OccupationalOccupational HazardsHazards

Occupying Hospitals: some inspirations and issues from our history

Occupational Hazards

Occupying Hospitals: inspirations and issues from our history

past tense Published by past tense 2013

W nicked all of the following, so please reproduce, spread, use all or part of this text, (so long as it’s not for anyone’s profit). past tense c/o 56a Infoshop 56 Crampton Street, London. SE17 3AE email: [email protected] www.past-tense.org.uk printed by shortfuse press [email protected] contents

introduction 1

1. The South London Women's Hospital Occupation 3 1984-85 • Rosanne Rabinowitz including a short discussion of the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Work-in, 1976-8, the Hounslow Hospital occupation, and other occupations of the early 1980s.

2. Occupational Therapy 16 • by some individuals involved in the UCH Community Action Committee The campaign against ward closures at University College Hospital, 1992-4.

3. Brief accounts of other UK Hospital occupations 48

4. Occupy and Win 65 • London Health Emergency, 1984. A manual for fighting hospital closures.

A note on Unions 77 Some changes and mergers since the 1980s.

NB: We apologise for the rough look of this dossier, we produced it in a hurry, and have had some technical difficulties. Last minute production as usual...It’s not intended to be a coffee table affair, we hope it’s a practical document. As always, replies, responses, arguments, and more information is always welcome.

past tense introduction Secondly, many of the shorter accounts are very brief and sketchy. Partly this is due to the hurried nature of the preparation of this This dossier is not intended to be anything dossier; we didn’t have the time to investi- like comprehensive. It’s merely a contribu- gate as far as we would have liked. For tion to a possible debate... We are reprint- some occupations we only have a rough ing it because it shows how the idea of date and a name, and have so far discov- occupying hospital buildings, to prevent ered no more, but are working on it! But their closure by management, or to force the problem also results from the origin of wider concessions, was widespread and these accounts; most were pasted onto the accepted in the late 1970s and early 1980s, web direct from contemporary leaflets, and carried on producing actions in to the reports, etc; without a timeline of events, in 1990s. many cases, and even in some, no indica- We have tried to document some of the tion of the eventual result! Our investiga- hospital occupations we can in the UK in tions will continue, though, and hopefully recent history, both to give some account future editions of this publication will of the actual events, and where we can to appear with more detailed info. present issues, questions, conflicts that arose. The aim is to spread the idea that Thirdly, and following on from the above, such actions can take place, and have done while the longer accounts of the South so, but also to draw attention to successes London Women’s Hospital and UCH occu- and failures, and to organisational ques- pations do attempt some analysis and per- tions and ideological and political barriers spective on the issues and on organisation- that can come up (and potentially affect the al question relating to unions and political outcome). groupings, the shorter accounts that follow mostly do not. Again, partly this results Some of the following we or friends of from how the documentation has been pre- ours were involved in, others we have sented; but it is also true to say that they found out some information. But we accept come almost exclusively from trade union from the start this pamphlet has a number sources, and reflect no intent to question of limitations. union structures. This is inevitable; but we feel the lack of a balanced look at how Firstly we have consciously limited the fol- things really worked inside those events. lowing to the UK; in practice this means We know from the longer accounts of the England and Wales (there may be examples issues that arose at UCH for instance, that from other parts of Britain but we haven’t questions of dominance by political group- yet come across them). This doesn't reflect ings, or the complex relations of official any nationalistic intent, or imply that other union structures with workers taking examples from elsewhere hold no interest actions like working in, or occupying for us; it’s just that at some point you have wards, are not clear cut. Union hierarchies to set a practical limit. There are interesting usually fear and mistrust actions lie this struggles to be studied elsewhere; recent that break the bounds, and often had to be resistance in Greece against the current pushed into supporting them, or took spe- ‘austerity’ measures being imposed to sat- cific action to sabotage or prevent them. At isfy EU bail-out conditions have included grassroots level the relations were more some hospital occupations for instance.

1 complicated; many occupations, strikes, ly? Management practices and control are etc came from unionised workers, and much more vicious and our work situa- specifically through union branches; and tions much more precarious... fear of the official recognition was useful for gaining consequences of taking radical steps is a support from other workers. It would be powerful inhibitor. But even knowing such interesting to have some more thoughtful things are possible can be the first tenta- inside knowledge on how this all worked tive step. in practice in many of the other occupa- tions listed here. Some more thought and discussion would also be interesting, on how workers’ occu- Probably the most pointed missing ques- pations in the hospital context, especially tion here though, is, how useful are these when organised through orthodox union tales of the past to us today? It’s true that structures, represented a real challenge to much of this history, of occupations, existing relations in the NHS. How much resistance to previous waves of austerity, did occupations were in the main defen- re-organisation and ‘adjustment’, is forgot- sive of the status by their nature go ten, or at least exists in a backwater. Has beyond it, and approach a more radical the almost total decimation of the kind of breakdown of the hierarchical Health grassroots trade union militancy that Service, and of the divisions between enabled such actions to flower, rendered workers and service users? Since its incep- these accounts just interesting episodes, tion the NHS has always been imposed but firmly of our past? This question fol- ON us, in many ways, out of our control, lows on from this publication, if anything. despite its value, only a partial attempt The onslaught we are currently experienc- towards a socialised health care. Re-organ- ing from what we would loosely term the isations in favour of transnational profit- ‘capitalist class’, aimed at cutting as much making have increased this; how much did social provision as possible, has already occupations, especially where community begun to include cuts and ‘re-organisa- and workers participated together, reverse tions’ in the NHS, which will doubtless this, even temporarily? multiply. Current campaigns against hospi- tal closures, such as Lewisham or We hope this dossier contributes some- Whittington in London, show that collec- thing towards the asking of these ques- tive action and protest still has the power tions... to force the bureaucrats to reverse some of their slash and burn policies. But what past tense, 2013. actions may need to happen in the future? Could work-ins and occupations take place now in the same way? Or are other tactics more practical? Did the idea of workers’ control, a wider acceptance of a general collectivity, that existed in the 1970s and early 80s, say, allow such actions to be even on the agenda - and has the climate, the consciousness, the sense of what is possible or even thinkable, changed utter-

2 The South London Women’s Hospital Occupation 1984-85 Rosanne Rabinowitz What does it take to occupy a hospital, to ters! If the bosses won’t exploit us, we’ll have engage in direct action in a workplace that to do it ourselves!” deals with peoples’ lives rather than products? However, work-ins also included community In the first hospital work-ins, people were outreach and political organising. For exam- understandably afraid of putting patients at ple, at Plessey’s River Don steelworks redun- risk, and aware that someone might not want dant workers devoted themselves to campaign to have a baby or an operation in the middle work rather than completing orders for the of an industrial dispute. It was an unprece- plant’s liquidator. dented step, but staff and service users had come to a point where they felt they had to From private to public... take drastic action or say goodbye to their jobs and healthcare. A twist in the tail came when hospital work- A background of cuts and closures provoked ins and occupations extended this tactic to the this first wave of occupations in the 1970s, public sector. In the face of such closures, a often undertaken by people who were not strike presents problems unless it takes the activists. In the early 1970s both the private form of sympathetic action in other hospitals and private sector were restructured in or workplaces. However, by providing a serv- response to IMF directives. The restructuring ice that management was trying to cut, work- was also a move to curtail the improved ers strived to create a rallying point. wages and defences (‘restrictive’ work prac- Usually, hospital workers contemplating a tices) that workers built up through the years. work-in discussed it with present or prospec- This took the form of further centralisation, tive patients. This is more of a possibility in deskilling, redundancies, productivity deals, smaller, long-stay hospitals. speed-ups, casualisation and tougher disci- As long as patients are in a hospital, the pline. Secretary of State is legally bound under the Since this restructuring often involved clo- Health Services Act to ensure that they sures, people began occupying workplaces receive treatment and to pay all the hospital instead of simply going on strike. Some of workers; nurses, doctors, technicians, clean- these actions developed beyond sit-ins to ers... So by keeping patients in the facility, work-ins, which involved continuing produc- hospital occupiers were able to keep the hos- tion. Briants Colour Printing and Upper Clyde pital open and functioning. Shipbuilders were among the first work-ins. However, there is the problem of insurance. UCS became a rallying point due to the size Insurance rules stipulate that management and its location in area of militancy and close must be present on the premises and be legal- ties between the workplace and the communi- ly liable and responsible. This could include ty. Shop stewards seized control of the yards area health authority representatives or on-site and controlled the gates on a rota. Those administrators. During the Elizabeth Garrett sacked were kept in jobs by rest of workforce Anderson Hospital work-in, the on-site man- who now controlled production. The fact they agement consisted of the hospital secretary. were already sitting on top of a lot of capital The employees in a hospital work-in usually and unfinished work made this possible. acquire more power, but this occurs alongside Over 1000 occupations & work-ins took place a functioning administration. Some hospitals in 1972. However, in some situations self- did refuse entry to most of management and management can turn into self-abuse. A car- allowed only a token management force that toon of the time said it all: “Brothers and sis- would not be able to obstruct the work-in. 3 In order to keep a hospital occupied, you need by the consultants. physicians willing to admit patients and treat EGA was a good place for trying the occupa- them. Some physicians did remain in service tion tactic in a hospital setting - its unique his- in accordance with their concept of profes- torical legacy as a women’s hospital created sional ethics - if there are patients, they will ground for support and unity. The women care for them. But they generally stayed away doctors at EGA also tended to be progressive from political aspects of a campaign. - for example, one had received her medical Two hospital earlier work-ins have particular training as an anti-fascist volunteer in the relevance to what took place at the South Spanish Civil War. This committee’s main London Women’s Hospital: Elizabeth Garrett tactics involved lobbying, petitioning and Anderson Hospital (EGA) and Hounslow writing letters. Hospital. The rest of the staff got involved after actual closure was announced in 1976. This included The first: Elizabeth Garrett the big health unions: the National Union of Public Employees (NUPE), COHSE (repre- Anderson Hospital (EGA) senting nursing staff), and ASTMS (paramed- ical staff). In July 1976 health workers Founded by the UK’s first officially practising protested against health service cuts and the woman doctor, the EGA aimed to train EGA closure in particular: 700 workers staged women doctors and provide treatment for a ‘day of action’ and marched to the House of women by women. Closure of the hospital, Commons. Others took action in their hospi- located on London’s Euston Road, had been tals, forcing four London hospitals to restrict contemplated since 1959 on grounds that a admissions to emergencies. Some occupied woman-only hospital was an anachronism of health authority offices. Rank-and-file groups the Victorian era. The authorities considered took on a major role organising these actions. demand limited to small groups of orthodox Future New Labour health minister Frank Muslim and Jewish women who objected to Dobson was then leader of Camden Council treatment by male doctors for religious rea- and voiced support. Wonder what he’d say to sons. There was also a drive within the NHS an occupation on his patch now? to ‘rationalise’ and to close down small hospi- However, health secretary David Ennals tals. claimed that the EGA was “small, ageing... However, they hadn’t reckoned with a grow- can never be developed to fulfill functions of a ing women’s movement that made medical modern, acute hospital” and suggested the care for women by women a central issue. EGA become a unit at the Whittington Debate had also grown about the very nature Hospital in Highgate. of women’s healthcare, as seen in publications The Action Committee replied that the EGA’s like Our Bodies Ourselves. present location allowed it to function as a Throughout the 1960s Health Authority ‘ran specialised national facility and a centre ful- down’ the EGA by not doing repairs, replac- filling local needs. As a small hospital main- ing equipment or hiring new staff. Bed space tained “a friendly, unthreatening atmosphere, had declined from 300 to 150. A malfunction- necessary for a hospital interested in educa- ing lift in 1976 brought patients down to 46 tional, preventative and outreach work rele- and closed off the operating theatre. The hos- vant to the specific health needs of women.” pital faced a succession of closure threats. The committee also pointed out that residents Demonstrations and a petition signed by in the nearby Somerstown estate were press- 23,000 women forced the nursing council to ing for their own health centre; facilities for back down from closure in 1974. However, women at the EGA could take pressure off the the EGA maternity hospital had been closed Somerstown health centre. Increasingly down, and this had angered staff members. Somerstown residents and EGA campaigners They formed an action committee that repre- worked together. sented different sections, but it was dominated When Ennals asked the Area Health Authority

4 to close in-patient services at the EGA, staff ‘workers’ control’ or transform social relation- held an emergency meeting vowing to sit-in ships within the hospital. But staff usually do or work-in if necessary. The work-in had been gain more influence as a group, and ancillary urged by community activists (not staff mem- workers and nurses develop stronger organisa- bers) on the EGA campaign committee, but tion. was rejected as impractical in a hospital set- In order to involve more people in the cam- ting. But as closure loomed, the staff and paign, activists usually need to progress community seized on a work-in as their last beyond defense to demand extensions or chance. It began a few days before the actual improvements in the public resource. Direct closing date with official support from the action to preserve a service or facility inspires unions. debate on the role the facility plays in a com- In November 100 nurses and 78 ancillary staff munity, the needs it fulfills and the needs it began the occupation. Pictures taken outside must be developed to meet. the EGA on that day show pickets in front of In the case of the EGA, this expansion took the hospital with a banner declaring: “This place in the context of the women’s move- hospital is under workers’ control.” ment, defining the EGA as a women’s hospi- Meetings of all the staff made major deci- tal and a national and local health facility. sions, with committees set up by general This resulted in pushing for a well-woman’s meetings to do the actual organising. These clinic that takes a community-oriented included the Joint Shop Stewards Committee, approach to health and act as an information the Medical Committee and the Action centre as well as medical facility. According Committee; the latter made up of elected rep- to Rachael Langdon of the EGA Well- resentatives of all sections of staff, and linked woman’s Support Group: union members and consultants. “The dissatisfaction experienced by women in The Save the EGA campaign committee con- health care will not be overcome alone by sisted of supporters outside the hospital. seeing a doctor of one’s own sex or only by Though set up by Camden Trades Council, it the existence of a women’s hospital. The became autonomous and drew in people from issues are wider and preventative health is not other hospitals, local residents, people merely a matter of individual effort. This is involved in childcare and housing campaigns where the importance of alternative and - such as the nearby Huntley Street squat - women’s movement health groups lies... A and activists from the women’s movement. well-woman clinic and a women’s hospital One shop steward participated in campaign which could develop an exchange of ideas meetings, and the campaign sent a representa- and knowledge with alternative and women’s tive to other groups. This committee main health groups would be a step forward for support for working in came from the cam- women’s health.” paign committee. Ambulance drivers and workers in referral Campaigners demanded that the EGA be agencies such as the Emergency Bed Service upgraded to a ‘centre for innovation and were vital in opposing management attempts research’ in women’s health matters and a to stop the flow of patients into the hospital - resource in the community. Campaigners and workers notified drivers that the hospital workers sponsored well-attended discussions remained open and asked them to bring relating to women’s health issues such as patients. menopause and contraception, which often drew over 200 people. Sometimes the discus- More than defence sion between doctors and radical feminists set on challenging the medical establishment got Work-ins are essentially defensive. They aim lively. to keep the premises in repair, maintain More closure threats arrived in 1978; in May, morale and keep equipment and patients in a large demonstration in front of the hospital the hospital. They are not set up to implement stopped traffic on Euston Road. In 1979 cam-

5 paigners won the battle to keep the EGA open Hounslow workers faced constant threats and as a gynaecological hospital. However, the intimidation, a forcible smashing of the work- old building closed in 2008 and EGA now in. operates as a specialized maternity wing with- With less support from doctors, Hounslow in the UCH hospital. staff including nurses, porters and cleaners Both the EGA, and later the South London and took the main initiative and challenged Women’s Hospital, campaigners had ongoing the traditional hospital hierarchy. The work-in debates over whether they should plead as a only lasted six months, but the community special case, or defend their hospital as part of occupation of the hospital that followed lasted an across-the-board opposition to health serv- two years. Lines were drawn clearly, and ice cuts. there was no special pleading. For example, people in the EGA campaign The response to proposals for possible closure group believed that campaign should ‘feel in 1975 started with admin staff and friends, free’ to split from the staff action committee if plus local volunteer and charity organizations, it didn’t not take a direct line against the cuts; who wrote letters and circulated petitions - they felt the campaign should take the initia- usually hand-written sheets passed around the tive, which hospital workers could follow or neighbours. Senior nursing staff took an inter- not follow. They believed the campaign was est, opening communication with ancillaries responsible to those who used services, which and porters, and these involved workers from expressed itself in total opposition to the cuts ‘outside’ in the campaign. Activists from the and transcended the interests of workers in West Middlesex District General Hospital saving their particular hospital. looked into plans and discovered a whole series of cuts planned for the region. Hounslow Hospital Hounslow’s closure was announced in January 1977, set for August; the work-in In contrast to the EGA, West London’s started in March. Management tried to trans- Hounslow Hospital did not have the advan- fer staff, and threatened those who refused tages of national reputation, special support with sanctions & sacking. They met with GPs, from the women’s movement or supportive warned them against admitting patients to consultants. It was a small facility for geri- Hounslow and threatened them with sanc- atric and long- tions. stay patients, con- When the sidered a home as August closure well as a place date arrived, for treatment. staff organised a Situated in an march through industrial area, Hounslow and a girdled by two party for the motorways and patients. As they Heathrow pushed past the Airport, closure date Hounslow faced there was a lot of more repression fear. Workers and practical dis- had no idea if advantages. they would get The authorities paid; the authori- had backed down ties tried to from closure claim that the threats to EGA at least three times and did not AHA did not have to maintain staff and facili- attempt to break the work-in, outside of ties though the law said otherwise. morale erosion and running down facilities.

