25 Sep 2020
Toast our NHS and public health teams today to get safe test and trace
It's clear that local public health teams and health services (including GPs and NHS labs) must be put back in charge of testing and contact tracing in the community. Our test and trace system goes from bad to worse with every passing week.
This government hasn't listened to the evidence, so we wanted to get the attention of our decision makers with a stunt. Dressed as beers, we went to Matt Hancock's department to say: Serco couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery!
We need your help to get the message to decision makers today, by raisising a glass and toasting our NHS and public health teams, to show your support for functioning, publicly run Test and Trace across all of the UK.
Please send the government a message with a toast to safe, public test and trace today.
1. Take a photo of yourself with a beverage of your choice and if possible, this placard!
2. To post it on Twitter, simply upload or drag your photo into this pre-drafted tweet, making sure to tag @MattHancock and @ your MP (if they're on Twitter).
3. To post on Facebook, upload your image, making sure to tag your MP's facebook page, @matthancockofficial, and @WeOwnItcampaign. You can use the copy below if you like:
We need to fix test and trace. Local public health teams and our NHS must be put back in charge of testing and contact tracing. That's why I'm toasting the NHS and public health teams today
4. To post on Instagram, upload your image, tag your MP, @matthancockmp and us: @weownit_campaign
5. If you don't have social media, please send your toast to our NHS and public health teams to info@weownit.org.uk, with your MP's named, and we'll get it up on social media!
Comments
Tim Vialls 4 years ago
Track and track should not be allocated to private providers
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John Lipetz 4 years ago
Strongly agree.
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Vera 4 years ago
We should let nhs be in charge of all track and trace
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JUNE SCOTT 4 years ago
I too am appauled at the government wasting tax payers' money. The government are throwing good money after bad (down the drain). What is the point of track and trace without it being policed. It needs to have a security device placed in each doorway, which you would have to enter your phone no/swipe card before the door will open. Alternatively, pubs, bars, restaursnts could employ a door person to check tempertures and take names and telephone numbers. This would be a much more effective way of carrying out track and trace, snd would save millions being wasted, and the mey saved would help our economy in this panademic.
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Jean Wilson 4 years ago
Stench of sleaze
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Astrid Cullen 4 years ago
I am concerned about public money being sent directly to private companies who have no health and welfare experience and who continue to subcontract. All with no scrutiny by parliament. Covid is an excuse to support corrupt funding practices and must be stopped. The NHS is being deliberately marginalised. Private companies must NOT carry an NHS logo!
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John Lipetz 4 years ago
Agree. The Govt. should use the local authorities and local public health experts - and pay them accordingly.
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Ann Beeson 4 years ago
You have hit the nail on the head Astrid.. This Tory government have got away with these corrupt , and rotten practices for too long ,siphoning off public money into the private pockets of the unaccountable few. The NHS may be imperfect, but it is ultimately accountable to 'we the people'.
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Elizabeth Hopkins 4 years ago
Stop giving public money to serco. Give it to our NHS. Who do a fantastic job
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stephen buckland 4 years ago
no comment
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Pauline Beadle 4 years ago
Stop the private companies doing the track and trace tests give them to the NHS.
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Anonymous 4 years ago
Private Companies cannot be trusted to do anything with a great result not even a result, they are only interested in making money, We need to let the NHS do the testing for
Coronavirus, NHS have proved themselves, they get on with the Job.
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jean skasick 4 years ago
The present system has been an utter shambles, disgrace to humanity and definitely not working. Support this before anymore damage/deaths are recorded
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Joy Smout 4 years ago
When I hear a politician say NHS Trace & Test I’m incandescent with rage.
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Sylvia brown 4 years ago
Privateers exist to earn profit.. it’s utterly immoral to profit from the public sector, especially health .. End it NOW
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Julie Shaw 4 years ago
The government needs to realise that people's lives have been lost and more are at risk. This is NOT Zan opportunity to line the pockets of your mates who are in business. Either put services out to tender or use services that are already available and are PUBLIC. Stop taking us for mugs.
