Further vandalism of the NHS as Con Dems axe NHS Direct

The Tories claimed in the general election:

"We can't go on like this. I'll cut the deficit, not the NHS"

This may be technically correct, as they have ring-fenced the budget.  But they are using some of the funding for a pointless and dangerous re-organization of the NHS and to pay for it they are cutting services.

The latest example of this is the announcement yesterday in the Guardian that the Con Dems plan to scrap NHS direct replacing it with a new budget service called NHS 111.

Currently forty percent of NHS Direct's staff are trained nurses.  NHS 111 will have one trained nurse to every 25 call centre staff, in other words only 4% of the staff will be professional nurses.  The other call operators will go on a 60 hour training course.

As soon as the public realise that the new call centre is not staffed by health professionals they will start putting extra demand on casualty and out of hour GP services, rather than risk receiving unprofessional advice from call centre operators.

I have used NHS Direct on more than one occasion in the past and was satisfied with the professional advice I received to save me having to put demand on other NHS services.  I would not use the proposed new service for health advice.

The biggest risk could come from a member of staff offering poor or incorrect advice to a caller which could result in them not seeking professional medical advice when they do require it.

The cost to the public of NHS Direct is £123 million a year.  This is money well spent, which reduces the demand on other areas of the NHS.  We must fight to defend this and you can start by signing the petition at http://www.savenhsdirect.co.uk/

There is no need for these cuts.  The government would not need to be looking for cuts if it was not for their expensive and dangerous re-structuring of the NHS which is going to cost the tax payer £1.8 billion a year.

We have to fight the cuts and the Con Dem vandalism of the NHS before it is too late and see all the improvements of the past 17 years thrown away.

Why I won't give a preference to any Labour leadership candidate who sends out a negative message on immigration

After a few months of the leadership campaign I have come to the decision that there are two candidates in the leadership election I cannot give a preference to on the ballot paper due to their views on immigration.

The first is Ed Balls.  It is with a heavy heart I do this as I feel he as been very good calling the Con Dems to account, but I cannot support a candidate who has come out with the following statements:

"What I've said is we should look at that free movement of labour directive to see whether or not it needs to be changed either to allow transition arrangements to be longer or also to prevent the practice where people can come and work in our country and then send benefits back to their own countries". UKPA

To be honest, I think Gordon's answer to Mrs Duffy showed he'd not been having the conversation, because what she said was the kind of things being said by Labour supporters, and in some cases former Labour supporters over the last year and a half. [This] was: 'Look, we're not racist, and we support our EU membership and we know that immigration's important for the NHS, but look what it's doing to my community, to my child's job prospects, to our housing queues'. Guardian

Secondly we have Andy Burnham.  Once again he has been good tackling the Con Dems, particularly on NHS reform.  But I will not support him because of statements like the following:

"We were in denial. We were behind the issue all the time, and myths were allowed to develop. There's still an ambivalence among some in Labour about discussing immigration. I've been accused of dog-whistle politics for doing so.

"But it was the biggest doorstep issue in constituencies where Labour lost. People aren't racist, but they say it has increased tension, stopped them getting access to housing and lowered their wages." Telegraph

While he said he would "avoid disowning our past" on immigration, he said: "Their [the electorate's] strong feeling was that we had our fingers in our ears and our hands over our eyes. We just didn't want to talk about it.

"For me the big task is for Labour to reconnect with people who are feeling this. They need to feel that Labour understands what they are saying and then will take steps to address it." Guardian

These two candidates worry me about the direction Labour would take if they became leader.  I don't deny that immigration is a doorstep issue, but this is mainly due to right wing tabloids blaming migration for everything from lack of housing and jobs to terrorism.

We have to establish a two pronged approach to this problem.  Firstly we have to have policies to increase and improve housing stock and tackle the areas which have high unemployment and deprivation.  Secondly we have to challenge the myths around immigration.

The easy solution is to agree with the likes of Mrs Duffy and try to appeal to those who feel immigration is an issue by lurching to the right and trying to out do the Tories on immigration.  But this is surely wrong and against the fundamental values of the Labour Party.

We have to move away from the New Labour rhetoric which resulted in David Blunkett accusing asylum seekers of "swamping" some British Schools (BBC News) and Phil Woolas putting out this dreadful leaflet during the general election:

100 days

We have now reached 100 days of the Con Dems and we face a very bleak picture of what the country will be like for the next five years.  The country faces:

• Drastic cuts to public services of up to 40%, even though the private sector is in no position to absorb the thousands of public sector workers who will be made redundant.  Those who manage to keep there jobs face a two year pay freeze at a time when RPI is currently 4.8%.
• A rise in VAT to 20%.  A regressive tax which will hit the poorest in society the worst.
• A wrecking bill which will see an expensive re-organisation of the NHS and allow back door privatisation by scrapping primary care trusts.
• An unequal education system which will see Gove's free schools create a two-tier education system at the expense of 700 projects being scrapped from Labour's building schools for the future scheme.  At the same time we will see higher education facing a real funding crisis as cuts kick in.
• A shake up of benefits which will see many of the poorest in society facing even tougher times as benefits are slashed.
• A cut in the number of MPs tagged onto the AV bill. The money this will save is negligible and will mean MPs will be more thinly stretched to cover constituency work.
• Councils will see funding cuts of £1.165 billion, meaning drastic cuts to local services.
• The arts will see major cuts regardless of how successful some of the projects currently are.  This has been shown by the scrapping of the UK film council.
• 9 regional development agencies have been scrapped.
• More outsourcing of government duties to the private sector, most recently with the scrapping of the audit commission.