6 Comparison and clampdown David Ennals. The district administrator later admitted that losing the 66 beds had badly The EGA had on-site consultants who could affected geriatric care in the area. admit patients; Hounslow had none and depended on GPs. They had to tout for more Complete control admissions, though August is traditionally a slow time. The authorities tried to turn Once the hospital was shut, campaigners patients away and cut off the phones. The moved in and took complete control of the EGA had been treated as a freak case, but building. They had little idea what to do with Hounslow indicated a trend of resistance to it now that the patients gone and wards health service rationalisation. If a small weak- wrecked. Eventually they cleaned it up and ly-organised hospital became such a focus for used it as a local centre. Some of the original community resistance, they saw obstacles to staff continued to be involved with the occu- imposing any cuts and rationalisation. The pation. With the end of the occupation two Hounslow work-in had also gone further to years later, five were left. challenge the hierarchical relationships of the However, the occupation itself drew in new hospital. Consultants weren’t around much, people and took on a life of its own. and the process of campaigning had broken Following the raid Hounslow had become a down traditional boundaries. The campaign national issue. Nurses, porters and food serv- and the staff had effectively taken over con- ice workers traveled to hospitals and meetings trol of admissions. As one Hounslow Hospital throughout the UK, discussing their experi- worker put it: “With consultants no longer in ences and asking for support. They initiated a control of admissions, the hierarchical system national campaign against NHS cuts, called of privilege in the NHS was smashed.” Fightback, based at Hounslow and involving When threats didn’t succeed, a district team people from the EGA, St Nicholas, Plaistow of officers took forcible action on October 26, and Bethnal Green work-ins. 1977. If the authorities had to continue fund- The Fightback production team occupied the ing as long as patients were present, they got matron’s office, the West London Fire around that by forcibly removing the patients. Brigades Union used the assistant matron’s Aided by the private ambulance service (pub- office as their headquarters, Maple Ward lic ambulance staff refused to take part), became a ‘conference hall’ used by local police, administrators, top nursing officers groups. The National Union of Journalists and consultants moved on the hospital. They used hospital facilities during a strike. cut the phonelines, thwarting the emergency The occupation became very intense, given phone tree. The raiders pulled 21 patients out the strong emotions provoked by the raid, the of their beds and took them to the private length of time the occupation carried on and ambulances. Pictures show the scale of the variety of groups taking part. Women destruction - wrecked beds and furniture, the whose world was defined by husband, family floor strewn with food, torn mattresses, and job found themselves making speeches sheets, personal articles. According to a nurse: and going out every night, confronting their “Old ladies had to queue up for an hour, cry- husbands to go on tour or to stay overnight at ing all the time, as we remonstrated with the the hospital on night picket. Seven marriages AHA people to cover them against the cold.” broke up in the course of events, and many The raid provoked a public outcry and led new relationships started. indirectly to the downfall of Hounslow’s After a year of occupation, the AHA backed Labour leader. A week later 2000 striking hos- down on the eviction threats and conceded to pital workers picketed the Ealing, negotiations on the occupation committee’s Hammersmith and Hounslow AHA to protest demand that Hounslow Hospital be reopened the raid and demand reopening. The AHA had as an upgraded diversified community hospi- to censure their own officials and called for a tal, based on plans that had been developed public enquiry, which was turned down by during the occupation. The occupation com-

7 mittee did not negotiate as a special case. The things going and maintain morale. Union offi- opening of a community hospital meant little cials think in terms of ending it all and negoti- if cuts are made elsewhere. These negotia- ating the terms. According to one participant, tions broke down when management did not union officials that came into Hounslow when give firm dates to provide plans, or guarantee the work-in was made official “caused more commitment of funds. havoc than management.” However, the committee ended the occupation in November 1978, claiming that ‘no positive South London Women’s political gain’ would come from an eviction. They thought the demands of maintaining a Hospital: don’t be so kinky 24-hour picket were draining resources from other kinds of campaigning, and diverting Many of the occupations of the late ‘70s had attention from cuts in other areas. They achieved short-term goals; and some work-ins claimed some victories in dislocating the pro- were defeated due to lack of support from gramme of cuts and put forward detailed consultants. However, use of the tactics plans for an expanded community hospital. In trailed off by the early ‘80s. Until... its statement, the committee said that work The Wandsworth Health Authority announced began on redesigning facilities in the new in 1983 that it will close the South London community hospital/health centre after the Hospital for Women (SLHW). This hospital occupation ended. had some similarities to the EGA and similar issues came up in defending it. However, this In 1976-78 work-ins or occupations took time around the authorities couldn’t say that a place in at least ten hospitals. About five hospital where women receive treatment by work-ins were waged over an extended period female physicians was a remnant of the of time to oppose closure, and the rest were Victorian age. Instead, Wandsworth argued in shorter actions to oppose under-staffing and terms of rationalising and budgets. back up other staff demands. There were also Staff initiated a work-in late spring 1984, sit-ins in administration and health authority which only lasted a couple of months. Fewer offices, including an eight-week occupation at consultants were admitting patients, then the Aberdare Hospital, and in one nursery school consultants were all offered positions else- and an ambulance station. Occupied hospitals where and they jumped ship. included Plaistow Maternity Hospital, two But nurses and other staff wanted to fight on. wards at South Middlesex and one at Bethnal Together with local activists they organized a Green, where local people assisted the work- “lie-in” in July 1984, following the exit of the in by occupying the wards that had already last patient. The outpatients’ department been closed. (housed in an adjoining building) was due to Some participants pointed out that union offi- shut later, in spring 1985. cials definitely got in the way during work- I found out about the campaign to save the ins, hindering rather than helping in open- hospital when I went to the well-woman clin- ended struggles where people need to keep ic and found a stack of leaflets there. This

8 might have been when the work-in was still about on the water-beds when the press was going on. due to arrive. “Don’t be so kinky,” one of A good 200-300 women came to take part in them said. the lie-in. We slept in the wards and main- tained a mass picket to stop the authorities Of course, when no attempt was made to evict from removing equipment. All the large wards us the next day, we had to decide how to con- were filled. The top wards were kept empty as tinue the occupation and how to organise it. an example of what the fully-equipped wards First, what to do about the security guards. could be like. During the first few nights of the ‘lie-in’ they In the absence of patients, the occupation were doing rounds throughout the building aimed to keep all the equipment on site in while we were sleeping, walking around and readiness for re-opening. Though a relatively shining their torches and speaking on their small hospital, SLHW was a large rambling walky-talkies (this was the ’80s, remember,

Victorian building with many entrances and mostly pre-mobile phone). We had some tense exists. We maintained a picket at the main negotiations about this, but eventually they front door, locking the other doors in the main agreed to stay in their office on the bottom building, and also kept a picket at the gate in floor. the car park. Numbers were still high for the first couple of There was still a lot of coming and going in weeks, but as you might expect they started to relation to the outpatients as well as security dwindle. It became a strain to maintain the guards still stationed at the front. picket. After the third week or so the health All kinds of women took part in this event - authority informed us that they wouldn’t be local pensioners, hospital staff, nurses, anar- evicting us while the outpatient facility was cha-punky girls. It was also racially and cul- still going. Obviously, the authority knew it turally mixed. I met a few women who said would be easy for us to get back into the that they’d been born in that hospital. There building if part of it remained open to the was a fun atmosphere, with lots of people sit- public. The health authority insisted that the ting outside on picket. It was a warm summer security guards remain downstairs, but as night, so people also relaxed in the garden. they’d been keeping to their area it wasn’t a Unfortunately, the next day a few snotty problem. Not a bad gig for them really, with social worker types scolded girls for fooling the pickets keeping an eye on things they did-

9 n’t have much work. had been active in earlier health service strug- Since the days of the EGA the women’s gles - we made the hospital into a campaign movement had diversified and grown. Women centre and a kind of social centre a well. We came from the Greenham Common peace invited other groups to use the space, and held camp to support the occupation. One lot got activities like jumble sales, tea dances and annoying when they told us we should have public meetings. We had a big picnic in the non-violence training. It seemed to be impos- garden with performers - among these was Vi ing their way of organising on us. At the same Subversa, singer from the anarcho-punk band time, a bunch came from Blue Gate who were the Poison Girls. The first jumble sale was more down-to-earth. By this time, each gate at massive, with bags and bags of stuff that Greenham had their developed its own char- acter and politics. There had been a lot of Labour lefty influence in the beginning, which might have reflected elements of the campaign before I got involved. We were living in the days of the GLC, after all. We got visited by GLC Women’s Committee chair Valerie Wise, who gave speeches in front of the hospital. She kept saying: “My name is Valerie Wise, and I’m here to talk about the GLC.” Some of the women there were chuffed by this, though her constant self-promotion made me sick. In fact, I was having some doubts about staying on if we’d be hearing a lot of this. Then I went on holiday for about ten days. Just after I returned, I was in bed recovering from an all-night train and ferry experience. Then I received a phone call that emergency an empty bed in the pickets were needed at the hospital. Already? Women’s Hospital. I’d meant to give it a few days before going Picture: Susan Timmins down again, but my caller said it was very important so I turned up. made us a good £500 and costumed the entire occupation group too. A bunch of new people were on picket, and I A radical nurses’ group had been active for found out someone was having a baby some time; an Asian women’s health group upstairs with a midwife in attendance. When also met there and did acupuncture. Some of the baby was born, celebrations ensued and these activities kicked off quickly, other then the TV bods turned up. The baby was a things took a while to get going. little girl called Scarlet. The occupation went through several reorgan- A whole new bunch of women infused the isations, but we made decisions at general campaign. Some had just moved to London, meetings throughout. When a lot was happen- and they made themselves at home in the ing we had general meetings every evening, wards with the private rooms. This inspired a but this wasn’t always necessary. We set up general movement to occupy the wards groups involved with particular tasks: publici- upstairs, and use the big lower wards as com- ty & propaganda, coordination, outreach & munal and social areas. With the involvement campaigning, looking after the building. of new and full-time occupiers we entered a Since we were entering a phase with a defi- new phase. nite long-term commitment, everyone eventu- Taking a tip from the Hounslow experience - ally moved into the private rooms in the among our local supporters was a nurse who upstairs wards and left the big wards for com-

10 munal purposes, meetings and events, And Coudray was on the ground floor. This turned just like the gates at Greenham, each ward out to house mainly straight women with took on its own character. babies, though there were lesbian mothers as The top floor ward in the main building well in Chubb and other wards. Quite a few became known as called Cloud Nine. It was of the Coudray women and children were the favoured by the spaciest Greenham girls, offspring of a woman who had been involved mostly from with squatted street Freston Road or Green Gate. Most Frestonia. of these women There were a lot of new were great, but relationships going on, some of us got amid a high interest in impatient with a feminist & lesbian politics. few who came With all this going on, to the hospital sometimes we got inward- to chill out (or looking. However, there warm up, dur- were plenty of occasions ing the winter) when we ventured out of the and didn’t take building. We went to most part in the health authority meetings, picket and usually to ask awkward ques- other activi- tions and be disruptive. Just ties. From after the eviction we went to their point of one meeting and got so view, they enraged at the attempts to came from ignore the issues brought up the rigours by the eviction, we ended up of storming the platform and Greenham throwing chairs at the authority to have a bods. If there’d been a domi- rest some- nance of polite Labour leftism where in the early phases, as time went warm - on the occupation became more with outpa- militant and radical. tients still open, the central heating and Other hospital occupations had hot water remained still on. Greenham was also sprung up, including a work-in at a geri- their main commitment. Yet the long-term atric hospital in Bradford and occupied A & E occupiers of Clapham felt that maintaining a at St Andrews Hospital at Bromley-by-Bow. viable picket was crucial in keeping the build- We came out to support these actions. We also ing open, and everyone should help with that. supported a picket at Barking Hospital, where It didn’t help when some of our guests an anti-casualisation struggle had been going seemed to regard the picket as an answering on for over a year. service. During the miners strike of 1984-5 we made Preston House was a separate annexe reached contact with Women Against Pit Closures and through a tunnel or a separate front door _ some of them came to visit the hospital, this took the overspill from Cloud Nine. One including women from Rhodesia in of the wards - I forget the name - was popu- Nottinghamshire and from Dinnington in lated mainly by local campaigners who’d South Yorkshire . been there at the beginning, including a con- tingent of nurses. On one hand, we were reaching out to other Chubb Ward, where I stayed, seemed to be movements and resistance, but we also faced popular with young urban-oriented activists. issues in how we worked within the occupa-

11 tion. Because the building was warm and again. After we publicised the situation, once comfortable and any woman could stay there, again new women turned up and they were it drew many who were fairly vulnerable. So ready to kick bailiff ass! Rallying from a while we defended health service provision, depressing period, the occupation became we often found ourselves providing the kind vital again. of support that should be coming from these As soon as the outpatients closed, we took very same services. Women had different atti- control of the whole building. We went down tudes towards this. Some didn’t want to take to the lobby as a group and got the security this on and wanted to concentrate on the polit- guards to leave. There were some tense ical campaigning. Others felt they had enough moments, but they left without much argu- on their plate and couldn’t take on caring for ment. Then we took over the phones, the others even if they wanted to. And then some switchboard and the communications network women got very involved in the ‘caring’ of - this included some walky-talkies, which the campaign and believed those who didn’t excited us immensely in the olden days before participate were evading their responsibilities. everyone had a mobile phones. There were also arguments around sharing There had been many discussions about tac- childcare. And since this was the ’80s, rows tics. Some women did not want to do barri- over identity politics broke out. So it wasn’t cading and engage in any resistance, or were all fun and parties and solidarity. Certainly, not in a position to do this. Though they with- morale was very low about a drew from the month before the eviction. Let’s building before the face it, there was a lot of bitch- barricades went ing... petty arguments over which up, they still put ward got the TV, that kind of themselves on the thing. phone tree and We were also worried about how took part in picket- vulnerable women would fare if ing and demonstra- the place gets stormed by the tions. cops. Most left when they One woman called realised that things were going to Sharon insisted get hot. that she’d lie down In the case of one woman with in front of the cops mental health issues who would- and use her body n’t or couldn’t leave, her sister as a barricade, came to take her and had her sec- though she tioned, fearing she’d fare worse if opposed any other she waited around and let the kind of barricade. cops do it. We resolved to keep We all thought that tabs on the woman’s care and ... and an empty ward. would be extreme- visit her in hospital. Debates Picture: Susan Timmins ly dangerous, and raged over whether this was a tried to talk her out positive or thoroughly despicable of it but she insist- outcome ed even more and got very shrill and even It didn’t help that others came along and used abusive. At that point, we had to ask her to the occupation as a hotel: for example, one lot leave and eventually carried her out bodily. I of American women’s studies students kept mention this because it’s important to record asking “How often do they change the sheets the disagreements and fuck-ups. here?” We planned to barricade the entrances, leav- ing only the big front door with a movable Meanwhile, the date of the outpatients closure barricade, a great heavy beam. Women would drew closer and eviction became a real threat barricade themselves into particular wards,

12 while a mobile group would turn fire hoses on barricading the former outpatients building, the bailiffs and chuck sawdust and then go up we poured vegetable oil on the floor and to the roof of the main building. Another task added dried soybeans to make it all slippy- of this group was to make sure women who slidey for the bailiffs. wanted to leave got out when the bailiffs Since we were very security-conscious, we arrived. wore surgeon’s gloves and masks while per- One thing that sticks in my mind now is how forming these operations. One evening while we strived to organise so women could do we were barricading, a group of alternative whatever they were prepared to do and set video-makers were following us around. We their own limits as much as possible. For were just about to use some cabinets and trol- example, those who could not risk arrest vol- leys for barricades, then the video-makers unteered for look-out shifts in a van nearby. insisted we wait for them to film the rows of There was never any sense that certain actions trolleys to portray “all that is lost”. were more important than the others; we all I would love to get hold of those videos, but I pulled together. don’t remember the names of the women who Every afternoon we held rallies in front were on the team or the name of their group. of the hospital, passing out For safety, we all moved out of the pri- leaflets, talking to people, vate rooms upstairs and everyone speaking out and singing. slept in the big Nightingale ward Some of us hung out on the again. After many desolate nights balcony over entrance, when only a few people held the dressed in hospital uni- fort, pickets involved over 30 forms and surgeon’s masks women or so. They became very and sang songs like “what party-like. The mobile group, shall we do with the cops which I was in, slept in a room and bailiffs”. It was very downstairs near the door, so we fun and theatrical. had the partying near us all night. We were in a constant state of But sleep? Did we need it? Not then, alert, and many false alarms came nah... through on the walky talkies. I remember Meanwhile, the nurses’ station in the commu- code names like “Merrydown” and nal ward acquired extra curtains and became “Spikeytop”. known as “the bridal chamber”. Lots of rela- Once we had a report that someone was dig- tionships started... ended and started in this ging up the electricity in the road, and we period. swarmed out (with our masks on, of course) to confront the folks alleged to be doing it - The eviction date came and went, and we and it turned out to be ordinary road works. were still there. We put on a party to celebrate Most local people were very supportive and (Sleaze Sisters, regulars at the Bell, did the people from other hospitals turned up to help DJing), and started to make plans again. We picket. A miner who we met in at the turned the first floor ward into a place to Bradford hospital occupation also turned up. relax, painted a mural on one wall and gave He seemed embarrassed when he realised it each other massages; we disrupted another was a woman-only occupation, but we sorted health authority meeting. Some of the groups him out with a local miners’ support group. that had been running events at the hospital However, I should mention we had harass- returned to put them on again. ment by homophobic schoolboys. This minor But three weeks later, the hospital was evicted annoyance wasn’t enough to dent our enthusi- on 27th March 1985 by 100 male cops and 50 asm. female cops. By then our numbers had gone The all-out barricading effort continued. We down from about100 to 30, but we still made gathered loads of wood and hammering rang a good stand. After the usual false alarms a out throughout the building. While we were phone call came through the switchboard with

13 a tip-off. This one turned out to be true and an attempt to save the two women. the bailiffs arrived at 3.15am. Later, we picketed Kennington Police station As planned, women barricaded themselves where the two women were held. They were into wards, while the mobile group barricaded released after two hours, though they’d been the last door and stairs. roughed up while in custody. We then picket- Another group of women occupied the roof of ed Cavendish Road police station where the Preston House. Meanwhile, a small crowd cops were holding a press conference on the had gathered in front, summoned by our eviction. phone tree. I’ll mention at this point that we After the picket, some of us were walking to a did get support outside the building from café near the hospital. As we went past cops men. A local activist called Ernest was very hanging outside the hospital we saw them prominent in this - later he took part in arrest one woman and we went to rescue her, Wandsworth anti-Poll Tax organising and which resulted in six of us getting arrested. A went to jail for non-payment. I remember him bunch of schoolgirls saw what happened and shouting at the cops: “why do you have to be they were so angry about it they tried to help so macho?” and got arrested too. They were taken to the Our group ran up to the top floor, turned on police station, strip-searched and held for six the waterworks at the cops and bailiffs though or seven hours, and released with cautions. sadly the water pressure wasn’t up to much. The active role of the school pupils in this We went to the roof and threw the last barri- melee makes me think of the 2003 anti-war cades in place and sat on the cover to block school walkouts and more recent agitation the ladder over the education mainte- leading up nance allowance. to the roof. We heard Afterwards... women shouting A clause in the hospital’s and freehold stipulated that the singing building must be used for from the the benefit of women, and it Preston was also a listed building. House roof Wandsworth Council had and the tried a number of plans - balconies. one was to turn it into a Smoke Picture: Susan Timmins hotel - but the clause got in bombs and the way. It was empty for fireworks went off. Then the banging started over twenty years after the eviction. below as cops and bailiffs hacked their way The last plan was building a Tesco’s on the through the barricades. It took them about two site, which is on the border of Lambeth and hours to get to us up off the roof. Wandworth, but within Lambeth jurisdiction. In the press a lot was made of the use of There’d been local opposition and an appeal women coppers - it was called “the gentle against the permission was lodged, but it was touch”. Not that it matters much, but the turned down and the Tescos went ahead. The policewomen played a subordinate role. Male development included flats above the super- coppers dragged us down from the roof. market - I’m not sure if it is private or social Whatever their gender, the cops were big on housing - which might have something to arm twisting and made a big show of starting with how the project got past the conditions. to nick us: “Prepare to receive prisoners” We did make an attempt to continue a health- then pushed us aside near the vans. However, oriented action group. We managed to get a they did cart off two women. There was lots very small grant and a meeting place in a dis- of pushing and shoving and some fighting in used bunker in front of St Matthews Meeting

14 Place in Brixton. We had a public meeting murderous cuts’. We stressed the women’s that was reasonably well-attended. But it is health angle as a central part of this opposi- most memorable because it took place on the tion and organised events and workshops day a riot broke out in Brixton after Cherry relating to this. Gross was shot (and permanently paralysed) Another thing that strikes me is that we were during a police raid. able to arrive at consensus in our most heated discussions and everyone had opportuni- ties to speak and express themselves. Given some of the excruciating, highly extended experiences of consensus deci- sion-making I’ve been involved with since then, this seems incredible now. Or am I looking at this through a rose- coloured telescope? We were ahead of our time with our plan- ning for ‘diversity of tactics’ - allowing for more confrontational tactics alongside ‘fluffy’ ones. Back in the ‘80s this wasn’t really done. So I’m proud that we made a Picture: Susan Timmins break with the binary of pacifism vs ‘vio- lence’. Within the diversity, we placed But this group fell apart. Perhaps, with the equal importance on the different tactics and end of the occupation itself, the transforming didn’t elevate one above the other. In the element of the action was gone. Political and early 2000s anti-capitalists planned actions personal differences affected the group more, with different blocks using their choice of tac- and it seemed time to move on... tics; several years later the particular blocs However, I won’t end on a totally downbeat and tactics may have become stuck in a rut note. The eviction of the hospital led to an and lost their effectiveness. However, the core influx of women settling and getting active in principle of tactical diversity is still a good the Brixton area. Much of this was around one. squatting and housing, and the growth of a More recently, Greek health workers have new feminist and lesbian community inspired occupied a hospital in response to austerity by that. A host of DIY and feminist projects and health cuts. And with further cuts and pri- sprang up. Culturally, this was important to vatisation going ahead here, this is a good women who’d been alienated from boy-domi- time to look into this history and see what les- nated politics and the ‘official’ lesbian and sons can be applied now. feminist scene.

