THE leaking of Department of Health (DoH) documents, including ‘Pay and Workforce Strategy for 2008-11’, reveals the Labour government’s plan to slash NHS wages, by holding pay rises down to below two per cent, with the government’s own inflation figure at 3.9 per cent.
The documents recognise that such a tactic will result in industrial action throughout the NHS, but Blair and Brown are prepared to fight such strike action.
This wage cutting policy is to be aided by growing unemployment. It is estimated in the documents that the NHS financial crisis, created by the Labour government, will cost 37,000 NHS jobs this year.
Already, thousands of nurses and junior doctors, and other skilled NHS workers, are going straight from graduation into any form of casual labour that they can find, since NHS hospitals have been starved of the cash to employ them.
This constitutes a colossal waste of resources and billions of the taxpayers’ money.
However by 2011, well into the government’s programme for closing down general hospitals and transferring ‘care’ into the community, the documents state that there will be a shortage of 1,200 GPs, 14,000 nurses and 1,100 junior and staff-grade doctors.
This slimmed down NHS will be further hit by a 3,200 strong ‘surplus’ of consultants who the NHS can no longer afford to pay, who will be dispensed with, as well as a ‘surplus’ of 16,000 physiotherapists, health scientists and technicians.
At the same time the programme of hospital closures, reconfigurations, mass sackings and wage cutting, will see a much bigger chunk of the NHS budget handed over to the private medical industry.
The privateers will offer private medical insurance in areas where there are no accessible NHS hospitals.
It seems that the privatisation of NHS dentistry is to be the model for this operation.
Yesterday a very complacent BMA said of the leaked reports: ‘It’s very alarming and the BMA will use its influence to make sure some of the predictions don’t happen and put patients at risk.’
The Royal College of Nursing said the prediction of a shortfall of 14,000 nurses was part of a ‘yo-yo attitude to workforce planning’, with nurses graduating now unable to find jobs because of cuts.
The UNISON trade union said that it will ‘strongly resist any attempt to slash nurses pay’ but would not say that it was prepared to consider industrial action.
Every NHS worker remembers what happened to NHS Logistics. It was privatised with the union leaders not lifting even a little finger to try to stop it, just days after the Labour Party conference voted that there must be an end to NHS privatisation.
Even with the vote of the Labour Party conference behind them the trade union leaders refused to even shadow box, no mind throw a punch.
The reformist trade union leaders are paralysed at the thought of challenging Blair and Brown.
However, the government onslaught on the NHS must be fought.
Councils of Action must be formed bringing together local trade union branches, youth and community organisations to defend the NHS and fight redundancies, cuts and closures, with demonstrations, strike actions and occupations of hospitals.
Central to the struggle must be a campaign to force the trade unions to call general strike action.
Occupations of hospitals to keep them open and their services running, is the way to begin the fight against the NHS closure programme. If these occupations are threatened with state attack they must be supported by local and national strike action.
This struggle must be built up to cause an earthquake within the trade unions that will force the current trade union leaders out and bring in leaders who will call an indefinite general strike.
The only way to safeguard the NHS and stop its closure and privatisation is to bring down the Blair-Brown government and bring in a workers government that will carry out socialist policies.