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David George 4 years ago
We should finish with private companies do any type of work were it concerns public money you only have to look at the prisons and railways.
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jim mctavish 4 years ago
The private sector just isn't working
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John Kane 4 years ago
I've just received my result of over 60s cancer screening today. Thankfully, it was negative and at no cost at point of treatment to me. Thank you, NHS. This would not be possible under privatised health care.
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Ray Mumford 4 years ago
The Tory party is only interested in enriching their 'friends' by outsourcing services to them and protecting them. It does not matter whether they do the job properly - they get the millions. In return the companies will either give the politicians a place on the board or 'consultancy' when they leave government. This has been Tory policy for years. Look at Kenneth Clarke - went from health minister to director at British American Tobacco. Look at Margaret Thatcher - went from PM to third world promoter for Philip Morris Tobacco (Marlboro). Please check out the facts.
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Neil Batey 4 years ago
When will the government learn that private companies can't deliver these services!
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Gill Wright 4 years ago
While private companies make a pig's ear of track and trace, we 'oldies' are continuing to be put at risk by this callous government. They put profit before health and welfare of the population. The NHS could operate track and trace with infinitely better results. We know loyalty to your wealthy chums is one of your top priorities but come on, Boris, open your eyes and get a grip!
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Albert hall 4 years ago
Stop wasting money on these useless companies give it to people who care for the community
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Anonymous 4 years ago
Serco has already not kept to their contract at Queens Hosp Nottingham and NHS has taken back control All private concerns must be held to account
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Tony Miller 4 years ago
Private companies are not to help anyone or anything, they are there to make money, and how they get it, it doesn’t matter as long as it’s “legal”.
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Astrid Brown 4 years ago
I have always believed in public ownership for the necessities of life; e.g. housing, water, heating, public transport and, of course, the health service. I was lucky enough to be born not long after the NHS was founded. I have had to watch various governments decimate everything that was in public ownership.
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Mark Oliver 4 years ago
It is obvious to me that for this operation to be carried out within the private sector is fundamentally wrong and the experience to date has borne this out. To involve something as essential as this, for the security of many lives, with any kind of commercial aspiration is reckless and frighteningly amoral.
It is essential for us to be able to trust the NHS and for the government to be trusted by the public to deliver an NHS than can be trusted.
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Patrick George McCall 4 years ago
Serco are well known for screwing things up or for fiddling. Why do they keep getting nice juicy contracts from this Government? Party doners maybe?
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Julie 4 years ago
Put testing along with track and trace back in the safe hands of OUR NHS and take back from SERCO as it’s not fit for purpose.
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Brian McClintock 4 years ago
I wonder if people who voted conservative last time realised that they would be continuing to privatise our NHS
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Terence Adrian Cook 4 years ago
Please stop giving OUR money to YOUR mates.....
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Geraint Jones 4 years ago
I am so in favour of public services. Worked in Local Government for 35 years. Hate privatisation of public services with a passion
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Philip Cerny 4 years ago
I returned to the UK, after living 6 years in the United States and having to use their failed health care system, in order to benefit from the excellent NHS. Nevertheless, cuts and various privatisation measures need to be reversed so that health care returns to being a fully funded public good, and less of a profit-making (or losing) source for the private sector.
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Robert Best 4 years ago
I have been saved by the NHS twice don’t let be threatened with private companies
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Keith Sharpe 4 years ago
Hands off OUR NHS
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Keith Tytler 4 years ago
Dear Mr Opperman
Sort your government out and get a track and trace system that works.Let an organisation that deals with health ie the National Health Service.Not companies who are mainly interested in profit
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Didireallysaythat 4 years ago
I am still waiting for people to wake up and start actually supporting the NHS at the ballot box.