In retrospect, several things distinguished this Dedicated to Jill Allott, 1961-2012, supporter occupation. The nine-month time span of the of the South London Women's Hospital occupation allowed it to grow into an impor- occupation and stalwart of the Brixton tant point of contact between groups who anarcha-feminist and squatting scenes. She is might not have worked together otherwise. much missed. In the EGA campaign there had been dis- agreement over whether to promote the hospi- tal as a special case - a women’s hospital. Or to take it up in terms of opposing all cuts. Though it took some time to arrive at this Thanks to Susan Timmins for the use of point, at SLWH we included both the feminist her photos of the South London Women’s dimension and a strong anti-cuts class strug- Hospital, taken during the occupation. gle element. Our banners said ‘Stop these

15 Occupational Therapy

the incomplete story of the University College Hospital strikes and occupations of 1992-4

The story of the (ultimately unsuccessful) could not leave Ward 2/1.” From there, it struggle to keep a hospital open despite the escalated into an indefinite strike as more and efforts of the government, the Area Health differing people were sucked into the conflict Authority, management, University College Patients refused to leave the threatened Ward London and the Wellcome Foundation and and porters refused to move them. Briefly, the Trust. traffic on Gower Street and Tottenham Court Road was blocked by strikers and within no Put together by a number of individuals in the time there was a lot of support from other UCH occupation together with help and sug- workers, mainly in the form of generous gestions from others, London 1995. donations to the strike fund. COHSE was to past tense note: we have reproduced this text make the strike official but NUPE didn’t. as was later republished on anarchist web- It was something of a breakthrough as effec- space libcom (2006), with some pix from the tively the threatened part of the hospital was original pamphlet. Some of the developments soon run by time health workers themselves. in the NHS that it discusses are now several As one said, “management were being com- re-organisations ago... But it raises interesting pletely circumvented.” Unlike the later occu- points. pation in September 1993 (c/f main text) the first one took place in a functioning situation The First UCH Strike where all kinds of day to day nursing practi- calities had to be considered. For a brief (late November/early December 1992) moment, many of the quite nasty divide and rule mechanisms in the hospital hierarchy The first strike at UCH comprising of an were diverted and perhaps the most important occupation cum work-in against the phasing obstacle of all was overcome. A hospital out of the hospital took place in late occupation/work-in cannot succeed without November/early December 1992. It was said the support of junior doctors and this, it at the time that it was the first occupation of a appears, was forthcoming. Generally junior hospital in the UK.(1) Everyone who worked doctors are loathe to support or take any at UCH knew that some kind of crunch was action as they are utterly dependent on con- coming. Staff had been accused of “over-per- sultants good reports and are prepared to take forming” and it was mooted that 60 nurses shit waiting for that fat salary at the end of the were to be sacked. The purchasing authority 72 hour per week work rainbow (there was had let it be known that they found UCH too however, a junior doctors’ strike in the 1970s pricey and also, in the background, the and this might be worth looking into). Equally Tomlinson Report had pointed some kind of (or not so equally), experienced nurses tend to unspecific finger at the hospital. give junior doctors hell as they know that The strike started simply enough. One day in they’ll be handing it out like hell when in a late November some managers marched on consultants position. All such understandable Ward 2/1 - a general surgical ward - to close pettiness aside, finally and most importantly, it. There was an immediate spontaneous the harassment of junior doctors is largely to response as nurses linked arms to form a do with worries about cock-ups on the ward. human chain at the ward’s entrance. as one Although responsible for everything on the nurse said, “We decided as a Ward, without ward, the nurse-in-charge is under medical any union involvement, that as nurses we supervision from the doctor. The usual situa-

16 tion is inexperienced juniors having responsi- attack. Headless chickens come to mind.(2) bility over and above their skill and age. The The strike was successful though and the subsequent panic felt by the nurse-in-charge management backed off giving oily-written who usually knows the score in a potentially undertakings that all wards due to close for life or death situation translates into hassling Xmas would re-open on January 4th and and nagging juniors. dropping all disciplinaries against strikers. But in a subversive dynamic, everyday rela- Probably they were nervous after all the tionships quickly change, affecting even the tumult (hot air really) about miners a month most hidebound. In the UCH occupation, it previously. Possibly too, they were nervous seems that the consultants’ attitude bad about the rank’n’file Health workers Co-ordi- changed too and was sympathetic to the nating Committee, a body boycotted by the action taking place. To the annoyance of man- Health Unions themselves, thinking it was a agers, consultant Dr. M Adishia even trans- more potent body than it was. In reality, the ferred a patient to Ward 2/1 a day after the Health Workers Co-ordinating Committee was occupation began. This kind of thing was a made up/fake co-ordination (in comparison unheard of. Prior to the free market reforms to the rather more genuine co-ordinations in consultants ‘ran’ the hospitals. They were the UK strikes in 1988/89) pick’n’mix of var- seemingly all powerful, often terribly arrogant ious Trotskyist factions each running their and, inevitably, hated by all. Thus it was easy own party recruiting campaigns and little for the new hard-nosed management to take demonstrations - a unified, on the ground power away from the consultants as no one response being the last thing on their minds. was prepared to defend them. Having created Of course, as a lot of people knew, UCH man- such (unheard of) unity among the hospital agement were biding their time when they staff it wasn’t surprising that one UCH striker could hit a lot harder and nastier... And had cause to say in early December 1992, how!... read on... “we need workers councils in hospitals.” The only force pitted against them was the 1993 new, economically insecure, limited contract, cadre management employees. These man- The strike... agers didn’t ideologically believe any longer in what they’re doing but are scared stiff to do On August 17th 1993 about 50 nurses and anything else knowing that the porters at University College Hospital in cen- dole could be in waiting for tral London came out on indefinite strike them tomorrow. Blindly ruled against management plans to begin by money terrorism, they’ve closing down the hospital. seen their proletarianisation on From the the horizon and they don’t beginning the like what they see. A nurse at 50 strikers UCH whose ward was were - and closed by management in remained - a the space of two minutes minority of the without any medical con- total work force sultation or warning com- of the hospital; mented, “the manager this was one of said she knew it was the main weak- wrong but there are nesses of the strug- other managers waiting gle. In the original to take her place.” Shits though strike ballot well they may be, they’re hardly the stuff who over 50 voted to could make a solid defence based on convic- strike - but UCH man- tion come a more concerted, more general agement announced

17 that those taking industrial action would be for it had begun, it was obvious all the way banned from the building, so making it through that they did not want it to be effec- impossible to provide a rota for emergency tive or help the strikers in any way. They cover for patients as had been done in the obviously wanted, at the most, to negotiate December ’92 action. This discouraged some some kind of structured closure program for nurses from striking - and numbers were fur- the hospital with maybe a few token conces- ther reduced by the divisions of the trade sions thrown in - and parade this as some kind union structure, i.e. ambulance drivers were to of victory (see leaflet). UNISON only offi- be balloted separately, some nurses were RCN cially came into existence on July 1st 1993 members (with a no-strike agreement) while through a merger of the NALGO, NUPE and others were casual/temp staff employed via COHSE unions - so forming the largest public agencies. sector union in Western Europe, with 1.4 mil- Once the strike began there was some support lion members. This was their first major dis- from other workers - ambulance workers pute and they were keen to prove to manage- refused to move patients out of closing wards; ment that they were worth negotiating with British Telecom and other workers would not and could do the job - i.e. by proving they had crass the picket line to dismantle closed control over their members and could deliver wards; postmen and women leafleted their an obedient work force to the bosses. The rounds; and tube workers at nearby Goodge union disassociated themselves from any St used the station tannoy to report and publi- “unofficial” actions (such as a brief occupa- cise the strike. There were a couple of one tion of hospital chief executive Charles day strikes by catering, ancillary and clerical Marshal’s office) and sent circulars to other staff at UCH - and also by staff at the nearby hospitals ordering workers not to support it. EGA and Middlesex hospitals. Same public UNISON withheld all strike pay for 6 weeks. sector workers - teachers, posties, DSS and It was finally paid the day after the union had council workers - came out unofficially for forced the strikers to return to work. the Day of Action on September 16th (the The strikers tried to get support from other teachers despite being threatened with disci- workers - they were constantly visiting differ- plinary action by their union if they did so). ent workplaces. But it was nearly always done Local people and other supporters also turned through union structures - i.e. by approaching up to the marches and rallies during the strike shop stewards rather than by talking to work- - in fact the best marches were the ones that ers face to face. All this usually resulted in formed themselves spontaneously from the was a resolution of support being passed at rallies and went streaming off through the the next branch meeting, a money donation central London traffic. With the cops unpre- and a promise to send a few people down to pared and confused but not wanting to be the next rally. publicly seen getting heavy with a nurses-led In 1982 in Yorkshire nurses were able to bring march, Tottenham Court Road was brought to out thousands of miners and car workers by a standstill in the rush hour a couple of times bypassing the union structure, by simply by 150 people. standing outside the workplace and appealing Other marches were more tame, controlled directly to the workers for solidarity. This and less effective - due mainly to the union should have been tried by UCH nurses and branch officials getting afraid that the rowdi- porters, but the prevailing faith in the unions ness would upset the union bosses too (encouraged by SWP ideology) prevented it. much.(3) Nevertheless, the September 16th In Leeds, in 1982, support came from engi- march still managed to completely block neers and public sector workers. The best Whitehall for a while - or at least the riot cops example was some construction workers who did, so as to make sure we didn’t get to were building miners’ baths at Wooley Downing Street or Parliament. Colliery. The shop steward there had a brother Although UNISON had apparently said they in a hospital in Leeds (long stay) and got in would back the strike even before balloting touch with the nurses at the hospital to picket

18 himself and other workers out. When striking The majority of the strike committee were ini- nurses arrived they had no difficulty in stop- tially against an occupation, although 3 nurses ping the construction site, although there was did take part on the first night. It’s very likely a visible chillness from local NUM officials. that some were against the idea simply One of the construction workers drove because it was promoted by those strikers straight through the nurses picket line. This who were SWP members - there was already led to an extension of the construction work- some resentment about SWP manipulation ers’ strike for three days. It all ended when within the strike committee and this was the builders caught the scab, took the wheels probably thought to be another example or off his car and emptied his wallet into the vehicle for it, same of them at first assumed health workers’ collection bucket. In 1982, that we occupiers were all SWP members.(4) there was still too much reliance on union Those in occupation decided during the night structures - mainly on a shop steward rather to argue for not leaving the next day; this was than full time official level. This was because mainly in response to full-time UNISON offi- of inexperience and workers being over-awed cial Eddie Coulson turning up at l a.m. with by the myth of the shop steward. Defeat was ensured by reliance on the union structures and ideology, with unions turning militancy on and off like a tap, leading to disillusion. But 11 years on at UCH, so many defeats later and in a Central London workplace, there was much less chance of repeating such a success. ... And then the occupation

Ward 2/3 in the Cruciform building of UCH was occu- pied on September 15th - it had recently been emptied of patients as part of an ongo- ing closure of this wing of the hospital. The idea was first suggested to some local people on the picket line by someone who we later found out to be a full time SWP official. The occupation was originally planned to end after one night, merely being a publicity stunt to coincide with the Day of Action occurring the next day - but it was eventually decided that the occupation should continue indefinitely. First leaflet from the UCH community occupiers

19 hospital managers (who he’d been in confer- divided half and half for and against. It was ence with for over an hour before hand) to try decided that for the moment we wouldn’t and make everyone leave. Coulson stated in open another ward and that the fate of ward front of hospital chief executive Marshal and 2/3 would be put off for now until it could be two strikers that UNISON members would be discussed further. disciplined; he said that he wouldn’t be sur- Most of the strikers then went off to join the prised if there were further management disci- march, while we waited in 2/3 for the plinaries; he was prepared to drop all the marchers’ return and the strikers decision. demands of the strike, some of which he was While waiting we heard that UNISON bad only paying lip service to anyway, if Marshal cancelled the National Day of Action they’d would drop the disciplinary threats. He said planned for November 11th - this was in he could guarantee a return to work within response to our occupation. We also learned 24-36 hours if Marshal did this. He also that management were taking advantage of talked with Marshal about the “damage” the the fact that the march bad moved off, leaving dispute had done to UNISON, and how be nobody behind to carry on picketing: they had would be looking at ways of disciplining immediately begun to close another ward. UNISON members through the machinery of This news was relayed to the marchers, who the union (these are almost direct quotes from were by now blocking Whitehall, and the a letter of complaint sent by the UCH branch march set off back to the hospital. to their union leadership). At the end of the When the marchers returned some quickly strike Coulson was quoted in a paper as say- stormed into the hospital chief executive’s ing that UNISON had “lost control” of the office, occupying it for a while. Some others dispute, giving the “unauthorised” occupation came up and joined the occupation. as an example. Meanwhile the strikers went into their meet- Still, at the time, the strike committee were ing - it was 6 hours before their decision to divided about the occupation - some now not bold on to Ward 2/3 came back to us. only wanted to continue in Ward 2/3, but also The best day of the strike and the strikers to open another ward (the rest of the 2nd floor spent most of it in meetings! was empty). During the rally on the 16th September all the strikers came up to the Life is a hospital (for a while) occupation - initially just to protect the 3 nurses already present from disciplinaries and Although determined, aggressive tactics are to walk out with us down to the rally. But going to be increasingly necessary if we are to when we told them we didn’t want to leave keep some kind of free (albeit through nation- this started an emergency meeting. It was an al insurance contributions) Health Service urgent situation - if we were going to take intact, the occupation of Ward 2/3 wasn’t another ward it should have been then, with about “militancy” as such. Weren’t we there all those people outside. The whole rally of basically because it made you feel good (good 1,000 or more people should have been enough to want to fight rather than just fulfill- encouraged to enter the hospital and become a ing a dull political duty) and gave you one mass occupation, taking over empty wards. hell of a lift? A new world begins (or is at In the middle of all this, in walks Tony Benn, least glimpsed) instantly in such actions - and as he waffles on, the rally marches off simply in meeting, laughing and messing towards Whitehall... Somebody went out of about with barricades etc. with people you’ve the occupation to try to get the march to turn largely never met before. Quick as a flash, around - they did manage to stop the march that horrible imposed isolation knot - an isola- for a bit but, amid the confusion and argu- tion much worse today than its ever been - is ment, the march eventually continued on to loosened and that single factor could possibly Whitehall. be the most important in any future occupa- Back at the hospital, the strikers took a vote tions. about continuing the occupation -they were For the first few days of the occupation we

20 were more or less left to organise ourselves. be at least 6 strikers on the ward at any time Leaflets were written and distributed; a pick- and that there must always be at least one eting rota was put in operation (which meant striker on the picket line with us. They justi- for the first time there were to be some 24 fied all this by saying that if anything bad hour pickets); developing local contacts happened in the occupation or if things got brought in more people and donations of “out of control” this would jeopardise the food, cash, etc.. A great atmosphere and infec- strikers - by giving management an excuse to tious buzz was in the air for those first few legally evict the occupation and to victimise days and everybody involved felt the occupa- the strikers (6 of them already faced discipli- tion had great potential as a focus for the nary actions due to activities in the strike). struggle - people were openly discussing By the time this meeting occurred, most of things and coming up with new ideas all the the occupiers were tired out from a lack of time. A hardcore of a dozen or so people were enough sleep due to late night picketing, so involved in what was happening that we leafleting and generally running around trying were basically living on the ward for a while. to organise stuff. We were stunned by these sudden proposed changes (although in retro- Coming Down With a Dose of spect we should have been expecting some- thing like this) and did not resist them as we the Trots should have done; this was partly due to sim- ple fatigue but also because we were being But, alas, the spell was soon broken. We had guilt tripped about the necessity of protecting been requesting a meeting with the strikers the strikers’ interests as a priority. The impli- for a couple of days, and one was eventually cation was “how would you feel if a nurse arranged between the full strike committee lost her job because you lot fucked up?” The (i.e. all available strikers) and the occupiers; answer was obvious but the likelihood of it but instead we were met by just a few union happening was exaggerated and used as a shop stewards who were all SWP members. weapon against us. One of these SWerPs was also the union Although none of us were happy about all branch secretary at UCH, and although she this, we weren’t able to respond effectively - was not even on strike - she was one of the and as we mistakenly thought that these were clerical workers and they had not come out - decisions taken by the strike committee as a she very much used her union status to play a whole we didn’t feel in much of a position to dominant and often manipulative role during argue. We should have said we would consid- the strike. They proceeded to tell us of their er these proposals and then discuss them with plans for completely restructuring how the the full strike committee as soon as possible, occupation was to function - we were led to instead of just capitulating. If we had known believe (wrongly as it turned out) that they that these issues had not even been properly were speaking for the strike committee as a discussed by the strike committee and that whole and only relaying to us what had been there had already been strong disagreements decided by it. In fact it was an SWP engi- within the strike committee about SWP neered coup, done behind the strike commit- manipulation then we wouldn’t have felt so tee’s back as much as ours’. isolated with so few options. I was also partly They wanted vetting to decide who should be unfamiliarity with what was a pretty unusual allowed into the occupation - this was to be situation as well as a (not unrelated) lack of carded out by the branch secretary and chair- confidence and assertiveness in ourselves and person - both SWP members. People would other simple personal failings that led to our have to book themselves onto a formalised downfall. It can’t just be explained by the rota days in advance just to be able to spend a supposed absence of enough organisation or night in the occupation - reducing it to a duty of a certain kind of organisation, as some and a chore, killing off the social dynamic have tried to do (see Appendix for more on going on. They also intended that there should this).

