As we are distracted by news of Prime Minister Boris Johnson waffling on about Peppa Pig, the NHS in England is being dismantled.

As we are distracted by news of  our Prime Minister Boris Johnson waffling on about Peppa Pig, the NHS in England is being dismantled. It is entirely possible that his behaviour is designed to distract from that fact. MPs today will vote for the third and final time on the Health and Care Bill before it heads to the Lords. 

The Tory Government's health and care bill focuses on restructuring parts of the NHS in England to create a ‘truly integrated’ healthcare system that involves less central bureaucracy, but will see it being split into 42 parts, with private companies being able to sit on the board of each part and decide who gets funding. It will put profit at the centre of the NHS and is a threat to universal healthcare. It is bad for staff, it is bad for patients.

Successive governments have been plotting to dismantle the National Health Service for many years. The Health and Social Care Act 2012 removed the obligation on the Secretary of State for Health to provide us with healthcare, which was central to the founding of the NHS in 1948, ‘free at the point of delivery’. Primary Care Trusts and Strategic Health Authorities were swept away, to be replaced by Clinical Commissioning Groups, partly run by general practitioners, but also a major point of access for private service providers. In 2013, Public England, a new executive agency of the Department of Health, was set up. All of these measures paved the way for privatisation.

Over the decades, the NHS has been deliberately starved of funding, so that when the Covid pandemic hit, it was ill prepared. Due to this and government bungling, the UK had the highest death rate per capita in the world. And instead of making the very most of the resources available, the Government took advantage of the crisis to flout tendering laws and award contracts to friends and family with no experience of sourcing PPE and whose only interest was in maximizing profits. We have also seen in the pandemic how bringing in private firms has wasted vast sums, and absolutely failed us as patients and as a country,To save money, there will be more down-skilling, such as nurses replacing doctors, which has happened during the pandemic, causing staff stress, lack of patient trust and greater risk of accidents.

Opponents of the bill are warning that it will pave the way for the English NHS to be replaced by a profit-driven American-style system, which would incentivise private health providers to cut and deny care to increase profits. The United States has one of the worst healthcare systems in the world and the most expensive. Health insurance does not cover all procedures, patients needing long-term and expensive treatments are often refused them. If they can’t afford private treatment, they are just left to suffer and decline. 

The Johnson government’s Bill is also a Service Withdrawal Bill that will  remove the statutory duty on the Health Secretary or on the new NHS Boards to provide hospital care.Integrated Care Boards will be able to award and extend contracts for healthcare services, of unlimited value, without having to advertise, including to private companies. This is what the Department of Health has got away with during the pandemic, and very lucrative it has been for friends and relatives of Government ministers. Short-term contracts to private providers will also damage established relationships between NHS staff and patients.

The Trade Union Unite has been one of the loudest and fiercest critics of the proposed bill, voicing concerns about its impact on services, accountability, funding, professional standards, privatisation, safety, and terms and conditions.

Earlier this year Unite’s national officer for health, Jackie Williams said:“The Westminster government’s new Health and Care Bill is a Trojan horse for more privatisation, cronyism, austerity and a licence for politicians to run down and sell off the NHS."

The British Medical Association has also come out in opposition, thinking the timing of the legislation is "particularly unwise. while we are still tackling Covd 19 and resulting backlog of care" and that " the Bill addresses none of the problems the NHS is currently facing"

The Health and Care Bill will put far too much power in the hands of private companies, who will be allowed to profit from people’s health, contrary to the principles of the NHS. 

It really beggars belief  that it has even gotten this far. Privatisation of the NHS should be a deep red line for every citizen, It should not  have been up for debate in the first place. Reform, improve, invest, make it more efficient, yes but lets not go down the path of privatisation. 

Until recently, the NHS was the envy of the world, the best value for money. But cuts to services year on year and more and more privatisation ( even now you have to pay to have your ears syringed) has knocked it down several places and will only get worse if this rotten disgusting Government under Boris Johnson gets it way and this Bill is passed. Sadly it might be too late, the Tory Government has already gone ahead and approved a plan to make the poorest people in the UK pay for the social care of the richest.  If  todays Bill is passed we face many bleak days  ahead. Imagine if your sister, brother, dad, mum, auntie etc  were MP;s and voted for it. Personally, I'd disown them. If you haven't already go to https://www.yournhsneedsyou.com/ and urge your MP to vote against it! It's rather urgent now.