Pledges: NHS
#4 in the series
I’ve had numerous emails about NHS issues, unsurprisingly!
The Email:
I am writing to you as one of my Prospective Parliamentary Candidates this General Election, calling on you to commit to fully funding the NHS and stopping privatisation.
NHS workers are still in dispute with the government over pay and leaving due to burnout, 9,000 overseas staff are leaving their NHS roles every year for better pay elsewhere and waiting lists are not getting any shorter. Our NHS is crumbling.
Paying private providers will drain nurses and doctors from the service long term - it's a sticking plaster solution. There are hundreds of thousands of Organise members who are calling on the next government to fund and save our NHS.
- 96% of us agree that the next government needs to fund our NHS properly.
- 94% of us agree the NHS needs more funding and not more privatisation.
- 88% of us think it's wrong that NHS staff will now have to wait even longer until a decision is made on their pay.
Together, we're calling on you to:
1. Commit to pushing the next government fund the NHS properly.
2. Commit to ensuring your Party doesn't expand the privatisation of the NHS.
3. Commit to being on the side of NHS workers' and getting them a pay rise.
Candidates’ commitments to policies that prioritise the NHS will inform my vote. Access to the NHS is becoming increasingly hard and as one of my candidates, you must prove that you share my concerns and will help make the NHS better.
My Thoughts
I am 100% for things being nationalised anyway, rather than just being privatised tools to make the rich richer. Nationalised public transport and utilities. And obviously a properly funded NHS!
I wouldn’t go private even if I could afford it. As such I currently have a broken wisdom tooth and am battling to get NHS treatment and using it to raise awareness of the awful situation with the endless NHS cuts. I wrote about it here and here.
Meanwhile a close family member has had brain surgery, and the lack of NHS funding has caused them years of unnecessary stress and difficulty, and they regularly have to wait for half a day to get help. (On top of battles with the DWP.) The NHS staff are good and compassionate, but they’re just run ragged and overworked.
The Tories want to bring the NHS to its knees so we can all become debt slaves to a privatised health care system that only works for the wealthy, as is the case in the US. We must stop that. I couldn't be more pro-union, pro-national healthcare if I tried! And I am outspoken about it (as with every other social justice issue – check out my posts).
It's also a general Green policy to restore the NHS. Greens are offering investment to “nurse the NHS back to health.” Alongside over £50bn per year on health and social care by 2030 will be an additional £20bn capital investment to bring crumbling hospitals, primary care buildings and outdated equipment up to modern standards and an increase in salaries for NHS frontline workers including doctors, dentists and nurses. Unlike other parties, we are also offering a “cast-iron Green guarantee” that Green MPs will fight privatisation of the NHS. Read the full press release here. Whereas Tories and Labour would rather commit £75 billion to weapons and attacking other countries.
“Hey Karl, how will that NHS boost be funded?”
Tax the rich. Force companies to pay the tax they owe. Instead of militarisation and bombing and killing people in other countries which creates hatred and makes arms dealers richer, let’s spend that money on what it is meant for: looking after the people in our country. We need a fundamental shift in how we look at local and global issues, or we’ll get same old, same old. Don’t get me wrong, it won’t be easy as there are so many obstacles and opponents with vast resources trying to stop change for the better. But we have to try.
Though do note that health is also one of the partially devolved issues, so much of the policy (such as free prescriptions) is decided in the Sennedd. However, that doesn’t mean that NHS decisions in England don’t have an effect. Just beware of candidates for Westminster barking on about issues that they won’t necessarily have any say in because the issue is devolved! I’ve seen a fair few statements that are misleading in that way.
Additional
I’ve also had this email:
Dear Karl Drinkwater,
The Green Party has just announced that they are taking We Own It's Pledge for the NHS. I am getting in touch with you and the other general election candidates in my constituency to ask you to join them in taking the Pledge.
By taking the Pledge for the NHS you are promising that if we elect you, you will use your position to work toward:
Reinstating the Health Secretary’s legal duty to provide healthcare to all (repealed in the 2012 Health and Social Care Act) - this is only for candidates in England as other nations have retained this duty
Giving the NHS across the UK £40 billion more per year to catch up with equivalent European countries (according to Health Foundation) - following the Barnett formula this means approximately £32 billion, £3.9 billion, £2.5 billion and £1.32 billion extra per year for the NHS in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland respectively.
Bringing services outsourced to for-profit companies back into the NHS as their contracts end (to end the waste, protect patients and save lives).
Respond to the Pledge for the NHS by filling out this short Google Form.
We Own It has produced an informational blog for candidates on the Pledge for the NHS HERE. We Own It maintains a webpage HERE with candidate responses.
Despite the government claiming that the NHS now has more money and staff than ever before, there is no doubt that we have just lived through 14 of the worst years of the system’s history.
The fact is that we spend far less (at least 21% less per head) per year than the average European country spends each year, according to an analysis by Health Foundation.
To capture the effects of over a decade of underfunding, the NHS now has 125,000 staff vacancies, our hospitals are crumbling, dealing with sewage leaks and rats, among other indications of systematic decay.
Outsourcing is also burning a hole in our NHS and its budget.
For example, NHS Trusts get the same amount for specific surgeries as private hospitals, yet the entire burden falls on our NHS when private hospitals botch surgeries or treatments because our NHS cannot turn people away. According to the Sunday Times, 550 people are transferred to NHS hospitals from private hospitals each month.
And We Own It is releasing new research next year showing that billions have left the NHS in profits on contracts given out between January 2012 and May 2024.
A brand new Oxford University study linked healthcare privatisation to worse patient care.
I am asking you today to make it clear that, if elected, you will stand up for our NHS. I am asking you to take the Pledge for the NHS - HERE.
Thank you very much for your time.
And yes, I have signed the full pledge because this is a Green Party policy! We’re the ones pushing for it. It’s unsurprising to see that not a single Conservative has signed it on the summary page just now:
The Greens will to bring back to life what previous Governments have tried to kill: the NHS.
2024-06-14 Update
Labour’s manifesto sees an “unprecedented slowdown” in NHS finances. Co-leader Adrian Ramsay said: “This Labour Party manifesto is a diagnosis of doom for our NHS and other frontline services. Labour has today promised investment of just 1.1% increase according to the Nuffield Trust, an “unprecedented slowdown in NHS finances.” Greens understand the severity of the crisis the NHS faces and have a plan to nurse it back to health. We are proposing a £50bn investment per year by 2030 alongside an additional £20bn capital investment fund. Our frontline services can’t keep limping on without real investment from real tax reform.”
Promoted by Karl Drinkwater (Green Party) at The Gate, Keppoch Street, Cardiff CF24 3JW.