21 Their plan was to make the occupation a cen- you as if you were an unwelcome intruder. tre for union and SWP organising and to fill And so hypocritical! A poster then appeared: the place with SWerPs. Having seen that we “NO DRUGS OR ALCOHOL IN THE were good at organising ourselves and devel- WARD.” And yet it was only a few nights pre- oping our autonomy the union/SWP hacks felt viously that an SWerP had been openly rolling threatened - partly because they judged us by up spliffs. Previous to this laying down of the their own miserable standards and thought we law there was no trouble at all with anybody were really some secret anarchist group (pos- getting out of their heads. In fact even occu- sibly Class War!) come to try to take things piers who were regular boozers had hardly over. Rumours were flying amongst the strike touched a drop, being so occupied with what committee that this was the case. was going on. It was only after the SWP coup They also wanted to reduce the occupation to that people were drunk on the ward - and they a publicity exercise - i.e. getting media were mainly SWerPs come back from the pub. celebrities and MPs to visit and be pho- After that occupying was more like work; a tographed there. In fact it seemed they had duty; a painful task to be undertaken. Wage decided that getting public opinion on the side labour felt freer than this! Better to occupy of the strikers was going to be the main the Morgue which was just below Ward 2/3 - weapon to win the strike with. Some occu- at least that would have been a bit of life in piers now felt they were being treated as a death.” token pensioner, a token mother and child, The SWP’s plan was to draft in large numbers etc. to be displayed for the cameras. One of SWP foot soldiers, but this was never very woman was even offered a spare nurses uni- successful - some did turn up (although a lot form to wear in case there were no real nurses who were told to didn’t) but never in suffi- around when an MP came to visit! cient numbers to completely dominate or The effects of these changes being imposed alienate the rest of us; as they usually only were several: a lot of people, particularly came for one night they still had to ask those locals who visited regularly, were put off of us staying there for information about the coming to the occupation. And there seemed general functioning of the place. Some rank little point in giving out leaflets encouraging ‘n’ file SWerPs were fine to be with (5) and people to come to the occupation if they’d all we could talk and relax with them but the real have to be vetted first. The atmosphere was hacks were often vile functionaries and mere totally changed, with people now feeling they appendages of the party machine, mouth were only there with the permission or toler- pieces for faithfully parroting the banalities of ance of certain officials and no longer as joint the party line, with no social graces or partners in the struggle. The openness of the warmth at all. occupation, with free debate flowing back and In fact it might be said that leftist militancy is forth informally, was replaced by an atmos- a diagnosable disease in itself, with definite phere of intrigue and secret whisperings... schizophrenic behavioural tendencies! The “In those early days one related to the occu- personality split between political duty and piers as strikers, local or non-local or all real desires, voluntary submission to party mixed up together. You were curious about lines and hierarchies with repression of their lives, background, last night’s binge, doubts and contradictions, obsession with learning about hospital jobs, what immediate manipulation of others and conversion of oth- tasks had to be earned out, etc. Ideology just ers to one’s own rigid beliefs, etc... didn’t really count and you couldn’t give much In the early days of the occupation it was the of a fuck what political persuasion anybody Trots who’d left bunches of Socialist Worker had. It was only after the attempted SWP around (along with the Revolutionary mini-coup that you really started relating to Communist Party etc. leaving their rags lying strikers as SWerPs or not And that was REAL about) ready for piling propaganda in the BAD. After that, paranoia, whispered conver- occupiers’ heads. At the same time these sations (from them) with doors closing behind politicos spotted in a flash one Class War

22 newspaper lying innocently about and what’s were prepared to put their heart and soul into this? - a man called Vienet’s book on the the occupation. Instead of the ‘straight’ work- French occupation movement in May ’68 - ing class (at least as the leftists saw it) they things that somebody had bought or nicked got those without the correct image. for one’s own personal enjoyment on the day. The SWP turned the occupation into a politi- So an ideological construct was fearfully cal arena where all other forces were seen assembled: “Its Class war anarchists in either as rivals or subjects to be submitted to there”; “Is that a destructive lunatic their will. In an atmosphere of intrigue, plots fringe?”; “Should we Kronstadt the bas- and manipulations we were forced into being tards?” The mind boggles at the lurid fan- less open and more secretive ourselves as pro- tasies possibly conjured up. tection against totally losing our ground. This The bunch that became the mainstay of the is often the effect on struggles of self interest- occupation were a mixed bag - partly deter- ed political factions with a separate agenda mined by the fact that we were the ones who for themselves - to combat them you are often could devote most time to it. On the dole or forced to adopt some of their tactics - result- on the sick, single mums, pensioners, ing in the social dynamics of the struggle casual/part-time workers or those whose jobs being stalled and energy being wasted on sim- were flexible enough to take time off ply trying to stand your ground and contain (builders, dispatch riders, etc.). Some had the effects and spread of the Trotskyist virus. known each other before, some hadn’t, but But it’s too simplistic to blame the SWP for most had some involvement with the strike everything - another sect could have played from the beginning; some who already knew the same role, as could any other union each other had been involved in producing bureaucrats or a group of timid, conservative their own leaflet and poster for the Day of workers in different circumstances. It’s no Action prior to the occupation, having been good seeing the SWP cadres as the shit part inspired by some striking nurses. People came and the rest of the strike committee as pure from a wide variety of social and ‘political’ light - sometimes the SWerPs took the more backgrounds and experiences - most had been radical initiatives, in opposition to more con- involved in other struggles in the past. servative strikers. But it’s important to Different people had served time with various remember that the non-SWerPs were never as political groupings, ranging from the Labour inflexible and ideological and therefore could Party through Trot groups, ultra-left marxism be more imaginative in many ways. and beyond. Others had never touched politics Avoiding the routinisation of struggles seems with a barge pole. None were hacks or Party to be a real challenge. All sorts of forces com- animals (in the political sense!) and there was bine to turn an occupation or strike into just a a consensus of distaste for such beasts. One or different kind of work. The Trots are usually two of the more ‘eccentric’ characters could at the visible cause, but it’s often that they are times get to be a pain in the arse but generally filling a vacuum created by people’s own they were responsive enough to get the mes- uncertainty - it’s inevitable in any genuine sage if you told them so; unlike some of the autonomous struggle - but the way in which devious lefties who had the cheek to call these vanguard groups use that uncertainty means people “disruptive.” they turn it into a weakness. Ideally they Some of the strike committee at least had a could be wrong-footed by a bit of playfulness stereotypical view of just who they wanted as and craziness, but when the situation becomes permanent overnight occupiers. Lots of work- tense and ‘serious’ and people start worrying er delegations carrying TU banners or repre- and falling back into the workday mecha- sentative of community/tenant organisations, nisms, autonomy gives way to ‘common etc.. What they got was just what they didn’t sense.’ At least in this experience at UCH want: the ‘freak’ or mongrel proletariat - those people got out and about which lifted the not that much into work and who largely had weight a bit - a lot of occupations become never seen the inside of a trade union but who sieges and in that context the vanguard and all

23 the other military metaphors start giving the numbers for a total coup: very few union offi- appearance of making sense. Isolation is cials turned up; and only 3 or 4 ‘left’ Labour another problem - especially if the occupiers MPs turned up, attracting very little press are seen to be a ‘minority.’ coverage. (It was laughable to later read It’s true to say that the SWP’s goal is not first- Socialist Worker’s claim that, due to pressure ly to advance a struggle, but to advance their of public opinion and the strike highlighting influence on a struggle, and it is this which the health issue, the Labour Party had been determines their choice of tactics: this was “forced” to send some prominent MPs down illustrated by the way their attitude to the to the Ward. They had been phoning up loads occupation was to change. of celebrities and these were the only ones Although of course the SWP strikers at UCH who ever bothered to come). sincerely wanted to win the strike, its never- The political vetting they’d wanted became theless true that the Party’s tactics are general- impractical as it turned out that the branch ly determined not by how to advance or win officials were too busy to impose it - and as struggles but by how to prove that if everyone the Party faithful failed to materialise in suffi- had listened to and followed them then things cient strength we were needed to make up would have worked out better - this often numbers anyway. entails directing struggles and demands at the The picket line was another main casualty of union bureaucrats, so that when (inevitably) the imposed changes. It was impossible for they don’t do what they’re asked to, they can the strikers alone to mount successful picket- be shown to be wrong and the SWP “correct” ing - there were 10 or 11 different exits all (this cynical attitude to the working class was connected by underground tunnels that the spelled out yonks ago by their arch-guru management could use to sneak patients and Trotsky with his theories of the “transitional equipment out as they closed more wards. demand” etc.).(6) During the occupation we had begun to But even in their own terms, none of their organise 24 hour pickets with walkie-talkie own plans for the occupation ever worked contact between the picket and our Ward; we well. They could never draft in sufficient still didn’t have enough people to cover every exit but it was certainly an improvement. But it seemed that part of the reason for the reor- ganisation of the occupation was that the union/SWP officials had given up on trying to develop effective picketing in favour of get- ting public sympathy on their side through publicity stunts. We had shown that we were serious about trying to make the picket effec- tive and more than just a token show of strength - and possibly it was thought that this could lead to a clash on the picket line that would have further pissed off the union and would not have looked good in the media (‘Picket Line Fight at the UCH’ etc.). The officials had demonstrated no real enthusiasm for the idea of mass pickets at the hospital - and the possibility of growing numbers of local people and others organising themselves independently (in co-operation with strikers) on the picket line would not have appealed to The above plan gives some idea what a them (just as it didn’t in the occupation). They eventually discouraged us from all night helluva job picketing UCH was. picketing by saying that management would

24 not bother moving stuff at night - shortly after ity of the UCH work force out the strike could we stopped night picketing they did start never win. Not that UNISON wanted other moving things at night. workers to support it - their attitude towards We wrote a leaflet to the strike committee the strike was hardly going to encourage more outlining our concern about how the occupa- workers to gel involved. The union machinery tion had been changed but is was never actu- did its job of keeping the strikers isolated ally distributed to them; the strikers found out from other sections of the working class who that UNISON had been going behind their could have given the active solidarity needed backs to stitch up a deal with management to for victory; and the strikers were not capable try to get them back to work. So the strike of overcoming this isolation. The strikers met meetings were too busy trying to deal with all and voted to accept the deal whereby they that to time to discuss the occupation with us went back to work in return for all disciplinar- - we were advised by a sympathetic striker ies being dropped and full trade union rights that this was not a good time to distribute our to organise in the hospital being restored. leaflet. The strike committee held its last meet- But a lot of these conflicts ing where two might not have happened (or delegates for the at least not so quickly) if occupiers were more people, especially from finally able to the council estates nearby, attend. A large had joined the occupation. If number of strikers there had simply been a big were elected as toing and froing of 200 peo- shop stewards at this ple or so (or even of less) meeting, this being then the event could have proposed by the taken on a momentum of branch chairperson its own whereby other and the secrets (both empty wards would have SWP). This was a been taken over as a mat- way of trying to re- ter of course as more integrate disaffected beds were needed to workers back into the sleep on at night, etc.. union structure and to This would have made it re-kindle faith in it - harder for the officials some of those elected to dominate events. had earlier thrown their UNISON eventually UNISON badges in the issued an effective ulti- bin in disgust. Obviously matum to the strikers - workers must “radicalise to go back to work or the unions,” “push the the union would with- leadership leftwards,” draw support for the “force the TUC to call a strike; which would general str... blab blab have left the strikers yawn” - in SWerP speak wide open to dis- this translates (they hope) missal and possible into more positions of legal action against influence in the unions for them. In their isola- the SWP “workers van- tion without wider guard.” effective support, this didn’t seem After all that was settled the like a risk worth taking. occupation was discussed. The union bosses said that with only a minor- We said why we thought the occupation

25 Text of Undistributed leaflet from occupiers to strikers: TO THE STRIKERS FROM SOME OF THE OCCUPIERS IN SOLIDARITY

We have written this statement because we want to sort out where we stand, to clarify our relationship to the strike committee and to the struggle to keep UCH open, which is also our struggle.

We have been involved in the occupation as NHS users, getting involved either from the start or from the Thursday demo, and have been trying to build the occupation as part of the struggle. We have helped build support in the local community, getting more people to join in and to widen the distribution of leaflets, getting local shops to donate food and display campaign material, along with community centres and others.

We produced our own leaflet, in consultation with a number of strikers, to put the case from the perspective of the community, of service users, calling for people to get involved. We have found that people, like us, do want to get involved, directly in the struggle for their health service, not just signing petitions or marching, and the occupation has given them a focus and an opportunity to start to get involved. We have also joined in the picket and enabled it to be extended a few times to 24 hours.

But it now appears that members of the community are at best to be tolerated, rather than allowed our own ideas and initiative. Even though a rota was being successfully developed, a formal rota has been imposed, controlled by the branch officials, making it more difficult for people tobe involved on their own terms. Some people already felt they were being treated as ‘token’ pensioners, etc;, and these changes have discouraged some people from returning.

More general involvement by local people and workers is being substituted by party politi- cal contacts. Occupiers have been forced into a position of passive observers as decisions taken elsewhere are carried out. These changes were presented to us on Sunday by a few branch leaders who seemed to be speaking for the strike committee, though it appears they weren’t. On the grounds that we cannot be allowed to do anything to jeopardise the strikers or the strike (which we have no intention of doing) we have in face been prevented from doing anything for ourselves. If allowing us any initiative is a threat, then the occupation should be staffed by cardboard cut-outs, not real people. Replacing the active solidarity of local people and other supporters by a strategy of using the occupation merely for public sympathy and visiting celebrities will not win our struggle. The miners had plenty of this sympathy and have still been destroyed.

Another justification mentioned in passing for dealing behind our (and others’) backs wa s the problem with the union. We recognise there are problems – we just want to be able to discuss these things openly, we want to help.

We are not suggesting the occupation be separate from the strike – we want to work with the strikers to save the hospital, not just be assigned tasks as if we were workers and the union officials our managers. We are not here to disrupt, we are not a political group come to muscle in, we want to fight with you, for our health service.

We would like to meet and discuss all this with the full strike committee A.S.A.P.

- IN SOLIDARITY

26 should continue - the main arguments are set side the workplace that defeated the Poll Tax. out in our leaflet [below] (which, again, was It’s significant that the only mass struggle in never actually distributed because during the over a decade that in any sense could be first part of the meeting a union bureaucrat called a victory was community based; nei- from UNISON head office was present and ther union sabotage nor anti-strike legislation obviously we didn’t want him to see it. When nor isolation could be used to restrict the he left, the occupation was discussed and it movement. At this meeting and another later was eventually voted to end it. After that, on in Ward 2/3 with more occupiers we man- there seemed little point in giving out our aged to add some discord to the familiar leaflet). refrain of the SWP union chairman giving a summing up lecture on what lessons could be drawn from the strike (7). He claimed it as The debate eventually became a political some kind of victory that management had argument - the SWP putting their line forward been shaken by (a defeated Arthur Scargill put that community action like our occupation it this way: “The struggle can only be useful and successful as sec- is the victory”). This des- ondary, supportive action for perate line from brave workers’ strikers has gained momentum since the miners’ defeat in ‘85, as the defeats pile up as each group of workers indus- is picked off in isola- trial tion one by one. With action. every defeat the They bosses are inspired didn’t to tighten the screw like it a little more. when we The occupiers put for- later held their ward the own meeting obvious where we voted example of by a narrow the Poll Tax margin to to contradict accept the them. At the wishes of the time the strikers and so SWP’s line end the occu- was that work- pation. ers would But the fight defeat the Poll goes on and Tax by refusing we can at to process the least information, han- reflect on dle the paperwork, our fail- taking strike ures in action, etc... Such the hope actions happened of making only on a very small our position stronger as action scale. It was what Wellcome we wait for the next cut was happening out- of the Health Butcher’s Leaflet distributed on 27 scalpel. stormed straight into the Wellcome board- The strikers and occupiers walked out togeth- room. Much to the shock of both them and us, er, with one occupier being pushed out in his there we were, in the heart of the dealers’ den, bed, and went their separate ways. Now call- facing the biggest and slimiest drug pushing ing ourselves the “UCH Community Action cartel in the world(8). We immediately started Committee” the occupiers headed straight for haranguing and shouting at the bow-tied and the nearby head offices of UNISON. A crowd blue-rinsed board members, demanding that of us pushed our way in to the building, they pull out of any deal to buy the UCH leafleted workers and vented our anger at Cruciform building. We stayed for half an some bureaucrats for the union’s role in sabo- hour, arguing with them and eventually forc- taging the struggle. They didn’t call the cops ing them to leave and hold their meeting in on us, thereby avoiding more bad publicity another room. Then three van loads of cops for them. The building’s entrance was later arrived outside, including riot cops. Once they grafittied with “UNISCUM” and another wall saw we were a motley crew including toddlers saying “Unison sold out UCH nurses and and pensioners, and not a gang of terrorists, porters”. A stranger later added underneath they sent in a few to tamely escort us off the “so what’s new? NALGO sold out the Shaw premises. workers” (i.e. workers in the nearby Shaw library). Later that day we gate-crashed the UCL The Action Committee kept holding regular Provost’s office, interrupting his lunch and meetings and did some actions. We decided to puncturing his self-importance to the point visit Wellcome, the multinational drug compa- where he was reduced to calling us names and ny involved in the sell-off of UCH. As luck shouting at us to “get stuffed”. We then would have it, when we arrived we discov- moved on to the nearby offices of UCH boss ered that a board meeting was then in Charles Marshall, which we invaded, disrupt- progress. Fifteen of us snuck up the stairs and ing a business meeting in the process. A few

28 of us stayed for a while to argue the toss with their agenda. him. All in all, not a bad day’s work. Members of the UCHCAC decided to use the We also kept demonstrating once or twice a Day of Action as a way of combating the week outside the hospital and tried to organise inactivity planned by the unions. We also to resist more wards being moved out, but we wanted to do something to try stop the immi- were never strong enough or well informed nent closure of the Cruciform building. So we enough of management’s plans. In the run up arranged for a group of us to reoccupy Ward to November 5th a Virginia Bottomley guy 2/3 on the night before the Day of Action. was taken round the local area to raise money Seventeen of us and some friends waited and a few laughs. We also attended and heck- while a few people cracked open the ward. led meetings of the local Health Authority; We all eventually sneaked in to find a bare who were discussing plans to deal with a £21 ward: no beds or furniture this time. million cut in their budget by not sending any The next morning we hung out some banners more patients to UCH; this would leave only from the windows, as people began arriving a casualty department without adequate back- for the UCH feeder march which would link up facilities, with patients allowed a maxi- up later with the main demo. At about mum 48 hour stay before being moved on. In 10.30am the hospital security guards finally order to compete with other hospitals for noticed us. They came and asked what we patients, UCH management announced a 10% were doing and then disappeared. price cut. This was to be achieved mainly by Most of us went off to join the demo, leaving the axing of 700 jobs - but even this wasn’t a handful to “guard the fort” and stay put. Our enough to satisfy the “Internal Market”. Ex- faction marched under an anti-TUC banner strikers we talked to said there was no mood saying “Tories Unofficial Cops sabotaging for a strike against these cuts amongst UCH struggles.” It was a boring march with 20- workers. 25,000 people on it; but the rally at Trafalgar Square was more interesting. We heckled a lot A Second Occupation through a megaphone at the TU bureaucrats and celebrities, taking the piss and expressing An NHS “Day of Action” had been organised our anger at the pathetic farce. It was ridicu- by the TUC for November 20th, basically as a lous to see actors from the TV soap token safety valve to dissipate the growing “Casualty” being invited to make guest anger and pressure from health workers and appearances and talk crap on the platform others. Originally planned for Thursday 18th, while real nurses who wanted to speak were it was changed to Saturday 20th - this was prevented from doing so by the union bosses. decided during the UCH strike in September, We also handed out leaflets at the demo apparently due to union fears of a growing explaining the UCH situation and asking peo- militancy amongst health workers. For the ple to come and join the occupation. About 25 unions, the unpleasant possibility of effective people responded by coming to the ward after action being taken - such as solidarity strikes the demo _ some SWP and Class War mem- or at least the major disruption of central bers and the other half various non-aligned London weekday traffic - would be greatly individuals - 25 out of 25,000 - pathetic. We lessened by holding the demonstration on a had a meeting and all these people expressed Saturday. The unions’ publicity for November support for the occupation but most left never 20th was very low key and half hearted - nei- to return. Four or five stayed the weekend ther the demo nor any other real activity was with about eight of us, and a friendly hospital emphasised, just the symbolic slogan “NHS worker managed to smuggle us in plenty of Day of Action”, with the demo mentioned in spare bedding to make us more comfortable. small letters at the bottom of the posters. The Some of the visitors went off to attempt their unions obviously have the resources to organ- own occupation in south London but were ise a massive demonstration to defend free apparently quickly evicted without any legal health care if they want to, but this was not on formalities by the cops.