There is absolutely no need for such huge cuts to public services at such speed, and no need for root and branch re-organisation of our public services.  These moves have more to do with Tory ideology than reducing the deficit.

None of this would have been possible without the support of the Lib Dems.  Many Lib Dem voters feel betrayed as they did not vote for this.  Many voters believed the promises of not bringing in immediate cuts or raising VAT and I sincerely hope they desert the Lib Dems at the next election, polls at the moment show a drastic drop in Lib Dem support and at the same time the highest polling for Labour in 3 years, not something you would expect so early in a new administration.

It was not an easy decision for me to leave the Green Party as I supported many of their ideals and policies, but the country now faces impending crisis and the wrecking of the public service improvements made by Labour in the past 13 years.   Only Labour can mount a serious challenge to the ConDem government and it is important that all of us who feel passionate about defending public services no longer sit on the sidelines and join the fightback to ensure the next election brings a clear Labour majority to roll back the mess this coalition will have made.

Action Alert – Panorama ‘Death on the Med’ - Contact the BBC

The following is a mailing from the Palestine Solidarity Campaign:

Action Alert – Panorama ‘Death on the Med’ - Contact the BBC

Last night, the BBC broadcast a Panorama programme entitled ‘Death on the Med’.

It claimed to reveal ‘what really happened’ when Israeli commandoes boarded the Mavi Marmara on 31 May 2010.

Watch the programme here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00thr24

The programme was extremely biased, portraying the activists on board as violent terrorists who set out to kill Israeli soldiers.

Please write to the BBC asking the following questions:

• Why was Israel’s ‘right’ to board the ship presumed throughout the programme?
• Why did the programme completely fail to mention that Israel’s siege of Gaza has been declared illegal by the UN? The assumption was made that Israel has the right to blockade Gaza, while the motives of those attempting to break an illegal blockade were questioned.
• Why did Jane Corbin not mention the bombs, rockets and white phosphorus dropped on Gaza by Israel during Operation Cast Lead over a three week period in 2008/9, killing 1,400 people? She did, however, mention the ‘thousands of rockets’ fired from Gaza into Israel, but did not say over what time period.
• Why was the Israeli evidence of how and when they killed the activists unquestioned? Activists who were on the top deck of the ship say the first person was killed – shot from a helicopter – before any Israeli had even landed on the deck. However, none of these activists were interviewed.
• Activists shot footage of the Israeli attack, but their cameras, laptops and other recording equipment was taken by the Israelis and has not been returned. Why was this point not raised during the programme, or put to the Israeli spokespeople?
• Why were the autopsy reports – which reveal that each victim was shot several times at close range, in a way that can’t constitute self-defence – not used, or even mentioned?
• Why was there no footage of the Israeli assaults on the activists – which led to nine deaths?
• Jane Corbin never questions the use of the word ‘terrorists’ to describe the activists, or their alleged willingness to attack the commandoes. Why does she then fail to examine why there were no fatalities or serious injuries among the Israeli commandoes, when these ‘terrorists’ were so willing to attack?
• Why were there no interviews with any of the British activists on board the ship, or with any of the journalists who were on board?
• Why was it not pointed out that the IDF has admitted doctoring the audio footage used in the programme, that the BBC claims was broadcast from the captain's deck?

  

You can find more points to make on the PSC website at www.palestinecampaign.org and http://t.co/wxcKyPH

Where to send your complaint:

Online: BBC complaints link: Follow the link and fill out the online form: https://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/forms/

Ring: BBC complaint line number: 03700 100 212

Email: panorama.reply@bbc.co.uk

Write: BBC Panorama, MC4A1, Media Centre, Media Village, 201 Wood Lane, London, W12 7TQ.

=====================================

The Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) aims to raise public awareness about the occupation of Palestine and the struggle of the Palestinian people. PSC seek to bring pressure on both the British and Israeli government to bring their policies in line with international law. PSC is an independent, non-governmental and non-party political organisation with members from communities across the UK. Join PSC today!

Palestine Solidarity Campaign
Box BM PSA
London
WC1N 3XX

Tel:   020 7700 6192
Fax:  020 7609 7779

Email: info@palestinecampaign.org

Web: www.palestinecampaign.org

A short video explaining why the ConDem plans equal the privatisation of the NHS

The ConDem Milk Snatchers

Borrowing from Thatcher's milk snatching policy of the 70s, the ConDem government are now going to stop free milk for under-fives in nursery and day care.

What really annoys me about this move is the rubbish spouted by Health Minister Anne Milton to justify the cut by saying there was no evidence the scheme improved health.

Anyone with the slightest knowledge about health knows it is a given fact that milk is beneficial to child development.  I'm sure many experts on health will soon come out to challenge Milton's statements.  This has already started with the following quote:

Tam Fry, honorary chairman of the Child Growth Foundation charity, said scrapping the Nursery Milk scheme would be "disastrous", adding: "The Conservative minister for health doesn't seem to have learnt the lessons from Margaret Thatcher. Milk is absolutely vital for children in their growing years, particularly pre-school, and has many other attributes as well. It's a step towards healthy living."

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