Streeting's plan for the NHS
Have we learnt nothing from 14 wretched years of Tory austerity, privatisation and draconian outsourcing? We are told the big NHS plan is to be … naming and shaming? Hospital league tables, introduced by Alan Milburn, who has just been hired as Streeting's advisor, are a simplistic and retrograde gimmick.

Covid use of private sector examined
The Centre for Health and Public Interest has investigated the use of private hospitals during Covid. The NHS paid the private hospital sector’s full operating costs at an estimated cost of £2 billion. We were told that this contract would provide additional capacity to assist the NHS when it was being overwhelmed. In fact the private sector were allowed to treat large numbers of fee-paying patients; the contract placed limits on the number of NHS patients which could be treated.

Myth of spare capacity in private sector
Nearly all the doctors working in the private sector do it on a part time basis and work for the NHS the rest of the time. The main constraint on clearing the NHS backlog is not lack of operating theatres but the number of consultant surgeons and anaesthetists. There is only one pool of such healthcare professionals in the UK and unless that pool expands significantly and quickly, pushing patients into the private sector will have little impact on the overall waiting list.

Wife died because NHS used 'cheap labour'
Roy Pollitt did not know his 77-year-old wife was being treated by a PA, who are only required to have two years' medical training, and believes "she would have lived if the NHS had not used cheap labour".

Concern over physician assistants (PAs)
As the result of professional concern over the clinical use of PAs, the government has ordered a review of the regulation of physician assistants.

Charles taxes the NHS
£11.4 million - that's how much King Charles made from letting the NHS rent a warehouse to store its ambulances.

Rapid expansion of PA roles
NHS Employers has set out guidance on employing physician associates (PAs), which advises those employing physician assistants (PAs) to ‘review adverts and job descriptions’ for the role to ensure they do not ‘blur the lines’ between PAs and doctors.

NHS needs in-sourcing
New We Own It research shows the NHS loses £10 million a week to private profit from outsourced NHS services. Plus, the reasons why outsourcing is a failed policy.

Trust threats tenants eviction
Workers housed in on-site accommodation blocks face eviction by Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust.

New £1.5 billion for NHS capital spend
The NHS will be given an additional £1.5 billion in capital funding next year to spend on new surgical hubs and scanners. Of course, where the trained staffing comes from is a separate matter.

Hospital building repairs now £14 billion
The cost of eradicating the total for NHS building repairs reaches a new high, almost £14 billion.

No Palantir in our NHS!
NHS England has given a £330 million contract to handle unprecedented amounts of health data to an American spy-tech firm currently supplying the Israeli military with advanced AI weaponry.  Health worker campaign group Medact has launched a campaign to highlight exactly who Palantir is, and what it does.

Private healthcare invests in Streeting
Good Law Project research shows that more than 60% of the money invested in the new health secretary since he entered parliament in 2015 has come from companies and individuals with links to private health.

Permission to go to toilet?
Staff at University Hospital Southampton were told to ask for permission to go to the toilet, with women having to request extra time if they had their period. The Unite union, which represents 59 porters at UHS, opened a ballot for strike action.

Community care handed to private equity
By paying a fixed population budget, regardless of numbers of patients and treatments, the ICB transfers financial risk to the prime provider, Health Care Resourcing Group, formerly known as Virgin Care, and its subcontractors. What standard of care will a profit-making firm provide?

BMA vote to phase out PAs
Very often patients in GP surgeries, are seen by who they think is a doctor but is in fact a physician assistant. PAs have been introduced owing to a shortage of GPs. But a recent tragic misdiagnosis has contributed to concern and now the BMA has voted to phase out PAs. But will surgeries that employ them respond?

SOS NHS: Why privatisation isn't the answer
Join a meeting in person or online here to consider the pros and cons of NHS privatisation. All we have to do is look across the pond to see the dangers of privatised healthcare; medical bankruptcy, patients denied essential care for lack of insurance.

Private provider takes over community care
HCRG Care Group (formerly known as Virgin Care) will be the "lead" provider (which implies sub-contracting) for Bath and North East Somerset, Swindon and Wiltshire. The trust decided in 2022 not to extend the contract to Virgin Care following its acquisition by private equity firm Twenty20Capital, but then reversed the decision.

Say "No" to using NHS budget to private healthcare
If you are concerned by the news that Streeting is considering plans that would guarantee private health companies public money and contracts for the long term, in exchange for promises that they'll invest £1 billion into building up their own facilities, then send him an email here.

Labour must learn from the past
...when they last took over from the Tories. Then, hundreds of billions of additional spending was invested in the NHS, to recover from austerity, and bring health spending on a par with comparable countries in Europe.