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Sue donbroski 4 years ago
My son had to get a test for his sick son. He spent most of the day trying to get through and was eventually offered tests up to two weeks away when obviously they wouldn’t be needed! Finall got a test at Tangmere airodrome where there about 40 officials but only one other car! What a waste
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Kay Slade 4 years ago
It is of urgent importance that the private firms of Serco and others are given the boot and the money transferred to a truly
NHS track and trace by people who know what the6 are doing. Urgent Urgent. Urgent
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Laura Jones 4 years ago
It is criminal to take tax payers money to give to these private companies that don't seem able to deliver. There is an existing local infrastructure that should be given additional funding to do the job. They know the localities and communities they are serving!
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Roger Philpott 4 years ago
Private companies should not be handed a rake-off from our money, 100% of taxpayers' should be going to fund the NHS which can be held publicly accountable for any failings.
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Terry BELLAMY 4 years ago
The Nation's health should not be a vehicle for corporate profit taking
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Colin Jacob 4 years ago
I cannot imagine why so many people were taken in by the Tories stealing public services and passing them over to private companies? It has destroyed much of the efficiency and levels of provision built up since the last war, and many people now have to travel vast distances to a hospital. The Tories haven't finished their hideous programme yet. Calling schools Academy 'Trusts' and those hospitals which haven't been closed, Healthcare 'Trusts' is about setting them up with Chief Executives and a plethora of managers in readiness for full privatisation. Nurses no longer have accommodation near their hospital and with so many staff shortages, nurses are booked at extra expense from privately run 'agencies'! With America waiting in the wings to pounce and run a 'for profit' health business, the UK needs to wake up to what is happening. Clapping on the doorstep is yet another ploy to cover up inadequacies and shortfalls in provision. Like many areas, my locality continues to build more houses to cope with the growing population, but the local hospital has fewer beds now than in the 1980's! Routine procedures are often put on hold , but treatment can be almost immediate if you are prepared to pay the private healthcare hospitals! This means that professional staff, doctors and surgeons are helping the private sector whilst avoiding serving non paying patients.
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Colin Jacob 4 years ago
I cannot imagine why so many people were taken in by the Tories stealing public services and passing them over to private companies? It has destroyed much of the efficiency and levels of provision built up since the last war, and many people now have to travel vast distances to a hospital. The Tories haven't finished their hideous programme yet. Calling schools Academy 'Trusts' and those hospitals which haven't been closed, Healthcare 'Trusts' is about setting them up with Chief Executives and a plethora of managers in readiness for full privatisation. Nurses no longer have accommodation near their hospital and with so many staff shortages, nurses are booked at extra expense from privately run 'agencies'! With America waiting in the wings to pounce and run a 'for profit' health business, the UK needs to wake up to what is happening. Clapping on the doorstep is yet another ploy to cover up inadequacies and shortfalls in provision. Like many areas, my locality continues to build more houses to cope with the growing population, but the local hospital has fewer beds now than in the 1980's! Routine procedures are often put on hold , but treatment can be almost immediate if you are prepared to pay the private healthcare hospitals! This means that professional staff, doctors and surgeons are helping the private sector whilst avoiding serving non paying patients.
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Delys Wallace 4 years ago
Test and trace should be through the expert NHS not through a private mess called NHS test and trace. A toast to our NHS and hope that all privatisation is stopped starting with the test and trace. Serco messed up probation which had to be taken back in house. Do the Tories not learn. What makes them think that they'll do any better on this when all evidence is to the contrary.
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Peter Jenkins 4 years ago
The NHS is sacrosanct and must not be used as a front for private health companies to provide services and extract profits from the U.K. public purse. All tax payer funds must be used for not for profit health provision by the NHS.
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David Wicks 4 years ago
We require an audit of spending on PPE and Track and Trace and any other private sector envolvement in providing services for the National Health Service or National Health England because we do not trust our Government to have tendered for the best use of Public money.
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P Webb 4 years ago
It is a scandal that Serco are allowed to get away with causing us all to suffer new restrictions as a result of their failure. The contract should be taken off them and large penalties applied.