29 Within a few days we were reliant on the be allowed inside the ward as this would cre- same old familiar faces to maintain and publi- ate a totally different and unwanted atmos- cise the occupation - our aim of using the phere and would also be a great security risk occupation as a base to get more people (but not everybody stuck strictly to this agree- involved was not succeeding. It was becom- ment). ing a strain on the dozen or so hard core of Management tried at first to ignore the occu- people involved to keep things going and the pation, fearing that any action against us lack of response was depressing. Sometimes might give it more there were just 2 people in the occupation publicity, but and the bore- responded imme- dom diately once we weighed contacted the heavy. media. Carlton We had a TV said they’d few sup- come down and porters interview from dropping outside while in and we talked to some them from a donations window on the of food but ward. Carlton very few phoned UCH people will- management ing to just before- become hand to get actively their side of involved - the story - even staying which overnight prompted occasionally manage- was too much ment to cut of a commit- off our ment for most electricity people. just before Although we the cam- had been very eras clear from the arrived. start that the But the occupation interview should not just be went another token ahead publicity stunt, we and was were now getting shown desperate and the on London-wide TV brick walls of apa- news. We made sure our mobile phone num- thy around us were ber was prominently displayed to the cameras. beginning to close in. So it was decided to This led to three people phoning us, two very contact the media in order to spread the word supportive and one abusive. Considering that that we were here - our own local leafleting millions of people saw the interview and and flyposting having bad so little effect. But phone number on prime-time TV news this we were agreed that no media people would seemed to be one more example of how apa-

30 thetic people felt. But in all our statements to Conway Hall - 22 people turned up, including the media we emphasised that our main goal a few militant health workers. We all had a was to help spread and inspire more occupa- good discussion with interesting ideas being tions; we can only hope that we have planted suggested. It was generally felt that more some seeds that have yet to grow. effort should be put into making links with The SWP were even less supportive than the like minded groups and individuals. But rest of the bourgeois press - it was only after again, only one or two people showed any we got some media coverage that they men- willingness to get involved with the occupa- tioned the occupation at all in Socialist tion. Still, we did make contact with some Worker - and only after we had been evicted! good people. There were attempts to involve more people It was no surprise when we eventually by holding a weekly under-5s afternoon, alter- received a High Court summons notifying us native health workshops, an acoustic music that proceedings were underway for manage- session, etc.. But general conditions plus the ment to regain possession of the ward. We impossibility went to the of long term court hearing planning made and, joined by these hard to a crowd of develop. friends and The few supporters remaining (including a wards in the few ex-strik- building had ers), we pick- been steadily eted outside closing during the court with the occupation banners and - and without leaflets. We the active sup- lost the case, port of staff or despite our large numbers solicitors argu- of other people ing that the there was management nothing we were unable to could do to try produce any and stop them title deeds or closing down clear evidence the building. that they had Once the last any right to patients had the building. been moved The court case out the man- also attracted agement also more TV, cut off our radio and heating. Now press cover- without heat or age. electricity we We had a nonetheless stuck it out; we stubbornly dug small but noisy spontaneous march back to our heels in and just wore more clothes and the hospital - afterwards a few of us climbed used candles, lanterns and camping gas on a flat roof opposite the UCH Chief stoves. Executive’s office windows and blared out a During this time we had a public meeting at tape of the old working class anthem ‘The

31 Internationale’ at the management for a Baroness Cumberlege. Unfortunately it was laugh, while waving banners saying “Spread too late to change our publicity from “Give the Occupations”. At around this time we Bottomley a lobotomy” to “Give Cumberlege received a couple of amusing phone calls; we a haemorrhage”. The night before, a wall had managed to get an article published in Pi, opposite the hostel was graffitied with the UCL student magazine, about UCH and “Bottomley bottled out” but it was painted University College London’s involvement in over before the Baroness arrived. When she the sell-off of the Cruciform building. did come she was immediately surrounded by us as she got out of her car, surprisingly she We had then reprinted it as a leaflet and dis- kept her nerve quite well and stopped briefly tributed it outside UCH and UCL, which was to argue with us. As the abuse and accusations just across the road from the Cruciform. We intensified she was hustled away by cops to also stuck it up inside the college. A few days shouts of “murderer!”. later we received an angry telephone call from Once again the great silent majority had a whingeing student journalist insisting that stayed silent and absent, not responding to our we stop distributing the article as it was “all flyposting and leafleting or mention of the lies” and we were infringing Pi magazine’s visit in local papers. Only about twenty peo- copyright. Realising she was failing to intimi- ple turned up, most of them already known to date us, as we laughed and insulted her for us, plus three residents of the hostel. One told being a pathetic crawling lackey for the col- us they’d graffittied inside the building but lege authorities, she slammed the phone that had been painted over too. down. Shortly afterwards we were phoned by We went back to the ward and had a party a member of UCL management who demand- that night. We were evicted by bailiffs, cops ed (unsuccessfully) to know who we were and and security guards at 7.45 the next morning, threatened to sue us - we told him to sue if he twenty days after the start of the occupation. wanted to, as we had no money to lose. And if they took us to court for making false state- So now the Cruciform lies empty, with the ments about UCL’s involvement in the closure loss of around 350 beds, while in other hospi- and sell-off of UCH then they would have to tals people suffer and die in corridors for want reveal what the truth of the matter was - of a bed. But a few days after the end of the something we’d all like to hear! The editor of occupation Bottomley announced that the the mag also phoned the author to complain UCH was “saved” - all that this meant was that she’d been called into the Provost’s office that there would still be a casualty department and given a furious bollocking for publishing (which hadn’t been under threat anyway) and it. (The Provost also mentioned that he had a renowned centre for medical research checked the student register for the name of (meaning that the plan to sell it off to the likes the author _ and there was not even a “Guy of UCL and Wellcome was still to go ahead). Debord” listed there!). It was clear we were This grand announcement was presented in beginning to make them feel vulnerable. the media as a great act of charity and a big Word had got out that Health Minister concession; when in fact all that they were Bottomley was due to visit Arlington House, a saying was that nothing had changed and their hostel for homeless men in Camden Town. plans were still the same. That was newspeak She was to be launching a new government at its most effective - people kept saying to us video about ways to help the homeless be how great it was that UCH had been saved - more healthy (of course, this didn’t actually when they had just closed down the main include giving them a home). We publicised building with the loss of 350 beds and 700 her visit the best we could, calling on people jobs to follow! Bottomley also said that she to demonstrate outside the hostel. Shortly might give some extra money as a temporary before the visit we heard that Bottomley subsidy, on the condition that management would not now be attending and would be make even more cuts. This was a way to substituted by Junior Health Minister avoid the embarrassment of UCH finally col-

32 the of wing ving” y the UCH UCH. Action b ‘Sa Community Committee, he leaflet put follo T out

33 lapsing due to the pressures of competition in face-to-face with other workers - the union the Internal Market - the money could also be reps will try to fob you off with excuses and seen as a reward to UCH management for its tie you up with official procedures. cuts package of 700 jobs. If strike action is to be effective it will have to Then, to cap it all, three weeks later it was be organised outside and against the unions _ announced that the latest plan being consid- and ideally there will need to be prior com- ered was to sell off the whole UCH site (like mitment of solidarity from sufficient numbers other hospitals, the land would fetch millions of workers so as to make it impossible for the on the property market) and to move parts of bosses to victim small groups of workers in the UCH to various other hospitals. Who isolation. knows what they’ll come up with next? And do all you can to immediately spread all strikes and occupations; such may seem wild- Victory prepared by a series of ly optimistic at the moment, but if each hospi- tal is to avoid being picked off one by one in defeats? isolation (just as so many sectors of workers have been) then we need a growing move- As we go to press it seems that some kind of ment of occupations and strikes. active campaign may be starting up at Guy’s Hospital to try and save it from the Health Butchers. From what we have seen so far it “Our hospital was saved by the kind of seems that the same old mistakes made at the action that this bill will seek to criminalise. UCH are doomed to be repeated at Guy’s; We occupied, we picketed, we slept outside many of the hospital staff appear to have the and we won. All that is under attack. We same naive faith ‘their’ unions and ‘their’ must stop this bill.” MPs etc. - and once again they are encour- - Candy Udwin, UNISON branch secretary, aged in this by the SWP - who have set up University College Hospital their own community campaign front group, as have two other rival political factions. The Quote from an SWP anti-Criminal Justice SWP now even claim that they saved UCH Bill leaflet: Ms Udwin is an SWP member (see leaflet below). The campaigning appears who, during the strike, loudly condemned to be about one hospital only - all the easier to the dangerous consequences if the be defeated in isolation. And only a few hun- Cruciform building was closed with hundred dred turned out for a demo, although this is of jobs to be lost. Yet now all this has hap- the local hospital for many thousands of peo- pened, she faithfully parrots the party lie ple. But these are early days and hopefully that this outcome is a victory won by the things will develop beyond these limits. SWP! So what lessons can we draw from the UCH strike and two occupations that are worth Life in the Void passing on to those who may find themselves in a similar situation? Alongside other attacks, the Health Service is Well, basically, never trust those who want to being torn apart around our but where is the represent you and speak for you - fight to pre- resistance on the scale necessary to turn serve your own autonomy if you have it and things around? The last years of accelerating fight to gain it if you don’t. Never trust the defeat, demoralisation and hardship seems to unions and lefty parties (despite the fact that have created an extreme cynicism about being there are OK individual rank’n’file members able to change anything for the better, or even within them) - they’ll always try to use you that worth trying to. People have retreated for their own ends. largely into an isolation centred on the strug- If you want to gain support then go and get it gle for survival day-to-day. The war of all- yourselves _ going through official channels against-all for shrinking resources has made is generally useless. Workers need to speak everyone a casualty; resignation rules. The

34 health service is an issue that effects every- or insurance society (literally - the unions body and yet the amount of active resistance now provide low cost insurance deals and to its destruction is so far pathetically small. mortgages to staff); as an issuer of strike pay There is at present little strike action taking when you can’t get anything off the State; as place in the UK; but when it happens there is a provider of legal skills (solicitors, etc.) in an more and more criticism by workers of the increasingly litigation oriented society where role of “their” unions in the struggle. UCH, Law Centres are often no longer available for Burnsall and Timex are the most recent exam- low paid workers; and the union as the place ples of this (interestingly, in each case it where bitter divorce proceedings or future was a predominantly funeral expenses cost you nothing more than female work force con- the renewal of a years subscription. In fronting a typically male short, working in harmony with the union bureaucracy). money terrorism of a free market The early ’70s were cash-and-carry UK. Thus often marked by a strong to get thrown out belief in the union as the of the union for real sister/brotherhood engaging in that would bring about wildcat radical social change. actions or Most of that sad faith whatever has now gone although (a threat there’s still a fair increas- amount of “if only we ingly could get rid of the employed bureaucrats things would by union be okay” type platitude - bureaucrat with little recognition that fat cats) the union structure is might have designed to be a control serious mechanism, or that trying financial to “radicalise” the unions conse- is as futile as trying to quences. radicalise any other capi- UNISON is talist institution. Yet, only the despite mounting criti- latest but cism, people feel more perhaps compelled to obey the the most union than in the significant 60’s/70’s period when there example of unions were rank’n’file movements extending their influence from the work- jumping in and out of the trade union place to other areas of life. Maybe this should form (almost always to end up in it again) and be looked at more closely because it may often initiating wildcat actions that bypassed reveal a new stage in the unions’ role in socie- the union bureaucracy whilst making use of ty (i.e. extending the disciplinary role, or at union resources for their own ends: but the least their role of social recuperation in the bottom line was still that of quite strong TU community). There does seem to be a tenden- beliefs. cy of unions pursuing a more “consumerist” But all these contradictions reflect the chang- role, looking after its people on all fronts - no ing role of the unions. why people obey the doubt, they would say, the better to integrate union today is because of its role as an eco- people back into the present system. Its differ- nomic provider: as a cheaper kind of building ent from the old German model of holiday

35 camps and trekking, in that the whole set up all, but the way they are pursuing it means is based upon private consumption, leisure that they could end up wrecking all kinds of and social services. The last thing the unions health care provision. could (or want to) do is bring people together At the present time all doctors and nurses are in a real physical closeness. trained within the NHS. With continual clo- At UCH the strikers never received strike pay sures of so many hospitals, including the best until after they had agreed to call off the teaching institutions, the effects are likely to strike. No doubt the accountants are instructed be catastrophic for health care in general. to keep money in the bank, making interest Private health care takes place mainly in NHS until the very last moment. Although nurses hospitals - so the BUPA alternative will be no are paid monthly, the porters are paid weekly solution. Being dependent on the NHS for and they were particularly hard hit during the facilities and staff training, it may crash with strike by the union’s mean approach. This it. The big increase in BUPA advertising is union strike pay sabotage is widespread: in just a sign of desperation. BUPA is now in 1988 striking civil servants in London never serious financial crisis - gone are its eighties received a penny until their thirteen week hey-days when, for a cheap rate, a BUPA sub- strike had come to an end. scription was lodged into many a middle All the measures listed above are a great form management contract. Now BUPA are desper- of blackmail - no wonder then that the unions ately revising their services and moving to a are now such superb organisers of constant position whereby those who are likely candi- and almost total defeat. But again, we can’t dates for any major illness can get lost/drop simply blame the bureaucrats for our own dead. failures - they thrive on our isolation and pas- But could we even expect a future total col- sivity - and their strength is based largely on lapse of BUPA to cause the government to what we let them get away with. pause and rethink its policies on health servic- es? What other country in Western world is Derailing a runaway train making such attacks on the general health of its population? The government recently If we look at the policies promoted by the began running a series of adverts in British Tory State in the last few years, it seems that medical journals c behalf of the United Arab increasingly they do not even serve the long Emirates government - the ads were aimed at term interests of the ruling class. The fast convincing thousands of NHS medical staff to money, free market “privatise everything that start a new career abroad working for much moves” ideology is like a runaway train mow- better wages in the UAE. The government has ing down anything in its path but having no announced that it plans to cut sick pay - clear idea of where its going. The destruction another attempt to force those who can afford of industrial manufacturing in favour of finan- it into private health insurance. And since the cial capital, the creation of a boom and then introduction of water meters in trial schemes bust property market, the lack of investment thousands of people who could not pay the in training for a skilled work force; these are much higher bills have been disconnected - all measures that have given them short term outbreaks of dysentery and other health prob- gains (at the expense of the working class) but lems have been caused by the rising cost of have inevitably created deeper problems as water (it is planned that water meters will they mature later on. The State is not capable soon be compulsory for all). It’s worth of planning logical long term strategy in its remembering that one of the main reasons own interests - only more cuts, more repres- better public sanitation was originally intro- sion. duced was because the diseases that devel- This short-sightedness is mirrored in the oped from the filthy slums of the 19th State’s plans for the health service. There is a Century showed no class prejudice and would strategy of wanting to destroy the popular eventually hit the richer parts of town. principle and tradition of free health care for It’s possible that there’s real disarray in the

36 ruling class; crudely put, a conflict between the financial year. So now everybody will ‘finance capitalists’ (who are blind to social have to wait six months for a free operation - consequences) and a more socially concerned and by then the queue will be so long they professional capitalist class. The finance capi- will probably use up the funds allocated for talist faction looking for a repeat of ’80s pri- the whole year in a month or so. So each year vatisation sell-off bonanzas - as they are also the queue will become more and more end- aware (rightly) that capitalism can never satis- less. This is one way of gradually introducing fy all the needs it creates. So they pursue cut- payment for treatment by the back door. back strate- To conclude: gies, with lit- the question tle regard for mark that the social con- hangs over sequences, the NHS, to almost taking be or not to a social be, raises a Darwinist number of position. On related mat- the other side ters which is a profes- can only be sional class hinted at which finds here. some sort of Can capital common overall dis- ground with pense with One Nation an NHS Tories. This given that faction is both powerful trying to chemical secure own companies sectional depend on interests State rev- (more money enues to for managers, administrators, professional underwrite their profitability? It was com- etc.) and appealing to a wider social consen- monplace in the 70s to argue against disman- sus around a program of managerial capital- tling the NHS on the aforementioned ground ism. They are, however, under-represented at as well as emphasising that taking a vast the top and exist as a middle management of amount of purchasing power (jobs) out of the the chaos. What they don’t appear to realise is economy would be a deflationary move that the system cannot fill all the needs they amounting to the suicidal. The Thatcherite have set themselves to manage - so they are in legacy is fully prepared to explode this piece a permanent state of frustration, and are of economic logic not by refuting the conclu- becoming somewhat deranged as a conse- sions but rather by accepting the conse- quence. quences. The most likely outcome of imposing the What part did war and war time play in the internal market will be a vastly reduced NHS setting up of the NHS, particularly in the need run as a skeleton service for those with no to have a fighting fit workforce able to wage other options, maybe with a sliding scale of war on capital’s behalf? Except locally, con- charges according to income. Already ventional warfare on a large scale is a thing of Leicester Health Authority is requiring people the past hence a further argument against an to pay for non-emergency operations since NHS, but an argument that would have been their annual budget ran out half-way through conducted behind closed doors. Undoubtedly,

37 however, the ideology of a “people’s war” from family and friends in a moment of real (1939-45) helped shape the comprehensive crisis. This example reflects the way in which nature of the NHS _ so today, its continued isolation accumulates in society at large - just existence is probably more of a political than seeming to happen - without anyone shoulder- an economic imperative with a political class ing responsibility or cold-bloodedly anticipat- using the issue to garner votes, especially ing the end result. But it suits capital’s needs from the ageing part of the population. It’s perfectly and a comparison with the practice conceivable a government could buy out a of moving prisoners away from familiar local- person’s right to free health care by offering a ities springs to mind. once-and-for-all cash payment This could It would be instructive to draw up a list of appeal to young, healthy people with no property magnates on the boards NHS trusts. money nor perspective on the future. Hospitals tend to occupy prime sights, and the The potential for political deception and conversion of St George’s Hospital at Hyde manipulation is enormous. A cull of the old Park Corner during the late ’70s and early and sick cannot be dismissed out of hand ’80s into a swish hotel ranks as a forerunner. though doubtless it would have to be left to Similarly, the Harrow Road hospital in west the “hidden hand” of market forces rather London was bulldozed and yuppie apartment than be achieved through mass execution. The prescrib- ing of inferior and cheaper medicine, and the withhold- ing of health care for people over a certain age not only underlines the economic bur- den of health care and the cost of an ageing population, but the problem of valorisa- tion of capital. A youthful workforce could be turned against the old and sick on the grounds that they act as a depressant on wages. All family social ties would have to be virtually sundered for this program of wrinkly- cleansing to have a chance of social success. The human consequences of the actual workings of the internal mar- ket are, however, a taste of things to come. On occasion, competing trusts award con- tracts to health authorities some hundreds of miles dis- tant. The Bradford Trust won the contract for Virginia Bottomley’s (Secretary of Ill- Health) constituency in the south of England, which means patients run the very real risk of being isolated

38 blocks constructed on the site overlooking the is witness to the determination to recreate all canal. By good fortune, the building company that was associated with yuppie culture. There and developer, Declan Kelly. became a victim is some recovery in commercial property but of the property crash and to this day the not enough to stop the majority of closed hos- wretched place has the air of a building site. pitals from being boarded up and left to await There is talk of converting Charing Cross the return of the roaring 80s and the stratos- Hospital into a hotel for senior staff at pheric property values. It could be the trusts Heathrow airport. It’s possible too that are biding their time and drawing some hope Withington hospital in south Manchester from the wave of privatisations sweeping could be used for similar purposes serving Europe. The majority of States - with France Ringway airport. Recently, St James’ and Italy in the lead - seek to expand by some University hospital in Leeds concluded a £25 20-30% the market capitalisation of Europe’s million deal with private developers over 13.5 largest stock markets. However, it’s not acres of their site. Doubtless it will be treated accompanied by fanfares as badly needed “proof” that the property of “popular capitalism” wheeler dealings of the to anything like the trusts do work, with same degree as under apologists eager to Thatcher. point out how the The increasingly deal will finance a precarious nature of new paediatric unit NHS schemes and a “ninety bed needs to be situat- patient ‘hotel’ for ed the multi- low intensity care nationalisation cases” - which does of the global hint that only private economy and patients will eventu- the reduced ally be welcome. significance Nor was any men- of nation tion made of a likely State as a bonus payable to pro-active trust managers. economic Leeds is however a force. special case and the Globalisation fact that land values is, however, have risen in Leeds fraught with has more to do with competing its runaway success interests and as a financial centre in this present able to challenge the phase the flow City of London in some of capital vastly respects (going on for half of all mortgages in outweighs flow of trade. Private insurance ties UK are lent by building societies based within in with the contemporary dominance of a thirty mile radius of Leeds). In Leeds too, finance capital so different from that Tony Clegg, the ex-chair of Mountleigh prop- described by Hilferding (basically as banker erty consortium, who pulled out just before its to industry). Its short-termism, money making financial potential nose-dived, is still chair of money, detracts from the goals of industrial Leeds General Infirmary trust after the pre- capitalism whose relationship with the nation liminary arrangements were put together by State is somewhat less ambivalent, needing the boss of Centaur Clothes store in Leeds. the State as a consumer, an enactor of labour The presence of property developers on trusts legislation and as an educator. The whole

