17 October 2018
The government's latest plan is to carve up the BIGGEST CHUNKS YET of your NHS and open them up to privatisers like Richard Branson.
Unaccountable, non-NHS organisations could be given contracts to run NHS services for half a million people, across a whole geographical area, for 10-15 years.
This means, for example, if you need a hip replacement and Branson doesn't want to provide it, you won’t get one. It’s not clear how you can hold him to account or whether he’ll have any legal obligations to patients. Plus, you’re stuck for 10-15 years.
The government has already been forced to rebrand these absurd plans - and forced to consult the public. Let's stop them altogether.
The deadline is Friday 26th October. It would be brilliant if you could also join us to hand in the petition - sign up on facebook or find out more on the Keep Our NHS Public website.
The needs of patients like you and your friends and family should determine what services our NHS provides. Not private companies angling for a profit.
But the government’s latest plan is to carve up up the biggest chunks yet of your NHS and open them up to privatisers like Richard Branson.
Right now 195 local Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) are in charge of meeting your needs as an NHS patient.
They’re not perfect by any means. CCGs are under huge pressure from cost cutting by the government. Some of them are rationing the services you can receive.
Services like hip replacements, fertility treatments and cataract surgery are already being restricted - leading to a postcode lottery for patients.
Nevertheless, CCGs are legally responsible for your care, and they can be held to account by you, by other patients, by NHS campaigners and by the public in general. They can be challenged when they restrict your access to care.
Victories have been won by holding CCGs to account. For example, NHS campaigners in Sheffield have saved vital services from being closed and in Worcestershire, plans to restrict access to hearing aids were dropped after input from patients and the community.
You can win victories when the NHS is accountable. But what about when your local doctor and hospital answer to privatisers like Richard Branson?
The new 'ICP' contracts would mean that CCGs handing over responsibility for patient care to organisations which are not part of the NHS.
The ICP organisation may be private, private-public partnership, or an alliance of NHS providers.
The contracts would carve up huge chunks of the NHS and put these unaccountable bodies in charge. Contracts would deliver all NHS services for half a million people, across a whole geographical area, for 10-15 years.
The ICP organisation would not be subject to public scrutiny. It’s not clear how you would hold them to account when they can hide behind commercial confidentiality.
The new contracts might go to private providers like Virgin, Capita, Serco or United Health (an American company) or they might go to new public-private partnerships like Viapath (a jointly owned company created by NHS trusts and Serco to deliver outsourced pathology services).
Even worse, these contracts would last for 10-15 years. So your area would be locked in, long term, to an agreement with an organisation that you can’t hold to account.
Your services might be cut, and you’d have no power to stop it. Plus, it would be harder to reinstate our NHS as a national service in public hands, in the future.
This reorganisation would put outsourcing and fragmentation at the very heart of our NHS, opening the door to more privatisation.
Thankfully, NHS campaigners have been working hard to force the government to consult on these plans. Now they need YOU.
These plans are being rebranded again and again because they're so unacceptable. If we all respond with a HUGE petition, we could stop these plans from going ahead.
The consultation deadline is Friday 26th October.
If you can, please also join us for the petition hand-in - sign up on facebook or find out more on the Keep Our NHS Public website.
Comments
Jayne hammoudeh... replied on Permalink
Privatisers? Privateers !
Gary Captain Lam replied on Permalink
As I have tried and tried to get the Prime Minister and the Health Secretary to have an audience to put forward to them a workable plan to save the NHS but all emails were ignored. Currently the government is stealing from the NHS by selling off hospitals to private companies and then leasing them back which is a cost to the hospital overheads which they did not have before.
What we got to do is to stop the Government from privatization through the back doors once and for all. The other issue is for now stop further funding as the money goes to the private companies to cover overheads and making profits for the shareholders and guys at the top who has no idea of how to run a medical organisation like the NHS. The NHS is a non profit orgainisation and privatising the NHS is totally against the ground it was set up as it will be a profit generating organisation where the profit does not go back to running the hospital but to share holders and bonuses for the executives who are already over paid. So any further funding will only go towards the profitability of the companies not directly to the NHS.
The immediate setup of a group comprising of doctors, nurses and normal citizens who should evaluate the need and way forward. This task should be done by this group and not people whose interest is themselves ( the company) or external firms of accountants who has no knowledge of what is needed as they have no medical background but only look at the financial side which is not what is needed.
I can go on and on over this but the long and short is stop the Government from selling the NHS off immediately and bring back those they privatised back into public ownership. We Own the NHS and We must have a say in how it should be run and that is where the New Group I mentioned come into play. The Government should not have the right to sell off and privatise without Our consent period. Furthermore our GPs and doctors should be the one who say what the patients' needs not the Government or private enterprises who have no idea what the patients need except what they need to make a profit and their fat bonuses on meeting financial targets.
Catherine Mciver replied on Permalink
The national health service is not yours to sell.. we pay for it . You don’t have a mandate to sell our health service
Nudrev breac replied on Permalink
REMEMBER, Nye Bevan words in 1946 regarding ye Tories and the NHS? HIS WORDS are coming TRUE!
Annmarie replied on Permalink
You can't sell the NHS as its not for sale how would the elderly and other people get seen stay away from it as its unfair we all need the NHS
Ann Begentyou replied on Permalink
Government you didn't ask us if you could sell our NHS so PLEASE DON'T take it for granted you can! because we dont want a private NHS Keep our NHS PUPLIC paid for!!
Bernard Connolly replied on Permalink
We are also fighting to have Wantage Community Hospital reopened after it was “temporarily closed” two years ago in July 2016. The whole NHS process is deliberately obscure and confusing so the general public cannot fully understand what is going on.
Kathleen reynolds replied on Permalink
NOT FOR SALE , how this government can think of doing this on the sly , makes my blood boil , GET THIS THE NHS is not for SALE , we don't want a private NHS KEEP OUR NHS for all young & old who need the use of there services , as I said NOT FOR SALE NOT FOR SALE
Baba Aye replied on Permalink
the right to health is a fundamental human right. it cannot be realised when private profiteers drive healthcare delivery.
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