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Josephine Green 4 years ago
Keep in public ownership
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Dr Ben Charnaud 4 years ago
The private sector have failed to provide access to testing for those who need it they have prioritised testing for certain people for political and financial gain they have not been transparent in their process. Their results therefore can’t be trusted The real NHS is professional and prioritises health needs not political and financial ones and can be trusted
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Jenn Sellek 4 years ago
Stop giving out contracts to mates and relatives, without putting the contracts out to tender. The public aren’t stupid. We know what you are up to and we’ve heard your lies. Too many people will die so do something about it.
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Maxine Olley 4 years ago
Stop throwing away our money and give it to our NHS, who are doing a wonderful job. Corrupt funding practices must be stopped NOW. It’s theft... and it will be stopped!
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Dr Derek Alan Gould 4 years ago
The sum of £100b, that Boris has proposed to give to multiple private comapanies for track and trace services, is TWO THIRDS of the WHOLE NHS ANNUAL BUDGET for 2020. Futher, while our (real!) NHS and our Local Public Health sector are experts in tracing and isolating infected individuals, the private companies that the Tories seem in thrall of, have no known expertise or track record in this. So Boris: give that £100b to the REAL track and trace pioneers in our REAL, Public Health NHS. Please don't play poker with the lives of the public.
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Jo McGrattan 4 years ago
The NHS has served us so well for over 50 years. We are so angry at this government's actions in dismantling it and giving the role to private companies who have no idea what they are doing! We need the expertise of the NHS now more than ever and especially during this pandemic. Bless them for their dedication!
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Maxine Olley 4 years ago
You are wasting public money, and time! It MUST be given to our wonderful NHS, who know what they’re doing!
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Yvonne Johnson 4 years ago
Stop wasting money for test and trace by serco.Get rid of the inept company.
Fund NHS properly for test and trace.
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Yvonne Johnson 4 years ago
STOP PAYING SERCO.
WASTE OF MONEY.FUND NHS INSTEAD.
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Gary luton 4 years ago
the rich & powerful looking after friends again, instead of doing what is good for the country
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Neil Corrie 4 years ago
The government should not privately contract out profitable parts of the NHS to defund the public aminity paid for by the Britidh tax payers through misdirected National insurance ! The government are defrauding the country & it should stop now by cancelling contracts & bringing them back in house at the deviled NHS that should be totally renstionalised !
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Doreen Brand 4 years ago
We must continue to let our MP and the government know how we feel.I have written to my MP Dan Poulter,on this to no avail he doesn't even bother me know why he does not agree!
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Gerald Lewis 4 years ago
stop wasting public money.
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JOHN JONES 4 years ago
SERCO and other private companies in it for profit only. Give testing work to nhs where any profit goes back into the system.
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Steve McDowell 4 years ago
Don’t waste any more money on these organisations which rip the public purse off.
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David Gilmour 4 years ago
This is yet another attempt to privatize the NHS by stealth by a Tory regime hell bent on using this crisis to fill the coffers of their kleptocratic friends in the City Of London.
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David. Osborn 4 years ago
Same old TORIES giving contracts to companies like serco who will cream off the top then give it to others . Why are people surprised?
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Elizabeth Rafferty 4 years ago
Have just experienced people being turned away from a test site as booking system failed to register them & the staff were concerned how complicated the test allocation to each site was.local co-ordination should be the way forward & established before winter illnesses complicate the process.
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Gwyn Hughes 4 years ago
THERE IS A WELL ESTABLISHED PUBLIC SERVICE IN TRACKING AND TRACING WHICH IS RENOWNED FOR A FAST, EFFICIENT AND COST-EFFECTIVE OPERATION - IT IS ROUTINE FOR EVERY CLAP CLINIC IN THE LAND. THEY KNOW HOW - FOR GOD'S SAKE USE THEM!
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Carol Broom 4 years ago
Privatisation is theft and profiteering. The rich are predating on the poor. National infrastructure must remain national. Selling off national assets is totally unacceptable.
