Campaign To Save Manchester's Ambulance Service From Privatisation Gathers Public Support

The Trade Union movement continues to defend the NHS from the privatisation agenda of this government following the passing of their Health and Care Services Bill earlier this year.

Already NHS hospitals have been taken over by a private healthcare company Circle Healthcare, with Branson's Virgincare taking over numerous NHS clinic services and GP clinics across the country including the North West.

As previously reported by Unionsafety, the latest private company to get in on the act of making profit from the sick and dieing is none other than a major BUS company - YES a bus company!

Not content with profiting from their Bus services, Arriva now wish to profit from the sick and elderly, by taking over Manchester's fleet of ambulances used to take out-patients and so-called non-emergency cases to hospital. But, it wont be long before they bid for the full emergency ambulance service.

The cost to those paying national insurance contributions will be a 10% increase in costs to the NHS, in order to satisfy the profit margins being demanded by private companies. Whilst they of course claim to be cheaper, they do so by cutting staffing levels, reducing wages, and cutting services.

Arriva have long been known for bidding for bus routes of their competitors, and then failing to keep to the previous owners frequency of the services or simply closing it down altogether.

Journey times for patients from their homes to the hospital will no doubt lengthen as Arriva reduces the number of ambulances, and staffing levels when it takes over in March 2013.

UNISON's campaign to stop them taking over Manchester's ambulance services was launched on 15th October, and previously reported by this website.

Earlier this month, on 23rd October UNISON debated the issue which resulted in a solid commitment to support the Save Our NHS :

Today UNISON North West Council have passed a motion unanimously that calls on all Branches in the Region to support our community campaign.

Angela Rayner moved the motion and stated:

“the campaign has seen great public support, including the Labour Shadow Health Team, Andrew Gwynne MP, Lucy Powell Parliamentary Candidate for Central Manchester, Sir Richard Leese Leader of Manchester Council, Alan Manning Regional Secretary TUC, Ian Stewart Mayor of Salford. We are calling on all branches to support the campaign”.

The motion asked Branches to support by placing links to the campaign website on their branch websites, share the petition with members, send out and distribute the postcards for members of the public to send to their MPs, come along to the lobby of parliament in December, support petition activities, raise the need to oppose this destruction of the service with politicians at every level, consider inviting campaign speaker to Branch meetings and donate to the campaign.

UNISON supported our view that this is the start of the fragmentation and privatisation of our NHS and we must engage with the public and community to stop this from happening.

Supporters and those signing the on-line petition and downloaded the campaign pack will have received this message via email from Angela Rayner:

"Over the past two weeks we've sent hundreds of campaign packs out to fabulous supporters of our campaign just like you, and we've heard some great stories about how you've got the message out in your community - from doctors surgeries to street stalls.

We'd love to hear how you're using your campaign pack to help us stop ambulance privatisation in Manchester, which we fear will affect patient care as costs are cut and services are run for profit."

You can sign the petition and order your campaign pack by clicking on the pic below:

See also: Campaign Launched Against Arriva Take Over Of Manchester’s Ambulances

source: UNISON / Save Our NHS Campaign