39 issue however remains highly complex: e.g. sense primary care is better in France. Some money markets eagerly snap up treasury auc- attempt will be made to limit the amount of tions in credit worthy countries and therefore money spent on the French Health Service have a vested interest in maintaining a man- because it would appear that health spending ageable level of government overspend which in France is, in comparison to other countries, includes expenditure of health and social “out of control” (but doesn’t every govern- security. ment say the same thing???). In North America, feeble attempts have been The latest gimmick marking the end of free made in the last thirty years or so to limit the health care: bed pans, urine bottles, and vomit control of insurance companies over health bowls - made into fashion accessories by art care. Most recently, President Clinton wanted students and promoted by Vernacare of Bolton to reduce the role of insurance companies to who manufacture products for hospitals. Now 80% of health care costs by 1997/8; which Vernacare use these selfsame products to dec- shows just how tepid Hilary Clinton’s reforms orate hospital walls (as they await closure?). were before they completely collapsed. (It End-of-art shock tactics to shock people into took less than two years in Atlee’s post WWII awareness over the demise of free health reforming government for a “free” NHS to care? A likely story. Such shock tactics, now come into existence in Britain)(9). In the US, capitalised a million times over, are nothing it has been reckoned that the only institutional but a cynical promo by a business out to group interested in preserving the American secure its sales pitch in the plundering of hos- Health Service status quo are the huge insur- pital services. ance companies. Many powerful industrial conglomerates in the US want a form of NHS Some Further Reflections so as to ease the burden of medical insurance for their employees. Capitalist arguments are When comparing the different Health Services wheeled out in support of an American NHS in Europe and North America, economically along the lines of firms will become more the most important point to grasp is the internationally competitive freed of a medical weight accorded to insurance companies ver- insurance burden. Firms also seek to minimise sus the degree of state subsidy. In France, health insurance cover as part of cost cutting, each individual is charged for hospital treat- and such ploys have led to strikes such as the ment but up to 70% is then reimbursed by the Pittston miners’ strike of 1989. There is also a state - the rest is usually paid for by the current of opinion that the control of the Health Insurance deducted at source by your insurance companies in America is leading to employers. The Balladur government wants to a degree of inertia with doctors fearing writs increase the role of the insurance companies will be taken out charging them with medical and is meeting resistance both on behalf of negligence in case mishap. Compensation can the employees and the employers because it reach astronomical sums and lawyers love will add to the wages bill. It could also be pursuing medical claims (c/f “The Verdict”, used as an argument by employers to cut the Paul Newman film about a beat-up lawyer wages. Superficially, when comparing Britain pursuing a claim). The whole thing becomes a and France things look better here regarding never-ending spiral of increased premiums to treatment irrespective of ability to pay. In cover law suits, with the insurance companies France, each individual is charged a nominal the main beneficiaries isn’t this, more or less, sum for each day they spend in hospital but how it must be under finance capital; the final this money is refunded. Ideas along French “antediluvian form of capital” as Marx put it: lines have been floated in Britain but, at the is it possible to return health care to an earlier same time, doctors in France are given an more rational form of capital? All in all isn’t additional increment to their salaries every it the rough equation: health care funded time they see a patient So it is in their interest through equity culture - with the insurance to continually follow up patients and in that companies along with pension funds playing

40 big on the stock exchange???). went amongst the wounded soldiery of the There is another shady area - the amount Crimea inspecting BUPA cards by the light of spent on administration. In comparison to the the lamp before administering treatment? NHS in Britain, the ratio of administrative The position of the staff nurse with its faint cost was something percent here to twenty militaristic ring has been replaced by that of percent in America. The admin costs are the “ward manager” resonant of a business increasing dramatically in Britain as more and appointment. The “line manager” of an more accountants are being employed, partic- Accident and Emergency Department approx- ularly fund-holding GPs. In one estimate imates to that of an “assembly line manager” quoted by the Economist magazine, a former with patients substituting for the throughput personal director of the NHS, Eric Caines, has of cars. Terminally ill cancer patients receive calculated that it often takes seven a half chilling letters concerning their admission to weeks(!) worth of administration to deliver an hospital from “marketing managers.” It’s as if hour and half of care to patients. a fatal disease has become a marketable com- The importance of insurance companies in modity, something henceforth to be touted on relation to health care, and who also related to the market. A hospital closure is referred to as the tempo of class struggle, must be linked to a “market exit”, not to carry out a life saving notions of popular capitalism, equity culture operation is called a “budget under-spend”. and a recognition of the role of insurance This impenetrable language is redolent with companies in driving stock exchanges for- symbolist abstruseness - a stay in a hospital ward. Concomitant with casino capitalism, becomes an “episode in care” a sort of “après- beyond the risk-taking and rapacious short- midi d’un NHS” bizarrely evoked by the termism, is the notion that on an individual estranged wordsmiths of monetarism - whose level, a person takes full responsibility for the aim is not to concoct some ideal reality failure of capitalism; that one introjects and through a language torn from its functional moralises its desperate shortcomings; that its context - but to cover up the unspeakable. The failure is your failure. Not to be covered by circle closes: this inverted apocalypse of lan- private insurance is to be guilty even though guage is indebted to the euphemisms of its limitations are becoming painfully obvious modem warfare where to kill was to “termi- to more and more people (BUPA has recently nate with extreme prejudice” and where vil- removed several medical conditions from the lages were destroyed “in order to save them.” insurance cover, such as Alzheimer’s The closing down of the NHS, i.e. its privati- Disease). demand “free medicine” is tanta- sation, inevitably forms part of the Tory gov- mount to being a fraudster, to want “some- ernment’s privatisation program. However, thing for nothing” and hence an aspect of the economic context and the circumstances “welfarism” to be bracketed alongside dole of class struggle in which the first privatisa- scroungers, single parents, travellers and, as tions took place and today’s projected privati- the net expands, the ‘sick’ and people on State sations are very different. Privatisation, begin- pensions. Amid the hysteria over the public ning with British Telecom, was an ad-hoc sector borrowing requirement, it’s forgotten strategy. The foot-dragging “consensus” prop- that an individual’s State health insurance ping up subsequent privatisations was largely contribution is exactly that of BUPA assuming manufactured through economic sweeteners. that the individual is employed. And what is The State crudely rigged “market” price, and forgotten as the welfare blitz shows no sign of sections of the working class throughout the abating is that one aspect of modem wel- ’80s were able to get in on asset inflation. farism, as expressed within the NHS, grew However, other than insurance companies, no out of the armies of Empire and, secondly, the one will get rich out of the pnvatisation of the need for the bourgeoisie to protect themselves NHS. Such a thing literally tramples into dust from cholera epidemics etc. through general any notion of a share owning democracy and environmental improvements. Does Mrs. a popular capitalism, because all the money Bottomley seriously believe Flo Nightingale goes straight to the fat cats as private insur-

41 ance schemes are taken up. “Popular” inter- recuperation of the everyday is very visible. mediaries are dispensed with who, in previous (This recuperation is not merely carried out in privatisations, would sell their shares to insti- terms of an idealised healthy person - it also tutions in order to make a quick buck. The carries a political meaning:- the restoration of privatisation of the NHS brutally emphasises the power of the status quo). Hospital wards the concentration of capital, not its pretended at times come to resemble a homely sitting democratisation. Misguided individuals may room with visitors sitting on beds, portable beef about waste in the NHS - the enormous TVs flickering, music blaring, easy chairs at amounts of food surplus to requirements dis- random. Nurses are far less starchy and doc- posed of everyday is still a familiar complaint tors and consultants are not so sniffy. - but there isn’t even the shreds of a consen- Belatedly the trauma of a stay in hospital has sus supporting the dismantling of the NHS. been recognised and a patient seen to have The mass of people, including middle class human and emotional needs. At the same time professionals, have been bludgeoned into the gain in informality cannot cover up the accepting it and behind every hospital closure, dust collecting in corners, the stains, the peel- in the not too distant past, is the defeat of sec- ing paint, the dilapidated state of the premis- tion after section of the working class fighting es, the clapped out beds. In fact the informali- to the death in isolation. True, criticisms of ty has developed alongside reductions in staff the formerly “fully operational” NHS were levels. It is as if recuperation has been permit- broad and manifold, but the ease and speed ted to exist with the proviso that everything with which it is being dismantled is different will shortly be gone - doctors, nurses, ancil- from the “willingness” of factory workers to lary staff, equipment, even the bricks and accept redundancy and closure previously. mortar. Here, to kill is to cure. Waiting lists Then there was an element of gladness to are abolished by closing all hospitals in an have done with alienated labour - now the insanity which knows no bounds, and strikes attitude is one of resignation and the feeling are abolished by shutting down industry. all protest is hopeless. The public’s attitude is There are a myriad of other matters one could not one of “medical nemesis” - the actual glance on. The misery of doctors enveloped in shortening of life through too much medical a world of serial sickness, endlessly seeing interference - but the aghast realisation one one patient after another, their loneliness, self- could literally be left to die in the not too dis- doubt and recrimination resulting in break- tant future. Whatever the future of the NHS - down; disastrous love lives often leading and a nurse in the UCH occupation did ask them in middle age to pounce upon the first for alternative ideas on the NHS to make it available member of the opposite sex. And more appealing - any renationalisation of then there are the drug company reps that health care must necessarily involve re-regu- prey on doctors, offering inducements like lation and a hands on approach in other holidays in the sun, to demonstrate the virtues spheres as well, like, for instance, the stamp- of some new supadrug - their stylish clothing, ing out of currency speculation favoured by large salaries, persuasive selling techniques more rational capitalists out of which insur- and at the end of the day nothing but the sting ance companies along with bank, pension and of conscience and alcohol. investment funds can do very well. Instead of And why haven’t doctors, consultants and a minimalist State, more of a maximalist State hospital administrators laid bare their profes- - all of which evades the vexed question of an sional unhappiness and told it like it was? autonomous medicine going beyond the rap- This failing they share in common with most idly fading institutions of the NHS. No matter other professional people who similarly main- how airy fairy such a notion now seems, the tain a vow of silence, leaving the rest of us to realisation of the good life through try and do it for them. It is noteworthy that Dr autonomous class struggle is inseparable from Chris Pallis of ‘Solidarity’ - a member of one good health. of the best revolutionary groups/magazines of Both in psychiatry and general health care the the 60s - never voiced his unease at being a

42 top consultant, as though clinical practice was form and content of the trusts, making them immune from the vicissitudes of class strug- more publicly acceptable (perhaps doing gle. When he came to write on the NHS, he away with the two-tier system and GP fund- used it as a vehicle to demonstrate the holding practices?), but any real rebellion Cardanite thesis of ever increasing bureaucra- from below concerning wages, staffing levels, cy. And where NHS staff have written from etc., will the direction of health care, some the eye of the storm it has tended to come Leeds health workers asked John Battle - a from within a Trotskyist perspective (e.g. Leeds Labour MP and Labour left winger - if ‘Memoirs of a Callous Picket’ written by the Party on coming to power would abolish Jonathan Neale, an SWP ancillary worker the trusts. Battle looked as though he’d swal- (Pluto Press, 1983) and Dave Widgery’s lowed a bee accusing them of being wreckers account ‘Some Lives’ of what it was like to be destroying the Health Service - and this at a a GP in a poverty stricken East London bor- time when the same health workers were daily ough), Only recently have more autonomous facing the new brutalism of trust manage- critiques started to appear, and let’s hope ment... Is this the shape of things to come? we’ll see a lot more of them when things real- ly start to come to the boil... Unfortunately, most people (and with all the so-called ‘reforms’ the num- bers grow by the minute) still have some kind of faith that the Labour Party, once in power, is going to ride into the fray on a white charger and clear up the mess, bringing about free health care, building hospitals everywhere. Don’t believe it. Basically, they are going to take over the ‘reforms’ managing the ‘unaccountable’ trusts with a phalanx of the their own person- nel. After all, it was ad hoc Labour Party initiatives (pretending to be grass roots and independent) on urban regeneration and single issues in the 60s and 70s that brought to prominence the para_state (as it was then known) which became the precursors of the now noto- rious and much more pow- erful (lucratively funded) quangos, staffed with failed government cadres. Obviously, the Labour Party Stickers produced by the UCH will change to some degree the Occupation Committee

43 Appendix Its not surprising this article was left out of the magazine: it wouldn’t have sat very well next to Shortly after the first occupation ended, one of their claims of not being vanguardist. These sen- the occupiers, who is a member of Wildcat (a timents, plus Wildcat’s own usual obsession with ‘revolutionary journal’) wrote an article about “the division between politically conscious peo- the events (“Managers and unions act in unison” ple... and the masses” were echoed by other - by “RB”). The article was originally intended statements in their UCH article. to be published in the next issue (no.17) of “If the working class can be led into socialism, Wildcat but in the end it was left out. The article then they can just as easily be led out of it is quite critical of the occupiers and our failures again.” - Eugene Debs - and there’s nothing wrong with that, except For us, we hate the left because their tactics that unfortunately most of the criticism is based always seek to destroy the subversive, on a misunderstanding of the real facts of the sit- autonomous content of struggles - and without uation. But never mind about that - we respond that content the struggle is headed for defeat. to a more important point of view in the article, But for Wildcat it seems that the left is a prob- concerning the question of organisation. lem simply because their ideas and long term In Wildcat no.17 several pages were devoted to goals are wrong: they want to use similar tactics the journal defending it against accusations from towards different ends. We know that the left’s others that they are vanguardists; that is, that influence on struggles often alienates, drains and they believe the working class is in need of their demoralises people who have to deal with their political leadership. Wildcat, who are neither manipulations - but RB obviously thinks it’s not Leninists or anarchists but call themselves (anti- important if the mass of the working class has a State) communists, say in their defence, “the relationship to its own struggles similar to that most vehement anti-Leninists usually share many of a passive TV viewer to their set - as long as of the conceptions of Leninism. In particular they can be prodded and made to act in a pre- they share an obsession with the division scribed way the “politically advanced” can win between politically conscious people (such as struggles by their domination. This is a logic themselves) and the masses. They see the central shared by trade unionists, the SWP and political question as being how the former relate to the specialists in general. latter. Do they lead them organisationally? We know that the leftist party machines always (Leninism); do they lead them on the plane of have a separate hidden agenda to pursue in ideas? (Anarchism); do they refuse to lead struggles - recruitment, self-publicity, etc., and them? (councilism)... They assume that everyone they believe they are the necessary vanguard that else is obsessed with the question as well: must lead the masses. It seems that RB would ‘Wildcat have evidently found that their ideas like to be the ultra leftist vanguard that outflanks and attitudes little impact on the mass of work- the left - instead of a rigid party machine, a ers around them...’ Who do they think we are - more fluid structure of ultra leftist militants the SWP?” Now contrast this with their state- dominating struggles, like “invisible pilots at the ments in their article about the UCH occupation: centre of the storm.” Wildcat often say they are “We should have set up an occupation commit- against democracy, partly because it submits all tee, and tried to ensure its domination by the activity to the will of a majority. But to counter more politically advanced people involved, in this by seeking to submit all activity to the will other words, by ourselves.” This hard-talk after of a “politically advanced” minority is no solu- the event is a mask for an inability to transcend tion at all. the limits of the situation any more than anyone RB rightly says that the SWP managed to else. In fact, RB waited until after the strikers “destroy the atmosphere of the occupation, an were forced back to work by Unison before dis- intangible but important thing” - one wonders tributing to some of them Wildcat’s “Outside what kind of appealing atmosphere his plans for and Against the Unions” pamphlet - again copy- an occupation dominated by the politically ing the ‘I-told-you-so’ arrogant attitude of the advanced would create? leftists. 44 Songs from the UCH 2. To the tune of “Daisy, Daisy”: (by Jean) occupation Marshal, Marshal, give in your notice, do, We’re quite crazy, ‘cos of the likes of you, 1. To the tune of “John Brown’s Body” You’re too busy protecting your purses, When you should be supporting your nurses, Verse 1 Resign - resign - you waste of time, The crisis at the UCH is looking very grave, And the rest of your management too. They want to close the hospital for the pen- Unison, Unison, give us your answer, do, nies it will save, We’re quite crazy, ‘cos of the likes of you, But we won’t forget the union for the support If you won’t back the hospital strike, they never gave, You’d better get on your bike, When they would not back the strike. Get real, get real, or else you’ll feel, Chorus Some action directed at you. Un-i-son sold out the nurses Un-i-son sold out the nurses ••••• Un-i-son sold out the nurses ‘Cos that’s what scum they are. 3. To the tune of “My old man said follow the van”: Verse 2 Now Marshal down in management is looking Unison said, “We’ll back your strike, very smug, And we won’t dilly dally with your pay,” But when he dealt with nurses he was acting But six weeks later they withdrew support, like a thug, Poor old nurses were well and truly caught, If he thinks he’ll get away with that, then he Then they dillied and dallied must be a mug, Dallied and they dillied, ‘Cos he cannot blackmail us. Done some deals with Marshal on the way, Now they can’t trust the union, Chorus 2 Not to stitch them up, Marshal blackmailed all the nurses Or blackmail them to stay. Marshal blackmailed all the nurses Marshal blackmailed all the nurses ======‘Cos that’s the scum he is. Dedicated (2006) to Jean Blache, RIP, Verse 3 Beattie, RIP, and to all others who also par- Now its up to the people, to do what we think ticipated in the UCH struggle. right, Nothing’s going to close again without a ======bloody fight, If we have to occupy, we’ll be there day and night, For we shall not give in.

Chorus 3 UCH is for the people UCH is for the people UCH is for the people So we’re going to take it back.

•••••-

45 Footnotes to ‘Occupational control - just as some nurses were about to march off without waiting for their orders. At the end of Therapy’ this march nurses and others continued past the rally to block Victoria Embankment The cops 1) This may have been the first occupation of a were willing to stop the traffic but the branch general hospital, but there are other incidences stewards called everyone back to listen to boring worthy of a mention. The women’s hospital, the Frank Dobson MP with the excuse that the union Elizabeth Garret Anderson, close by UCH, was had threatened to drop support for any future the scene of a long and successful work-in in the actions. mid to late 70s, and it would be worth getting together some of the real analysis of that struggle. 4) Other people who we met much later on, after Also, Thornton View nursing home in Bradford the occupation, and who had been to some of the was occupied during 1984/5 when faced with clo- very early UCH rallies and seen large numbers of sure. The strike lasted marginally longer than the SWerPs drafted in to attend them - they also miners’ strike taking place at the same time. assumed that the occupation was merely another Leaflets given out by the strikers constantly called SWP publicity stunt, and so not worth getting for an open picket but despite this, health care involved in. wasn’t revolutionised by the occupation: a nurs- ing officer continued to visit to keep an eye on 5) There was one nice guy, an SWP member who the nursing, and strict divisions were maintained had been in the occupation since the beginning, between staff, patients and general public - who felt the same way as the rest of us about the although this is a very difficult problem in such a Party hacks coming in and spoiling things - he life or death situation. The occupation was brutal- walked off in disgust saying he was finished with ly broken at night just after the miners’ strike was the Party. finished off. Worse than that, it was also done in a snow storm and allegedly one or two patients died 6) For a good examination of the SWP’s crass after the ordeal. Also, in 1979, there had been an opportunism see Carry On Recruiting! by occupation of a geriatric community hospital in Trotwatch; AK Press and Trotwatch 1993. Oxon. (past tense note: there were alot more than that... 7) We were also able to get some strikers (includ- see below in this dossier...) ing even one or two of the more open minded SWerPs) to question how relationships between 2) A nurse from Yorkshire isn’t so sure about this them and us, health workers and health users, and likens the managers he’s come across as hav- between different kinds of groups, etc., could ing some sort of Christian Fundamentalist look work better. about them and seem to act from a conviction that is quite crazy. Some of the courses they go on 8) For more information on Wellcome, see Dirty operate very much like “psychobabble cults” cre- Medicine by Martin Walker; available from ating in the manager a personal dependence on Slingshot Publications, BM Box 8314, London the managerial culture to the extent that breaking WC1N 3XX price £15 (729 pages). This book is with it summons up imaginings of self-annihila- sub-titled “Science, Big Business and the assault tion. on Natural Health Care” and describes the harassment, persecution and dirty tricks used 3) On one occasion a rally was led indoors for a against those who seek to offer alternative health “meeting” (in fact a speech from a UCH union treatments that could challenge the domination of branch secretary - a SWerP who was not on industrial-medical giants like Wellcome. The per- strike) ensuring that the march started in an order- secuted have included those who come from ly way and ended up in a nice quiet rally with a orthodox medical backgrounds and also those variety of SWP speakers. For a later one, large patients who have received effective treatment enough to be interesting, the union had a car after conventional drug-based medicine had given ready which drove through to the front to take up on them. It also details the scandals surround

46 ing the introduction of the “anti-AIDS” drug plistic in the long run. We must fight for what we AZT, its lack of proper testing and the dubious have plus a whole lot more, but eventually we claims made for it. (One criticism of the book is have to ask: what kind of free health care do we that it misses out the complexities and strengths need and how do we get it? The often toxic and of the struggles by AIDS activists in the USA. dangerous, profit motivated production line treat- See for example Larry Kramer’s Reports From ment promoted by the scientific-medical estab- the Holocaust.) It reveals the systematic attacks lishment is mainly concerned with the mainte- and slanders made on the producers of health nance of people to keep them functioning as effi- foods, vitamin supplements and alternative treat- cient, productive members of capitalist society. ments, very often orchestrated by those directly or This has nothing to do with healthy living. The indirectly in the pay of the processed food indus- book Dirty Medicine is highly recommended. try and drug companies. (Duncan Campbell, the investigative “journalist”, although not with any 9)Although it was the Labour Party that brought obvious financial interest, has been particularly in the NHS, it was originally the idea of active in these shady activities). Wellcome, with Beveridge, a Liberal and an extension of the post- their extensive contacts amongst the British ruling 1906 Liberal government’s introduction of health elite, dominate medical education and research insurance. Moreover, Bevan, Atlee’s Health here - and therefore have a very strong influence Minister, did a deal with the pro-Tory British on the functioning of the NHS and the nature of Medical Association to retain private patients and its treatment. The author has recently said that private beds within NHS hospitals. Bevan said “I “Although, as a socialist, I am committed to the stuffed their mouths with gold”: doctors were now NHS, I’m also in favour of choice and I know that being paid for work they’d done in the voluntary for many of our present-day illnesses, drugs can- hospitals for free, plus they kept the fees for their not be the answer” (Evening Standard, l4/2/94). private work. And this has been the basis for the Reading his book has only reinforced our feelings more fully fledged two-tier system we have today. that the slogan “Defend the NHS” is far too sim-

“Occupational Therapy’ was originally published as a pamphlet in 1995.