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Norman L Fairclough 4 years ago
Recent experience of trying to get the test which I needed to have an operation: sitting in a queue for hours to get through to someone who might be find me a test appointment. This chaos is exactly what you don't need a couple of days before an operation. Fortunately I got through via the General Surgery department at the local hospital to get an immediate appointment at a small testing unit at the local hospital. Just in time. What we have now doesn't work. What we need is a locally based system run by people who know the area and the people.
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Anonymous 4 years ago
As you say we own it we shouldn't be giving vast amounts of money to private companies give it to the NHS!!
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Richard Stephens 4 years ago
The NHS local services are best suited to carry out this Test & Trace as a localised, monitored personal service as they do with any health service.....no other UK test of a person’s health condition (other than pregnancy testing) is carried out without the 'control and gateway' advice and expertise of a health clinician /professional there to monitor if its really needed and clarify basis for any test as well as the likely actions in result of a test?? It's simple: Sack SERCO use our NHS.
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Howard Charles Wrigley 4 years ago
Stop giving money to Seco and Deloitte to badly run the testing and tracing and involve local NHS teams who know their own areas.
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Veronica Bale 4 years ago
I am concerned about public money being sent directly to private companies who have no health and welfare experience and who continue to subcontract. All with no scrutiny by parliament. Covid is an excuse to support corrupt funding practices and must be stopped. The NHS is being deliberately marginalised. Private companies must NOT carry an NHS logo!
A.V.Bale
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Edward Hills 4 years ago
We know from the pip and universal credit screenings that private company's are only interested in ripping the government off .by government I really mean the taxpayer.this test and trace system is too important to trust to incompetent private company's with their own agenda please trust the NHS to get it right
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Sarah Gale 4 years ago
local authorities and public health experts must surely be given trust and the resources to do the test, track trace AND SUPPORT...the phenomenal response to the Salisbury poisonings unequivocally proved how vital it is to have more Tracy Daszkiewiczs and less outsourced Hardings.
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Sarah Gale 4 years ago
local authorities and public health experts must surely be given trust and the resources to test, track, trace AND SUPPORT - the phenomenal response to the Salisbury poisonings unequivocally proved how vital it is to have more Tracy Daszkiewiczs and less outsourced Hardings.
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Peter Kenyon 4 years ago
Centralised administration using omnibus suppliers is more suited to centralised dictatorships than the democratic local authorities which work for their residents in this country.
I think we are heading for an autocratic right
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Irene Platt 4 years ago
We need our NHS not a profit making company who are only interested in lining their pockets and that of their shareholders. The ministers need to stop calling the private Track and Trace owned by Serco the NHS Track and Trace.
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Harry Fleming 4 years ago
stop calling it NHS track and trace - it has nothing to do with NHS its conducted very badly by private companies who have no experience. We have had for years a legal system of local public health departments, who are skilled in track and trace for all sorts of notifiable diseases really really stupid not to use and expand whats already available. the private system is costing vast amounts of money and causing the death of many people by sheer incompetance.
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Bernard Gallagher 4 years ago
We already have the NHS .. we, certainly, do not need inept politicians, and, profiteers sidelining funds that should be available to our magnificent health service..!
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K Bull 4 years ago
Track and trace via public ownership and organisations only
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Margaret Brobin 4 years ago
We had a Public Health dept with experience, based locally and throughout the country so why was this handed out to a private company. Shocking waste of public money. When this is over there must be an inquiry and heads should roll.
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Tom Burke 4 years ago
track and trace should be funded only via the established NHS and direct funding to them on our behalf and not to some private companies not answerable to the UK public.
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Mr S Macnaughton 4 years ago
The only support the Government has for the National Health Service is to clap.
That's it.
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Maggie Stone 4 years ago
The Track and Trace "gravy train" should be stopped immediately. The NHS should be in charge.
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Miranda Tunnicliffe 4 years ago
You really have wasted an awful lot of public money on a system that isn’t functioning. Over £5000 for every British Citizen. Please review and change tack quickly. We have easily the worst in Europe as you are not using this country’s experts.
