Top Doctors, Mps and NHS Providers Call for More Cash

Health Campaigns Together Supportedl Defending by Keep Our Our NHS NHS l Public www.healthcampaignstogether.com & London Health Emergency l l No. @nhscampaigns 5 February 2017 l l FREE FREE Would May try to flog our cash- starved NHS to appease Trump? As Theresa May flew out to her toe-curlingly humiliating the developed world. encounter in Washington – holding hands and seeking War on Want campaigner, Mark Dearn, said: a post-Brexit trade deal with the newly inaugurated, “It would be no surprise at all if Theresa May offered race-baiting US President Trump – she pointedly refused up the NHS in a new trade deal with the USA when you to comment on whether the NHS would be off the table consider that our government has already done exactly in any future talks. the same in TTIP. She would only say that she was committed to “If public services are combined with a ‘corporate a health service that is free at the point of delivery, court’ mechanism in a trade deal - something both the fuelling suspicions that health services could be offered USA and UK are very keen on - any future attempt to up to grasping US insurance companies and the vast renationalise any or all of the NHS would see US health corporations that have made US health care the most companies suing the UK for lost profits resulting from expensive, exclusive, wasteful, inefficient and corrupt in their lost ‘market access’.” NHS ON Top doctors, MPs and NHS Providers NATIONAL DEMONSTRATION THE call for more cash SATURDAY 4 MARCH 2017 12pm, Tavistock Square, London WC1 (tube: Russell Sq / Euston) March to Parliament Called by Health Campaigns Together & The People’s Assembly For info, coaches & supporting organisations visit: www.ournhs.info A petition to ministers signed by over 2,000 senior doctors was The NHS has, so far, just about managed this year’s winter pres- of which has already been swallowed by deficits). prematurelyBRINK! publicised at the weekend, before even more could sures without a meltdown. But it has been a close-run thing. Some However Dunne’s figures show growth will fall sharply next sign up. They were demanding the government back down on its trusts have failed to cope at times. year, down to just a 0.9 per cent increase in 2017 – well below the relentless squeeze on NHS funding, after a winter of near-misses In some of the areas where those failures have occurred or 4% annual increases in cost pressures. It would then go negative and system failures – with the prospect of two even meaner years come closest Tory MPs, wary of more cuts looming and the threat by 2018-19 with a 0.6 per cent fall in real spending per head in of funding to come. to close or downgrade hospitals, have also begun pressing The- that financial year. The doctors’ appeal coincided with an urgent call from the resa May’s government to reconsider its refusal to relax the vicious Growth would remain very low in 2019-20 at 0.2 per cent and hospital trusts’ body NHS Providers, demanding a swift review of austerity squeeze implemented by George Osborne in 2010. 0.9 per cent in the years following. how effectively the NHS prepared for this winter, looking at how Meanwhile waiting times are lengthening, performance is fall- So there’s no time to lose: the March 4 demonstration we funding for winter pressures is distributed and how services are ing back, the population is still rising – while ministers now admit called for last autumn, expecting a winter of crisis, proves to be supported by social care and GPs. funding is set to fall further behind in 2017 and actually drop by ideally timed, and promises to be big (see Back page). “Since it is trusts who bear the burden of the current approach, 0.6% per person in 2018. Join us and bring your colleagues, friends and neighbours: they should have the chance to set out what has worked for them In a written statement to the House of Commons, health minis- demand an end to the cuts and closures, an end to privatisation and what needs to change: expert organisations such as the Royal ter Philip Dunne said NHS England’s per capita real terms budget – and fair pay and conditions for our precious NHS staff. College of Emergency Medicine should also be consulted.” will have increased by 3.2 per cent in 2016-17 financial year (much It’s Our NHS! We need to fight for it – or risk losing it! NOW 12 packed pages! Back Page: March 4 our NHS – latest support 2 Systems AsFailure this issue of Health Campaigns from their local authority in 2015 Together goes to press, the Guardian than 2010. Over one million older reports the NHS has experienced the people now have unmet care needs busiest week in its history between according to Age UK. 8-15 January, with record numbers The CQC’s annual State of Care of hospitals having to send patients report shows 81% of councils have elsewhere or declare a major alert. spent less on adult social care in the In that week, 52 trusts had to be last five years. diverted to other hospitals, almost The funding outlook for the next double the 27 similar occasions in the four years looks even worse. Public 2.8Average number of same week of 2016, and almost half spending on adult social care is set of all English hospital trusts – 68 out to fall to less than 1 per cent of GDP. beds per 1000 people of the 152 – declared an alert, 61 of Many local authorities will struggle to in UK Chris Hopson, chief executive NHS them on a single day, another record. meet even basic statutory duties. Fifteen trusts were on alert contin- The marginal measures an- Providers, said on January 11: uously for 11 days in a row between nounced by the government, allow- “Can we all now agree there is a clear gap between what the NHS is ex- 3 and 13 January, with Bath’s Royal ing councils to raise limited extra pected to deliver and the funding available? Most people, including many United Hospital running two weeks funding through increased council senior leaders across the NHS, recognise the service can no longer deliver on “red alert”. tax, will not meet a widening gap all its current priorities and performance standards within current fund- Bed occupancy is close to maxi- between needs and resources, which ing.” mum. On January 8, NHS England is set to reach at least £2.8 billion by “If the money is fixed, how do we identify what the NHS will stop doing? figures show average bed occupancy 2019. “Once the hard choices have been made, how do we marry up the na- levels at 95.3%, while more than half The resources for social care and 5.0Average beds available tional debate with local plans to ensure we actually deliver what we know of all trusts (78) had upwards of 97% services outside hospital have de- per 1000 people across will be unpopular? of their beds occupied, and 36 trusts clined in inverse proportion to the “We can never assume the longstanding political consensus behind our had more than 99% of beds full. increasing rhetoric from NHS leaders OECD countries, de- current model will stay in place indefinitely, particularly if the public feel 6-year cash freeze and politicians on the need for “inte- the NHS is overwhelmed or failing to keep up. When will we reach that grated care”. spite having very similar point? Can we avoid it, if the current trajectory continues over the next The brutal 6-year freeze on NHS But the disintegration is even three years as the lower levels of NHS funding kick in?” spending, which is set to tighten fur- wider still. Many of the plans to cut lengths of stay. ther in 2017 and 2018, has already spending towards bridging massive brought a collapse of performance projected shortfalls in NHS funding on a whole range of targets, from the involve closing community hospitals, maximum 4-hour wait to be treated and reducing numbers of community or discharged from A&E through to based health staff and resources for waiting times for cancer treatment. mental health services. But the bed shortages flow not At the same time budgets for pub- just from the NHS cash freeze but also lic health measures aimed at reduc- the draconian cuts in council spending of ill-health have also been cut. 4NHS cost %and demand ing since 2010. And all the while GP-led primary The beds shortages are insepara- care services face rising workload rises each year bly linked with the desperate crisis in with none of the promised extra social care. In many acute hospitals funding. up to one bed in five is filled with peo- So it’s no surprise the system is ple who need no medical treatment, broken: six years of Conservative-led but cannot be safely discharged with- government have been methodically out support at home, or a care home breaking it. False assumptions deepen crisis place that is not available. Without a reversal of the cutbacks, Six consecutive years of cuts to < A November report from NHS Pro- previously: the crisis will inevitably deepen, drag- Average1 annual% rise in viders explained that the Five Year “Trusts have delivered annual local authority budgets have led to ging us back to the bad old days of Forward View in October 2014 “as- savings of 1.4% on average between 26% fewer pensioners obtaining care the late 1980s.

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