North West & Irish region NHS shop stewards met with Regional Secretary Paul McCarthy and National Officer Rehana Azam today to discuss the region’s NHS campaigns and to finalise plans for our march and rally at the Conservative party conference in September.
Supporters of the National Health Service and all those wanting to defend jobs, services and a decent welfare state will be marching in Manchester to deliver a clear message to Conservative Party Conference to say hand off our NHS from cuts and privatisation.
GMB has recently taken part in the NHS’s 65th birthday celebrations where amongst the speakers was Regional President Dougie Henry who warned of the diseases long ago forgotten since the formation of the National Health Service providing free treatment and consigning debilitating and sometimes life threatening illnesses to history. Free to all at the point of delivery and not for profit are the founding principles on which our NHS is built.
Today’s meeting took place as it was announced that the number of patients waiting for hospital treatment is at a 5 year high. The statistics, released on Thursday by NHS England, come amid concern that patients are waiting too long for medical attention in A&E units.
Paul McCarthy commented “Our meeting today is part of the region’s campaigning activity where we are focusing efforts on protecting the NHS from a coalition government hell bent on running it down and farming out services to profit chasing vultures in the private sector. It has been announced today that almost 2.9 million people are now on hospital waiting lists, a quarter of a million up on last year and the highest level for 5 years.
Moves such as the scrapping of the NHS Direct advice line and a number of other health service shake-up measures have contributed to the problems, with a knock-on effect on waiting times for non-urgent operations. Cameron’s reorganisation of the NHS has been a £3 billion flop with almost 5,000 nursing jobs axed and thousands of vulnerable people turning up at A&E after care budgets were cut”.
Patients are now facing additional pain and suffering as operations are cancelled and hospitals are grinding to an almost halt with a shortage in beds and the crisis in A&E. The GMB will continue our fight to save the NHS and the march and rally is an important battleground”
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