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carl mingard 4 years ago
This debacle proves two things, that the Tories are totally wasteful of our money and thus our lives as they put profit before need,as they always have. plus they are giving that money to those who have donated to their coffers, or where in their government. They have no interest in us the ordinary people, just their elite circle. We sorely need a viable alternative way of living not just existing
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John Morris 4 years ago
The NHS BELONGS to the people of the UK. The Conservative 'so-called' government are STEALING the NHS from everyone. The Tories are nothing but common criminals.
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Sally Lammiman 4 years ago
Stop giving money to private companies for test & trace
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MarieAnn Porter 4 years ago
Stop scratching each others backs, throwing jobs to "your mates" and get on with providing a service to YOUR PUBLIC, because WE...WE...pay you handsomely !!!!!
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Annie Bevis 4 years ago
We have seen how Serco works in the Public Services: they are a disgrace, incompetent and useless. The sooner the government gets rid of it, the better. All private contractors are all in the red. The figures were published a few years ago. They're incapable of running their own companies and stay solvent. How on earth do they manage to obtain the juicy contracts they do get?
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David Freund 4 years ago
We simply have to put a stop and recover the lost ground given to privatisation of the NHS on ideological grounds for profiteering. We need to own our NHS for the best health service for,all.
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Phillip Green 4 years ago
This ideologically driven government is unbelievably delinquent. For them everything has to be run by a private company. It has been shown time and again that privately run operations are not as efficient as publicly run. In three WHO trials the NHS has come out better that the US systems it has been put up against. More patients dealt with, better outcomes and not as expensive.Just out of interest do Serco give
funds to the Tory party.
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Jane 4 years ago
Let local authorities organise test and trace. They know what their area resources.
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P Hanson 4 years ago
You cannot trust the Conservatives, everything the touch becomes a disaster. A political party led by dogma.
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Carol Stevens 4 years ago
If the system ain't broke don't fix it as the saying goes but if the system is broken beyond repair replace it quick with a non privately owned company that can do the job. Unlike the Tory 'chums' who seem to have failed at every thing they've been given contacts for. So raise a glass to the NHS and give them a fighting chance and kick out the privates!
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Tim Grayson 4 years ago
This concerns our health, played for with our money, keep it in our hands.
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Sandra McKeown 4 years ago
Stop giving incompetent private companies private cash. They don't have the foresight to employ more staff to analyse after increasing tests. Disgusting and dangerous practices that will be accountable.
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Sally Drew 4 years ago
It's time to call a halt to the increasing privatisation of NHS services. Public money should not be used to make big profits for private companies.
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Mike Jones 4 years ago
Public money for public services. Not for private companies, share holders or CEO'S.
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Brian Gill 4 years ago
I agree wholeheartedly with the above comments.
The current government action here shows nothing, but stupidity - and the sacrifice of public health realities to ideological innefficiency and nonsense, rather than the proper pursuit of the country's health.
The key question is, therefore, how best do we act against this betrayal of trust - and proper, relevant action.
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Roger Kendrick 4 years ago
This Government has already wasted £millions of our money on private firms who have let us down so please don't waste any more on companies like Serco and protect the NHS and us all by setting up a NHS and local authority Test and Trace system.
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Lynne ISMAIL 4 years ago
Time and time again servo is shown not to be competent. Please stop allocating track and trace to them
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Mitchell Mccarthy 4 years ago
Let's keep fighting to put an end to Serco and all the others like them, and give the NHS the credit that they deserve.
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Elaine Snell 4 years ago
Shouldn’t the public decide who the contact goes to since it’s funded by their (public) money?
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Collette Hosseini 4 years ago
Track & trace should not be given to private companies to make a profit.
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Marion Tollervey 4 years ago
Another example of millions wasted by the government by employing private companies
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Marrilyn Eden 4 years ago
Stop wasting money to servo and other private companies! Concentrate on Our NHS!!!
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Kate Ferry 4 years ago
England is the only part of the world not using the public health officers for doing the job they have been trained to do.This Brexit Government has an anti pulic service obsession, and it's killing us.
