton or to Haywards Heath for treatment.
The NHS will remain free at the point of delivery and to suggest otherwise is dishonest scaremongering.”
For more information about the public event, the pledge campaign and the NHS campaign in the city generally, CLICK HERE:
Event: Pledge to save the NHS
Where: BHASVIC Main Hall, Brighton, Hove and Sussex Six Form College, Dyke Road, Hove BN3 6EG
When: Wednesday, September 24
Time: 7.30pm
You must be logged in to post a comment.