University College Hospital moved to a brand new Private Finance Initiative building on the corner of Euston Road and Gower Street, in 2005. The old Cruciform building was sold back to UCL and now houses the University’s pre-clinical training and a Biomedical Research Institute.

47 Some other hospital occupations in the UK...

Some accounts are obviously very brief. Also These accounts do reflect a more straightfor- we have limited its scope arbitrarily to the ward trade union outlook, which experience UK; further experiences from other places, (and reading the UCH AND SLWH texts) sug- other times, maybe next time... gests may cover a more complex reality. But Much of this information was lifted from in contrast to these accounts, the occupations sources from various trade unions; most of it listed here were overwhelmingly ‘work-in’ had been copied from leaflets, press releases, types organised through the union structures, reports etc from the time; as a result it is very albeit sometimes at the grassroots without sketchy. Sometimes there isn’t even a record of always bureaucratic support. how the struggle ended. The reports also con- We intend to produce further, and more tain little analysis, or any of the day to day detailed, editions of this publication, and so details that make the two longer preceding would be very much interested to hear longer texts more useful and interesting (though these accounts of any of the events listed below, or two emerge from a scene used to setting down any other occupations/work-ins. our experiences, with all their contradictions.

Rainhill Asylum Radcliffe Asylum, Nottingham 1913: ‘The Great Porridge Strike’... Not so April 1922: ‘The Battle of Radcliffe’ much an occupation as a (very) brief strike, NAWU members were also involved in the but included here anyway. strike action/occupation at the Radcliffe Rainhill Asylum, in Liverpool, had opened in Asylum, Nottinghamshire. The visiting com- 1851, as a progressive institution for the treat- mittee of the Nottinghamshire County Mental ment of “the insane”... The staff often worked Hospital at Radcliffe-on-Trent, announced on an 80 hour week which was thought to be fair 10 February 1922, that it was cutting the by the authorities because many duties were wages of the staff and reducing the amount of light, for example supervising recreational time off-duty. This had the effect of increas- activities like cricket and football. Free food ing the hours of work to above the agreed 60 was provided during working hours and there- hours. The union was determined to take a fore any deterioration in the quality of food stand over the issue and at a meeting of the was regarded as a wage cut. When a new strike committee held “at Mrs Foulds, Bolton menu replaced meat with oatmeal porridge on Terrace, Radcliffe... on the 10th April 1922 at 6 April 1913, 35 nurses and attendants refused 7p.m. after lengthy discussion, it was unani- to eat the porridge, to return to the wards or, mously resolved that strike action be taken indeed, to leave the breakfast room. By mid- the next morning in the female side of the morning the strike had spread throughout the asylum.” The female nurses occupied the asylum. At mid-day the Medical wards the following day. The men were taken Superintendent, Dr. Cowan, agreed to revise aback by the women’s militancy and, follow- the diet sheets. The strike was a success but ing a meeting that evening, joined them the they were later made to apologise or face dis- next day. The authorities responded by sack- ciplinary action. The workers were mainly ing the strikers and they were only offered re- members of the then National Association of employment if they signed a new undertaking Asylum Workers (NAWU), but the union’s declaring that they would “carry out the executive regarded the strike to be “sponta- instructions of the Committee and obey the neous and unofficial and did not entirely meet officers.., to put their orders into operation.” with the executive council’s approval.” All the females and most of the men refused

48 to sign and the occupation of the wards con- had placed pickets around the building and tinued. The union officials were not allowed then went off to the Nottingham race meeting. into the asylum grounds, so contact with them Not surprisingly, the NAWU took this accusa- and the strikers was very difficult. They were tion very seriously. The executive committee at the “outskirts of the asylum, watching the demanded that the “Union officials and mem- developments through field glasses.” The end bers of the Strike Committee implicated, take of the strike came on Thursday 12 April: such action as may be necessary... to disprove strike-breaking artisans and a force of bailiffs the allegations... Failing which they may be and plain-clothes policemen were hired by the suspended from office.” The union must have medical committee to evict the occupiers by been satisfied with the explanation of those force. Afrer a four-hour physical battle, the accused, because they decided to instigate strikers had to give in. The strike committee libel proceedings against the newspaper over report summed events up as follows: “On this allegation. The action was settled out of Thursday evening.., the members of the court and the Daily News agreed to “publish Union on strike were ejected from the institu- an apology and pay 150 guineas towards the tion by force. The Committee resolved that all costs.” strikers, be granted maintenance at the rate of 30/- per week, until they obtain other work.” After these two struggles, which took more of The Nursing Times and the Royal College of the character of strikes to gain specific ends, Nursing came down against the strikers; but we know of no other occupations of hospitals there was also a question as to whether the until the 1970s. This doesn’t mean that there NAWU had gi ven the strikers full support. weren’t any... The Daily News reported that union officials

The 1970s-80s as units within general hospitals.

The seventies in Britain saw the first wave of Obviously these closures and mergers not cutbacks in the National Health Service, car- only took many services further from the com- ried out initially by the Tories, then continued munities they served (or abolished these pro- through the 1974 Labour government. As part visions altogether), but also lead to job loss- of this policy, many small hospitals were es. But it didn’t take place without resistance: closed, services shifted and generally cen- there were a succession of occupations and tralised in fewer locations. one aspect of this work-ins all hospitals over the UK. We’ve was a decision taken to close specialist included all the information we could find so maternity hospitals and re-locate the services far on the following. Elizabeth Garret Anderson (Central South London Weir Hospital (Balham) London), Work-In 1976 November 1976 - 1978 This maternity hospital was closed in 1977... (See Rosanne’s brief account of this above... At some point prior to closure there was More info would be good on this seminal apparently an occupation; we have no more struggle however... especially some first hand info yet... accounts of workers involved... if anyone knows of any...)

49 Cane Hill Hospital, Surrey, Sit-In, agreement before staff were moved; proposals 18-21 August 1976 for local consultation procedures; and improvements in the pay system. From 18 to 21 August, staff at the Cane Hill When this was put to a mass meeting of Cane psychiatric hospital in Coulsdon, Surrey, pro- Hill staff, there was a narrow majority in vided emergency service only. After four days favour of calling off the industrial action. they won a ‘We would concession, have backed a that 40 addi- strike all the tional nurses way,’ says would be COHSE hired - ten branch chair- for each day person W of action. Glynne With laundry John.‘We want and linen two hundred rooms shut, Cane Hill workers holding a meeting more nursing no domestic staff across the services, and no occupational or industrial psychiatric division, and if the discussions the therapy, many staff were in effect sitting-in. AHA has now agreed to hold do not result in Care of patients was restricted to their basic a big improvement, we will seriously consider physical needs, with a total ban on new further action.‘The staffing situation in the admissions. Drivers were available for emer- whole of the area and region is scandalous,’ gency duties only. Glynne adds, ‘and we are now looking to After at first refusing to even discuss Cane action at this level.’ Hill’s chronic under-staffing, Bromley AHA’s eventual offer of more nurses for the hospital Neighbouring Surrey Area Health Authority was forced up to 40 at a meeting on 21 had appealed the previous March for August - steps were also to be taken to fill £2,250,000 for desperately needed psychiatric vacant posts for unqualified staff. The four staff. Instead, its budget had been cut by £2 days’ action also resulted in: full information million. on staffing establishment and costs; prior

South Middlesex (Isleworth, West Plaistow Maternity Hospital, East London) London 1977 Closed in 1977 (after an occupation). A 2 wards occupied here... No more info. planned march against hospital closures in East London arranged by Plaistow Hospital Hounslow Hospital, West London Campaign in March 1978 was banned by the March 1977- October 1979 police due to their nervousness after riotous See Rosanne’s account of this work-in, in the events during an anti-fascist mobilisation prelude to the South London Women’s against a National Front march in Lewisham Hospital occupation, above. in 1977...

Aberdare Hospital, South Wales c. 1977/8? Apparently there was an eight-week occupa- tion here sometime in this period.

50 Bethnal Green Hospital, East London 1st July 1978-December 1978

The Bethnal Green Hospital in East London served the local population as a community hospital valued for its continuity of care and accessibility to local residents. Hospital staff at Bethnal Green were told in October 1977 that the local Area Health Authority wanted to reduce services at the hospital to just care of the elderly. A campaign was mounted to safe- guard its future. The hospital was still work- ing to capacity, and its patients would have nowhere to go if its facilities were withdrawn, except to extend already over-long waiting lists. A Tower Hamlets Action Committee was established with over 700 people attending Emergency Bed Service (EBS) to guarantee the first meeting held on 24th November admissions and safety. The first hospital casu- 1977. The campaign included support from alty work-in in history began, with patients GPs, regular picketing of the hospital, huge arriving at 8:02. meetings and strikes and stoppages across East London... Meanwhile, the staff decided The only people to move out of the hospital to ‘occupy’ the hospital. were the administrators. Doctors, nurses and other staff continued to perform their duties, GP’s continued to refer patients, locals continued to attend the casualty department and ambulance drivers con- tinued to respond to emergency calls. While patients remained at the hospital, the health authority had a duty to pay staff salaries - and so the occupation took effect.

On the 30th July managers arrived at the hospital threatening staff with legal action, nursing staff instruct under threat of dismissal to move, medical staff who refuse to do so were 1st July 1978 at 8pm ,the time of the official "harangued" and threatened. The Bethnal closure, the hospital staff, applauded by a Green Hospital work-in was called off on large crowd of local people and filmed by the 30th July 1978 having treated over one thou- News at Ten (ITV) put up a notice announc- sand local patients. ing the occupation of the casualty unit at In the end however, the surgical beds closed Bethnal Green hospital. Detailed arrange- in 1978 and the remaining medical beds in ments are made with medical staff, GP's , the 1979.

51 St Benedict's Hospital, Tooting, South Women’s Hospital occupation (see Rosanne’s London. account) and was later a mainstay of the anti- November 1979- September 1980 poll tax campaign in Wandsworth, being jailed for non-payment of the poll tax. The staff at St Benedict's began their official The success of the Work-in led management work-in to prevent closure of their hospital on (with the agreement of Patrick Jenkin, secre- tary of state for Health and Social Security) to resort to intimidation, confrontation and violence to break the staff and campaign organisation, and force closure of the hospital.

Wandsworth,Sutton and East Merton Area Health Authority (AHA) took legal action, serving injunctions against eight leading members of the work-in. This included 4 staff members (from COHSE, NUPE and the RCN), 3 union officials (NUPE and COHSE) and 1 local campaigner. The injunctions prevented those named from doing any thing to pre- vent the removal of patients and to prevent the union-officials from entering the building. For six days in mid-September St Benedict’s: pickets blocking the gates... 1980, the Hospital was raided, and patients moved out, by force by the November 15th 1979. A strong support com- AHA, backed by a large force of police and a mittee was organised in the local community scab private ambulance company, Junesco. with backing from Battersea and Wandsworth Under the new Employment Act, the police Trades Council, local pensioners and others were able to impose an arbitrary limit of two who wanted to maintain the high level of geri- pickets on picket lines outside St Benedict's. atric care at St Ben’s. Local London Ambulance Service ambulance drivers pledged their support and refused to cross the picket line except for normal transport. “We could have gone on for ever” recalled leading light of the occupation, COHSE dele- gate Arthur Hautot, “They had to end the occupation because we were doing the work better and so much cheaper.” Also involved in the occupation, on a daily basis, was Ernest Rodker, who was later a sup- porter of the South London ... and getting nicked as the Hospital is raided. 52 St Benedict's (continued) ranging from wilful obstruction to criminal damages. One woman who worked in admin Then on the fourth day of the raids, they at a nearby hospital was suspended from duty, refused to allow any pickets on the gate at all, although she was at the picket line on her day and the private ambulances got through. off. By September 19th, sixty three patients had After the closure of the long stay geriatric been forcibly removed from the friendly secu- hospitals, reports began to emerge of the dev- rity of their beds and wards and dispersed in astating impact on patient care of "relocation chaos to a variety of other hospitals in the effects" - the impact of speedy closures on area. patients. Close to a third of patients forcibly Twenty-three pickets were arrested during the moved in the "raids" on St Benedict’s died raids, and charged with a number of offences, within the following six months.

Etwall Hospital, Derbyshire NUPE, told the Derby Telegraph: "The December 1979 - March 1980 gloves are off and if we have to fight for 15 rounds, so be it." In 1979 the Derbyshire Area Health He said a lot of thought had gone into the Authority took the hugely unpopular decision work-in. "At the end of the day, we will prove to close Etwall Hospital temporarily from that it can be run more effectively by the February 1980, as it headed towards an esti- action committee than by the bureaucrats." mated overspend of £1.4m. It said the move He added: "We were shocked to think the would save £300,000. It hoped to re-open the area health authority would not take notice unit in early 1981. of 15,000 signatures." But hospital workers, patients and villagers Miss Cook said: "As long as we have got were determined to keep the 94-bed rehabili- patients, the hospital staff will continue to tation centre open. look after them as normal. We are relying on The hospital, which started life as an isola- doctors who said they would back us to keep tion unit in 1902, was, by 1979, a prestigious us supplied with patients." rehabilitation centre run by a skilled and ded- She added that they had also asked for sup- icated team of staff. It was pre-eminent in the port from ambulancemen who they hoped Midlands as a centre for particularly badly would not transfer patients to other units. disabled patients, the young chronic sick and By Christmas Eve action group members geriatric patients, and the terminally ill, and were staging a vigil at the hospital gates in a people recovering from accidents and serious bid to block patient transfers. Group operations. It was feared that its closure spokesman Win Connor told the Telegraph: would have a dramatic effect on already "Our intention is to ask people entering the hard-pressed facilities in the rest of the coun- hospital their business to prevent patients ty. being moved for the sole reason of emptying The Etwall Community Action Group, beds and not for their medical benefit." formed during a public meeting at the start of The fighting spirit of the 45 remaining staff December, focussed the opposition of and their legions of supporters saw them patients, local people and staff at the hospi- launching 24-hour picket lines and the health tal. authority's original closure date of the end of On December 10th, after the health authority February passed without incident. rubber-stamped its temporary closure deci- But, on March 21, the campaign was finally sion, the staff began a work-in at Etwall. lost when ambulances, with police escort, in They formed a 15-strong management com- a surprise raid, removed the final few mittee (chaired by nursing officer Heather patients. Cook) which took over running the hospital. Nicked from the Derby Telegraph, 4th Jim Taylor, area officer for health union October 2013

53 St George's (Hyde Park) Princess Mary Hospital January 1980 (no idea where this is...!?) February-April 1980

Longworth Hospital, Oxfordshire. “The AHA have lost all control of the hospi- December 1980 - February 1981 tal”; he also claimed a RCN steward at the hospital had been transferred to another hos- In early December 1980 a brave fight was pital “because the AHA cannot guarantee waged by COHSE nurses and NHS staff to her safety” keep open this 50 bed-hospital specialising in care of the elderly in rural Oxfordshire. However the occupation was a brief one, In Faced with immediate closure of 13 beds on early February (possibly Tuesday 10th?) the top floor of the hospital, staff knew it 1981, in a surprise raid by management, the would only be a matter of time before the vulnerable patients were removed from the rest of the hospital would be closed and the hospital by force and moved to the Churchill patients transferred to Whitney hospital eight Hospital. Police sealed off roads around the miles away hospital to prevent supporters defending the So with help from Oxford Trades Union hospital. Council the hospital was Many of the occupied by frail elderly the eighty patients, now nursing and seriously dis- support staff. orientated, did Assistant not survive COHSE many weeks Steward Myra after they Bungay stated were ripped to the Health from their Service homes and Journal: familiar staff “We’re fight- (a process ing for the life later known as of the hospital...... Most of the patients have the ‘relocation effect’). been here a long time and Longworth is now The Area Health authority claimed it had home to them” raided the hospital because COHSE nurses Ambulancemen refused to remove patients refused to call off the work-in from the hospital, vitally strengthening the Ernie Brook COHSE Regional Officer stated occupation. “The Area Health Authority gave verbal assurances it would retain the beds for the Typically the Royal College of Nursing next three or four years, when I went to (RCN) General Secretary Catherine Hall receive its written assurance of the agree- condemned the action demanding that the ment, this sticking point was not included”. “Management regain control of the hospital for the sake of nurses and patients”. Local Longworth Hospital closed soon after the RCN Regional Officer Bill Reynolds said: occupation.

54 St Mary’s Hospital, Harrow Road, the effects of the run down of the Casualty at West London, Harrow Road (the major accident unit in the 26th June 1981 - ? some time later that District) and pointed out that the remaining year casualty facilities in the District would be inadequate to cope with the number of casual- In 1981, 400 staff at the Harrow Road site of ties which could easily arise in an accident at St Mary’s Hospital, in West London (which the nearby Paddington Station or in a major served the Paddington and Kilburn area) fire. Three wards had already been closed by decided to organise an occupation and work- then. in to try to prevent the closure of several departments. Police and security guards were brought into St. Mary's had been under threat for the pre- the hospital at least four times to support ceding four years; only the vigorous opposi- management's plans. A TGWU shop steward tion of the staff had prevented its total clo- was sacked, and a nurse was suspended for a sure. Rheumatology and Rehabilitation wards week, for attempting to prevent the forcible only opened in 1977 (the first in the District) removal of patients from a ward. had been shut in 1979, when the first serious At least one report claimed that “Throughout financial cuts affected the NHS. this struggle no more than token support has In 1981 the Hospital had been gained 431 beds, but the Area from the Health Authority decided unions that there were too many involved- acute beds in the District, TGWU, and that the service would NUPE, be concentrated at the COHSE and Praed Street site and at St the failure of Charles’ Hospital. the labour Threatened with the imme- movement to diate loss of the Casualty evolve its own Department and 100 beds, strategy on and eventual closure, (with health care surviving services to be has been par- moved to the prestigious tially respon- St. Mary's Teaching sible for this Hospital in Paddington), state of staff declared a work-in on affairs... The June 26 1981. In the leadership of course of this workers the TGWU - twice occupied areas of the which has hospital—the first time the been most administration offices were centrally occupied for 13 days, and involved in the second time a ward the struggle - was occupied for five days, has effectively to prevent its closure. On washed its both occasions court orders hands of any were used to evict the responsibility. occupiers. Despite poli- At a press conference in December 1981, cy won at the 1981 BDC it has consistently Terry Pettifor, NW Convenor of the London refused to mobilise its great industrial Ambulance Service Shop Stewards, described strength behind this key battle.”