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Alan Graham 4 years ago
It wouldn't be so bad if these companies were actually good at it but the list of failures is growing all the time. We can only jump to conclusions about why the same companies keep getting the work, even when they have already proved their incompetence.
Fortunately, Group4 aren't doing the testing...
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Martin Reddy 4 years ago
Serco has proved time and again that they are not capable of providing the kind of service the people of this country demand and deserve. However, this government seems hell bent on throwing hard earned public money at this inept company and for what reason. Is it because they can not see what the rest of us can see or is it pure political dogma? What ever it is please stop doing it as it doesn't make good financial sense.
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Michael John Hillcoat 4 years ago
When in employment I received private health service,. but now as an octogenarian I rely on tne N H S who have served me
well
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Peter Dunmill 4 years ago
I am concerned that a private company run by a close relative of a Tory MP, and without any experience of the Health and Welfare sector’s, gets huge amounts of public money thrown at them . When clearly,through past history, their track records on government contracts are less than inspiring.
Give our NHS the money and they will do a brilliant job, as always.
Health and Welfare services should be remain in the public domain, and not for profit.
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Jayne Gilsenan 4 years ago
Stop giving money to private companies !!!
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John & Cath Hanley 4 years ago
Test & Trace must now be given to the NHS to run properly
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Andrew Sayer 4 years ago
The NHS, not private companies with no proven competence in health care, should be responsible for track and trace. Giving huge amounts of money to such companies - often ones with ties to the Conservative Party - is both absurd and corrupt.
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Peter 4 years ago
I cannot understand why disgraced private profiteers like Serco and G4S (didn't they do well at the Olympics? Not) can be repeatedly given contracts that they Absolutely Do Not deserve, taking Our tax money and then not even doing the job? Are they big tory party donors? Something very fishy about all this, should be investigated and STOPPED.
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Lindsey March 4 years ago
This government is a disgrace to democracy
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David Tetley 4 years ago
It's an absolute disgrace, I am sick and tired of this so called government finding sneaky ways to privatize OUR NHS, and using the Pandemic that people are very concerned about to hide the fact that they are slowly selling OUR NHS. This has to stop now. We can all stop this by working together
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Gina Bridgeland. 4 years ago
End this dangerous opportunism now! Companies such as Serco have no business ANYWHERE in our economy, least of all in life-and-death services such as track and trace. Ministers such as Matt Hancock are ideologically committed to privatisation of the NHS, by stealth so that the public isn't alerted to their nefarious schemes, and see the pandemic not as the tremendous national tragedy it is, but as an opportunity to give out fat contracts (without any proper scrutiny and against expert advice from public health practitioners)to their chums.
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Judith Stergios 4 years ago
Serco and Sipel have made a mess of track and trace so why does the government continue to give the lots of public money well we all know why !
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Maggie Westby 4 years ago
I'm concerned that our 3-pronged battle with Coronavirus (immunity in some, targeted lockdown and social distancing to limit transmission, and tracing and self-isolation of people who have been exposed to the virus) is being sabotaged in the Test and Trace stage. And why are we missing this vital opportunity?
Tracing should be done by local, trained public health professionals and GPs, and not call centres belonging to private companies who don't know about healthcare and who are not making it work. We need to sort this out NOW. How dare the Government put people's lives at risk in this way?
- see recent British Medical Journal (BMJ) blog: https://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2020/09/24/karl-friston-how-should-we-respond-to-an-upsurge-in-covid-19-cases/
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Kash Singh 4 years ago
I am concerned about public money being sent directly to private companies who have no health and welfare experience and who continue to subcontract. All with no scrutiny by parliament. Covid is an excuse to support corrupt funding practices and must be stopped. The NHS is being deliberately marginalised. Private companies must NOT carry an NHS logo!
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Tony Greenway 4 years ago
The vast amounts of public money to be transferred to NHS and Local Authorities and the Tory Baroness with no relevant experience to be sacked and replaced with a competent administrator with a proven track record.
ALL our lives are at serious risk under the current shambolic mess!!!
