NHS Bill Proves E-Petitions Are Tory Gimmick As Drop The Bill Petition Ignored

Despite having the highest ranking number of signatures for any e-petition to the government with over 162,876 people having signed the petition: “Calls on the Government to drop its Health and Social Care Bill.”; the Commons Backbench Business Committee have voted by one single vote to ignore the E-petition and block it from being debated in the House of Commons.

The Tory Government propped up by the LibDems are pushing for the Health Care Services Bill which will effectively lead to the full privatisation of the NHS, and just one casting vote by a LibDem MP ensured that one more hurdle that the Bill would have to climb before becoming law has been removed.

Influential commentator Dr Éoin Clarke (PhD) who broke the news of this flagrant disregard for democracy, wrote in his blog ‘The Green Benches’:

‘This is one of the very many reasons that this NHS Bill is the grossest violation of democracy the UK has suffered in more than 3 centuries. In February 2010, David Cameron promised he would fix broken politics by guaranteeing any petition with 100,000 signatures a debate in the House of Commons. Sadly, he lied.’

Angry comments flowed on Twitter within minutes of the news breaking:

‘£2billion should be spent on nurses, docs and patients, not rehashing the NHS. Listen up Lansley’ wrote Lord Alan Sugar.

Val Hudson ‏wrote: ‘This latest flouting of democracy is going to make people so angry. Where's the mandate?’

The E-petition was presented to the Backbench Business Committee by Labour MP Jonathan Reynolds MP, who wrote: ‘As well as Lab colleagues I had support from Green, SDLP, DUP and Lib-Dem MPs, plus 162,000 signatures on the e-petition.’

Some commented that given the number of debates already had on the issue of the Health Care Services Bill, that not scheduling a debate on the e-petition was not unreasonable.

Meanwhile Ed Miliband, leader of the Labour Party commented:

‘Tell David Cameron that he can’t ignore 160,000 people who have said drop the bill’ followed by a link to a letter to David Cameron he urges everyone concerned about the future of the NHS and who feels aggrieved about the Backbench Business Committee’s refusal to allow the Drop the Bill petition from being debated.

He urges everyone to sign it and you can do so by following this link to the letter here

Join the debate on Twitter here by using hashtag #dropthebill

Source: Twitter / The Green Benches

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