UNPATRIOTIC TORIES & LIB DEMS OBLITERATING WW2 GENERATION’S LEGACY TO THE NATION

I have been in Derby’s city centre recently collecting signatures for a petition calling on the Government to drop its health reforms. It is clear from the public’s reaction that local people are angry and anxious about what the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats are doing to our NHS.

At a time when the Government is making huge cuts in the NHS totalling £20bn, it is unforgivable to spend £2 billion on this reckless re-organisation. Little wonder that doctors, nurses and other healthcare professionals are united in their condemnation of the Government’s plans. The bodies who have spoken out against the Bill include the Royal College of Nurses, Royal College of GPs, Royal College of Anaesthetists, Royal College of Midwives, Royal College of Ophthalmologists, Royal College of Paediatrics & Child Health, Royal College of Pathologists, Faculty of Public Health and the British Medical Association.

We have already seen how Government cuts are damaging healthcare in our city. Since the General Election, the number of people waiting longer than 18 weeks for NHS treatment in Derby has rocketed by a colossal 502%. I remember the dismal days under the last Conservative Government when people were often waiting for years to obtain vital NHS treatment. Many patients needlessly died before they could receive the lifesaving operation for which they were waiting.

But these reforms are set to make the situation far worse than anything we witnessed in the 1980s and 1990s. The intentions of the Health & Social Care Bill were exposed last year in a speech by Mark Britnell, a former Government adviser, at a conference of private sector executives. His remarks were widely reported when he said the reforms would show "no mercy" to the NHS and offered the private sector a "big opportunity" to make profits.

He wasn’t exaggerating either. The Bill turns the NHS into a full-blown commercial market, putting competition before patient care and allowing private companies to cherry-pick quick profits. NHS hospitals in England will also be able to use 49% of their beds and theatre time to prioritise private patients forcing everybody else to wait longer.

This Government’s zeal for undermining our cherished public sector institutions is distinctly unpatriotic and contrary to the decent British values for which my parents’ generation fought in WW2. And nothing symbolises those British values better than the NHS that was established by the first post-war Labour Government in 1948. Maybe that is why the tide of opposition to this Bill is so enormous.

Aneurin Bevan, the founding father of the National Health Service said, “The NHS will exist as long as there are folk left with the faith to fight for it.” I’ve got the faith and I intend to continue fighting for our beloved NHS. That is why I will be in East Street again tomorrow morning collecting more signatures for the ‘Drop the Bill’ petition, which people can sign between 11am – 3pm.