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karen bennett 4 years ago
I do NOT trust this government time and again they are proving money counts give the public money to our NHS who know how to set up track and trace
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Mike Akehurst 4 years ago
Stop wasting our money on private companies ,but being tories you love privatisation ,money for your boys.
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A Nightingale 4 years ago
We should not even need to debate this subject..!!
The fact is, and has ALWAYS been, clear!
You cannot hand PUBLIC SERVICES over to profit seeking private companies; BECAUSE THE FIRST PRIORITY OF PRIVATE COMPANIES IS NOT IN SERVING THE PUBLIC..!! Their first and ONLY real priority is too secure profit (and therefore a cash return for the owner\investors) ..!!
This is a PATENTLY OBVIOUS FACT and always has been.
Any Eton or Oxbridge educated politician, who claims not to understand this, IS A LIAR..!!
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Hazel Davidson 4 years ago
I believe that private companies such as Serco should not be allowed to do Test and Trace - they don't have the expertise and they are just taking our money and doing very little while charging the earth. Public bodies - the NHS and local councils - have better information and do the job much better. But they have been starved of funds, they barely have enough to carry out their legal duties. This is all wrong. The Government should not be handing money to Serco and others without any tendering process. Give it to the NHS and local government instead - they will do it better and cheaper.
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Anonymous 4 years ago
Stop spending billions on a shabby privatised test and trace system. Private companies are costing our NHS billions already, give a very poor service and are not monitored!
Money for old rope!
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Mike Topp 4 years ago
parliament should oversee government actions and government should not sub contract to private companies without due care
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Margaret Gray 4 years ago
I agree with a previous comment that private companies should not display the NHS logo!
Stop wasting the public money on incompetent, money grabbing private companies.
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Frederick Murphy 4 years ago
Track and trace is anything but world beating ,could it be the private companies you are using?
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Yvonne Wilson 4 years ago
I think it is scandalous that the Government is wasting tax payers money on outsourcing test and trace to private companies such as Serco, who have a bad track record and no experience in working with health services. These decisions are ideological and little to do with giving the public a fit for purpose testing system.
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Darren Kiggins 4 years ago
We need to stop the Tory scum at al and their friends running this country into a zombie republic and laughing stock of the world. Do you agree Dido Harding?
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John Zebedee 4 years ago
The government has had to spend countless millions on the NHS and supporting jobs and the economy but there is no excuse for wasting tax payers money on private companies that are failing to deliver on track and trace.
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Richard Mitchley 4 years ago
Private companies care about profit and not health. Mr Hancock take a note from Scotland and Wales and do it properly not pay hundreds of millions to a private company who don't care at all. Surely common sense would be to let the NHS run the app and not some company, shame on you!
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Ron Branton 4 years ago
We must now all accept that we have a total dishonest, incompetent government that we can no longer trust and we will have to accept through constant messaging and using whatever media we can will be the only way we can get things done, they will go down in history as the worst government ever to be elected and the worst for consistently lying to the British people. They try to accommodate many areas of their responsibility, by passing it on to private companies because of there incompetence to sort it themselves, making things even worse. We are certainly in serious trouble with these people.
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Joan Fryer 4 years ago
Since 2010 when the Tory government came to power, I must have signed thousands of petitions and donated more than I care to think about - the first I signed was a 38 Degree petition to stop Caroline Spelman selling off our forests. All of this has been essential because we have a government who have nothing but contempt for ordinary people who are the doctors, nurses, scientists, lawyers, engineers, police officers, fire & rescue officers, school teachers, key workers I could go on. Tory politicians are so arrogant they think they know best which they absolutely do not which is why there have been so many deaths from Covid 19. They fear socialism because they consider leaving everything to the markets is the answer - profit - profit - profit which also includes corruption. They would rather engage with private companies that know absolutely nothing about specialised fields but that doesn't matter as long as they contribute to Tory coffers - this is why this country is now the equivalent to a totalitarian state bordering on a rogue state because they ignore professionalism and think they are above the law.
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