Local campaign group ‘Islington Keep Our NHS Public’ is asking all candidates in Islington’s council elections to pledge to keep the NHS in public hands. Islington Green Party is delighted to make the pledge. Here is our response:
Dear Islington Keep Our NHS Public,
Thank you for giving us the opportunity to state on behalf of all the Islington Green Party Local Election Candidates that we oppose the privatisation and marketisation of health services and pledge to do all in our power to protect local health services.
This is a core value for the Green Party. We believe in an NHS that is publicly funded, publicly owned and free at the point of use, dependent on need and not on the ability to pay.
In our party principles, we state:
‘Free market mechanisms cannot adequately meet health needs, or effectively constrain costs. Proper healthcare for all and the responsible use of resources both require the continued provision of well-financed and publicly-funded health services.’
The Green Party is extremely concerned at the removal of the ‘duty to provide’ healthcare from the Secretary of State and the increasing amount of public funds being directed into the hands of private medical firms.
We deplore that the Labour government signed off more than 100 NHS PFI schemes valued at £11 Billion, 70 or more of these are now owned offshore and are beyond the reach of British tax. We are disappointed that the current Labour Leadership refuse to make a commitment to reversing the privitisation and marketisation of the NHS.
Green Party Health policy states:
HE 104: Healthcare is not a commodity to be bought or sold. The National Health Service must provide healthcare, free at the point of need, funded through taxation. It must be a public service funded by, run by and accountable to local and national government and devoid of all privatisation, whether privatised administration, healthcare provision, support services or capital ownership. The NHS is concerned with healthcare provision and should not be subject to market forces either internal or external.
So we have no hesitation in signing up to your pledges to do everything within our power to reverse the privatisation of the NHS.
And as Greens we will continue to tackle root causes of ill health, including mental health, and health inequality; understanding the links between public health and issues such as austerity, poor housing, transport, food poverty and air pollution.
Our manifesto for the European election says:
‘Green MEP’s will: Fight to restore the NHS to public ownership. We will continue to work to ensure there are no measures in the EU/US trade deal and other future trade deals which will encourage privatisation or prevent the future re-nationalisation of health care and other services in the UK. The deal as currently proposed risks setting all privatisation in legal stone by banning the nationalisation of assets currently within the scope of the market and so making it significantly harder for future governments to bring services back into public hands’
Given the Green Party’s ongoing campaigning for a public NHS we are confident that the party will include in its manifesto for the next General Election a commitment to repeal the Health and Social Care Act 2012 and restore the legal duty to the Secretary of State for Health to provide a comprehensive health service.