55 St Mary’s (continued) beds. The Hospital was due to be closed once Phase 1 of the rebuilding of its mother hospi- Several trades unionists active in resisting the tal in Praed Street was completed but, due to closure of St Mary’s were targetted, vic- financial pressures, it closed prematurely. The timised and sacked by wards finally closed on management... Rita 22nd November. Maxim, a TGWU shop Services were trans- steward who has stood ferred to the St Mary’s up to management all Praed Street building. the way, was threatened Part of the Harrow with the sack for refus- Road site was taken ing to do two jobs; a over by the Paddington telephonist was also Community Hospital, sacked for leaving work the rest was bulldozed at the end of his shift and converted into flats, without waiting for a its canalside location relief. making it an attractive proposition for the Not sure if this occupation succeeded, at least middle classes (though the developer appar- temporarily in preventing immediate ward ently later went bust, so it never quite closures, but by 1985 St Mary’s had just 166 achieved its yuppie promise).

Brookwood Hospital, Woking, Surrey cedure. (?May) 1982 But staff were most angry at the raising of the nursery charges. COHSE had an agree- Brookwood Hospital seems to have been ment with management that if there was any occupied twice. The 1982 occupation was proposals to increase prices they should be sparked by severe staff shortages, which consulted. They weren’t. That was when hos- managers had refused to recognise or deal pital staff decided that they would run the with. hospital more efficiently themselves - with- Management at Brookwood had consistently out all the aggravation of management. refused to employ more nurses. Out of an A decision which could be rationally applied establishment of 805, only 420 staff were in to the whole of the NHS - and the world in post. On many occasions there was one general... trained nurse in charge of three wards and having to give out drugs on their own. “The A Workers Council was formed, consisting of public must be made aware that there is a all the shop stewards and branch officers in desperate staffing problem and that more the hospital, plus the NUPE branch secretary money must be made available to the health and a steward from the District General service.” ( Joe Fleming COHSE Branch sec- Hospital at Frimley Park. retary and chairperson of the Workers Within two weeks of staff taking this action, Council of Brookwood Hospital 1982). the Area Health Authority agreed to hold an enquiry into the grievance. A Joint The grievances at Brookwood piled up over Brookwood Hospital Committee, comprising several years. Complaints ranged from wait- an equal number of staff and management ing three weeks for a new washer to the representatives, to deal with all matters Divisional Nursing Officer issuing orders to affecting services and facilities at ward sisters telling them when nurses should Brookwood Hospital and staff employed take their tea-breaks. When proper consulta- within the Division of Psychiatry, was a tion revealed that more staff were needed, direct result of the occupation. management simply withdrew from the pro-

56 Wood Green & Southgate Hospital Hospital 8-bed Midwifery Unit, and a say in October 1982 - December 1982 the future provision of GP maternity services. One of the issues at Harpenden was the loss Haven’t been able to find out anything... of a specific Midwife-led maternity service. As Daphne Hutchins, COHSE steward at the Harpenden Memorial Hospital hospitals said: "There is a vast difference (Maternity), Hertfordshire between a GP run maternity unit and working February - March 1983 in a consultant unit... The mother comes in relaxed, there is a friendly atmosphere and COHSE midwives occupied the Harpenden the midwives build up a rapport with the Memorial Hospital for two weeks in women. here the midwives look after the February-March 1985 in order to stop the mothers all the way through and wave good- sacking and transfer of Midwives. bye on the door step" The Unit was due to close on February 28th COHSE Kumar Sandy Regional Officer paid 1985, however staff with community support tribute to those who had supported COHSE occupied the hospital. All management were members in their fight "We now know that any refused admission unless it was on clinical threatened hospital can be run by the staff. grounds. The occupation secured wide sup- We gathered 3,500 signatures on a petition in port from the community and local GP's. two weeks. And now we know how to set up and run an occupation....As a result of our sit- The Occupation secured jobs for all Midwives in the health authority was forced to meet on the closure of the Harpenden Memorial COHSE's demands for alternative jobs for the midwives".

57 Thornton View Hospital, Bradford 5 August 1983 - April 1985. As long as there were patients in the hospital legally workers legally workers could not be The occupation and Work-in of Thornton locked out or lose pay during occupation of View geriatric hospital lasted nearly two NHS premises. Thornton View was the only years. hospital occupation to exclude management. An 82-bed long stay geriatric hospital located The occupation committee of nurses, domes- near the village of Clayton, outside Bradford, tics, porters, local GP's, relatives, other trade Thornton View was one of two local hospitals unionists and members of the local communi- targetted for closure by the Bradford District ty joined together to organise every aspect of Health Authority (who were looking to save the struggle at Thornton View Hospital. They £700,000). For most of the elderly patients at over-turned the management structure by run- the hospital, aged 65 to 95, it was their home; ning the hospital themselves. they had been at Thornton View on average for 7 years. As with other hospital occupations their was Prior to the Work-in, a year-long campaign always a number of pickets sleeping in, at had opposed Thornton View’s closure. four picket lines around the building. The Bradford DHA had many letters of protest picket on the front gate halfway was down the sent, a petition of 30,000 including 55 GP's lane in a very cold and exposed site. and the support of the Tory, Liberal and Labour groups on the The occupation prior and District Council together during the occupation with lobbies and demonstra- always secured the sup- tions — all to no avail. port of the patients rela- tives, and the local com- So at 8.30pm on Friday munity. Some of the night, 5 August 1983 a bold, patients gave radio and and well planned, occupa- TV interviews in support tion began, made official by of the work-in. Gradually, both NUPE and COHSE though, numbers of within the first week. Whilst patients dwindled, (it was the main purpose of the down to 45 beds occupied occupation was to protect by mid-’84); management the rights of elderly people played a waiting game... with no power (studies have The threat of a raid to shown that within 6 months move the patients by force of the closure of St. hung constantly over the Benedict's geriatric hospital occupation. (after an occupation by staff) in South London some 30% The occupational finally of the patients had died), the ended after 21 months fight was also to save 95 occupation - brutally bro- NHS jobs. As COHSE stew- ken at night by a raid in ard Betty Elie stressed, "We're not stupid, we April 1985, just after the miners’ strike was know that once this hospital closes we don't finished off. Worse than that, it was also done stand a chance of getting new jobs". in a snow storm and allegedly one or two The first job of the occupation committee was patients died after the ordeal to evict the Nursing Officer and examine (confiscate) the files on the union in her office, and make her office the occupation headquarters.

58 Hayes Cottage Hospital, West London. observed events at other recently occupied 25th October 1983 - late December 1983. hospitals (see St Benedict's and Longworth, above), as one of their leaflets urged support- Plans to close the Hayes Cottage Hospital, ers to write “letters going to the DHA forcing patients to travel further for care (to demanding that no violence will be used and Hillingdon) were thwarted by this occupation: that patients will not be forcibly removed in the end the local health authority backed against their will. This is a real possibility down and the hospital was saved. and it must not be allowed.”

On the evening of Tuesday 25th October 1983 The Hayes occupiers were linked to the the staff at Hayes Cottage Hospital occupied Hillingdon Health Emergency Campaign, in a bid to keep the hospital open. This action which formed spontaneously by members of was taken after a lot of thought but it was the public who had attended a meeting of the clearly the only way to Regional Health stop the closure after Authority on 27th other avenues had been September 1983. At exhausted. that meeting, the pro- The occupation posed cuts in Health received strong support spending ware from local people, with announced - including visitors coming round the proposed closure of with food, supplies and the two Cottage money. Messages of Hospitals Hayes and support also flooded in Northwood & Pinner. from all over London There were immediate while a delegation protests from the pub- from Charing Cross Hospital came over to see lic gallery and four people were ejected from them.... the meeting. Later an impromptu meeting of After a while G.P.s connected with the hospi- the protesters took place in the Civic Centre tal started to admit patients again. The electing a committee which immediately went patients in the Cottage Hospital were solidly into action to arouse public opinion and behind the work-in: one patient insisted that if protest against the cuts. Leaflets were pro- any attempt was made to move her she duced; public meetings held; petition forms intended to die in the ambulance...! distributed, resulting in thousands of signa- The occupiers’ aim tures. Letters were was to force the written to the press, District Health M.P.’s, Councillors Authority to put their and other public fig- proposals for cuts out ures inviting their sup- to full public consulta- port. tion, so that the people Trade union branches of Hillingdon could were heavily involved have a voice in the sort and asked to support, of Health Service that both financially and was provided, instead physically. The cam- of just a “totally unde- paign stepped up its mocratic and unac- supporting activity countable group of individuals dictating from following the decision by the Staff to occupy on high.” the two threatened hospitals.

The Hayes occupiers also obviously keenly

59 Northwood & Pinner Cottage Hospital, all local residents associations and Brunel West London university medical group. On 26 October October - December 1983 1983, recognising the considerable support for Northwood and Pinner community hospital, Northwood & Pinner Cottage hospital was those groups occupied it. They locked the occupied the day after Hayes (above), led by front and back doors and excluded all non- the Matron and COHSE Steward Jean Carey (daughter in law of Milly Johnson, famous Irish nationalist and Harrow Labour Councillor in the 60s/70s).

Both Cottage Hospitals were saved for the next seven years and provided a vital NHS service to their communi- ties. However in the early 1990s the Hayes Cottage Hospital was turned into a nursing home.

In September 1983, Hillingdon Health Authority decided to close this hospi- tal (together with Hayes) to compensate for a £1 million overspend. There was a massive medical management staff. The hospital con- outcry from the local community and the tinued to treat patients but under the manage- decision that was condemned by the entire ment of clinicians and the local community. It hospital staff. They were joined by local busi- was occupied 24 hours a day, seven days a ness and community groups, local churches, week, with pickets outside protesting at the planned closure and the Government’s run- ning of the national health service. The occupation had the support of almost the entire community. Local businesses sent food, milk, money and equipment. A carol service, which was led by a local councillor after the hospital’s chaplain had refused to take part, attracted 200 people... The protesters eventu- ally took Hillingdon health authority to court after it insisted on the closure, and the High Court found in favour of the protestors. Lord Chief Justice Woolf said that the health authority’s actions had been wrong and awarded costs against it.

Hayes and Northwood & Pinner had close links with Thornton View in Bradford.

Botleys Park Hospital, Surrey December 1983 Haven’t been able to find out anything about this one...

60 Prince of Wales Hospital, Tottenham, St Andrews Hospital at Bromley-by- North London. Bow, East London. Apparently occupied 1985 during a cam- c.1985 paign against closure. (Interestingly parts of the Ken Loach movie Riff Raff, about build- The Accident & Emergency Department at St ing workers converting a closed hospital site Andrews was occupied around this time. to luxury flats, were also later filmed here.)

St Leonard's, Hackney Hospital, East Freeman, who lived in a central London pent- London house, and had private health insurance, said 3rd July - 16th July 1984 in the Daily Mail "We might as well be living in a dictatorship" In 1979, despite opposition in the form of a day of action and a march attended by over a The incident was labelled a riot in the thousand people, St Leonard's Hospital Evening Standard and Daily Mirror, though Accident & no-one was Emergency reported as Department was being injured closed. on either side. By the early Admittedly 1980's the future there was an of the whole hos- attempt to pital was looking keep the bleak; by late 1983 Board mem- the Health bers in the Authority was meeting and actively looking to to stop them close the hospital voting in pri- under pressure vate... The from a disturbance Conservative Government keen to make cuts. was carried on all the main news channels At a Health Authority meeting to ratify the that night and newspapers the next day and cuts and closures at Hackney Town hall on ensured health moved nationally up the politi- 26th September 1983, the Health Authority cal agenda. and its multi millionaire, Jockey Club chair- man Louis Freedman were overwhelmed in a On the 7th June 1984 Norman Fowler, Tory turbulent day of protest, (later described as a Secretary of State announced his decision to “riot”) which ended with them being forced to close all wards and remove all beds at St abandon the meeting after the town hall was Leonard's and leave just a first aid unit and a surrounded by thousands of angry locals handful of community based services. opposing the closure plans. Freedman refused to use his casting vote to settle the closure In response a small working group was estab- issue; demonstrators demanded increasingly lished by the staff and Hackney health emer- vocally that he use his vote to save the hospi- gency to look into the possibility of the 180 tal. As he dithered, the doors to the Council staff working at St Leonard's organising an chamber were barred and padlocked, and after occupation or work-in of the hospital. A deci- a 20 minute stand off he was escorted out of sion was made to occupy the hospital on the the building with the help of local Labour MP 3rd July 1984. The occupation was ratified by Brian Sedgemore. a staff meeting of eighty staff on 4th July.

61 St Leonard's (cont) However, local trade unionists organised a 24-hour picket line outside the hospital and But by the 5th July (NHS Day) the manage- the drivers from the London Ambulance ment had somehow managed to secure and Station refused to move the patients out issue writs and summons against the key stewards. As On top of tar- NUPE had not geting union made the occu- representatives pation official, and other mem- and fearing an bers of staff injunction (sim- involved in the ilar to that used occupation, the against the management Miners) NUPE also made life officers uncomfortable removed NUPE as possible for placards and the patients began to dis- remaining in tance them- the hospital selves from the (who refused to occupation. move) by Despite this threatening thousands of people in Hackney were sup- legal action. Frail, elderly patients were bun- portive of the occupation. dled out in the early morning or late at night, driven to other hospitals, torn away from staff On the 16th July management repossessed the they knew and their possessions being sent on hospital, sending in security staff and bailiffs much later because they hadn't been told they (probably illegally) to end the occupation. In were to be permanently moved. the next three days management systematical- ly interviewed staff and reps and suspended After the Occupation was smashed, manage- key stewards. Disciplinary action was taken ment employed a whole private army of secu- against Andrea Campbell, a shop steward for rity guards to ‘protect’ the building, costing COHSE, and Geoffrey Craig, a NUPE shop the Health Authority almost £1,000 a day, steward. They were dismissed as a result of money clearly better spent this way rather that disciplinary hearing, and they then than used to maintain the crumbling local appealed. health services.

Neasden Hospital tioned, in similar cases, many elderly patients 1986 moved forcibly in this way died soon after In November 1985, it was announced that ‘relocation’.) Neasden Hospital, a geriatric hospital, was to The district Health Authority manager, Mr. be closed. A year-long campaign followed, Lorne Williamson, was accused of “arrogant- including an occupation at some point... The ly riding roughshod over the possibility of any Hospital closed in 1986... The ambulance per- compromise or constructive alternative to his sonnel protested so strongly that the manage- own blueprint for managerial decisions. He ment decided to hire coaches to move the 68 has even used his managerial expertise to patients... the shifting and breaking up of a nullify the decisions of his own district health community of 68 elderly people apparently authority committee.” “had disastrous consequences.” (No details An attempt to reach a compromise soluton on as to what this means, but as previously men- the closure was proposed, by local MPs 62 Neasden (cont) and understand the pressures within the areas in which it is working. The management has among others. However, Williamson managed shown a misunderstanding of human nature to close the hospital on 5 December. by taking money from the black community and spending it in an affluent white area.” Neasden Hospital was described as “a small oasis of health care... [with] gardens and The 94-bed Leamington Park hospital had trees. The old people were able, in summer been closed nearby four years previously, the time, to get out of their geriatric wards. A money from the sale of this site was supposed geriatric ward is a place in which people die. to support local healthcare services, but at the However, the ambience of living in a commu- time of Neasden’s closure the sale has not nity promotes longer life. If the site is sold, happened due to planning issues... attempts to the area will be bulldozed.... The object of the keep Neasden open by arguing for alternative closure exercise was to sell the site for £3.7 finance were ignored by the DHA. million and... to use the money for healthcare projects ... There are two principal areas 30 nurses and other staff were evicted from involved -Willesden and Wembley. Wembley is nurses’ housing in Neasden hospital in an affluent area and Willesden is an urban- November they were told that they had to be aided, deprived inner city area. Neasden hos- out by 27 November. They were finally pital is in Willesden, yet the money from the allowed to stay until 2 December and then closure will be used in Wembley. That is a allowed half a day off to move their belong- complete mess-up on the part of the manage- ings somewhere else... ment. The management should realise that

Hornsey Central Hospital Nurses Home They cleaned and renovated it, named it The North London 2006 Krankenhouse Project (Krankenhaus is German for “hospital”), started putting on More of a squatted centre than an occupation, workshops on juggling, music and screen (if such hair-splitting divisions are useful) but printing for the local community & developed interesting and inspiring nonetheless. a community garden. They described them- The Old Nurses Home on the Hornsey Central selves as “a group of artists, performers, jok- Hospital site in Park Road, London, N8 was ers, jugglers and well-wishers. We’re organis- occupied by homeless activists in 2006-7 for 6 ing anything that we can - for free! months. The Hospital had been closed since Exhibitions, workshops, cafes, classes, any- 2001 despite vigorous local opposition which thing”. continued up to the site’s demolition in 2007. In their words “this building is meant to be for The old nursing home had been lying derelict the people of Hornsey and Haringey. If we are for over five years. The building was slowly here, we look after the building and stop kids decaying and coming under attack from the vandalising it. Instead of demanding a council elements and vandalism. It was in a sorry state. flat, we are using, maintaining and protecting But then, a group of people decided enough derelict council property. Our ideal situation was enough.They couldn’t stand seeing this would simply be to be left here until the owners beautiful building go to rot. So, they let them- actually do something positive with the build- selves in and squatted the place. Once in, they ing.” found piles of rubbish mixed with faeces and needles and realised how much tender loving After concessions made to the campaigners, a care the building needed. large Health Clinic was opened at the site in The occupiers supported the campaign to re- 2009 which included a commemorative chapel open the hospital, and had a ginormous banner which had been originally earmarked for dem- hanging from the roof that read: ‘FIGHT olition. CUTS AND PRIVATISATION’ 63 Short and tactical, but Work-ins may be sary of the founding of the NHS, expressing back on the Agenda: similar concerns about the 111 service, also reporting for work in their own time to take Nursing and Health advisors providing NHS calls to highlight the valuable work they do. Direct helpline services to Cornwall and the NHS staff are deeply concerned about the South West based at Exeter on 1 May 2012 affect the change will have on patients and on held a ‘work-in’ in protest against the health services. The new 111 service has far Government’s plans to replace NHS Direct fewer nurses taking calls - 75% of calls to with a service that had not been properly NHS Direct are currently taken by a nurse, evaluated. under the new 111 service only 17% will be. NHS Direct has two qualified nurses to every From midnight to midnight, NHS Direct staff health advisor - NHS 111, has six health advi- (mainly based in Exeter but joined by nurses sors for every nurse. and health advisors from Bristol, Plymouth, The 111 service will not clinically assess Torquay, Taunton and Truro) staged a ‘work- patients, or give them access to emergency in’, with extra staff voluntarily coming in, in dental or contraceptive advice. People suffer- their own time, to help staff the NHS Direct ing mental health problems from patients phone lines. They were protesting the roll out engaged in self harm or depression will not of the 111 service which will replace NHS longer be able to get the help they need by Direct, concerned that the roll out had not calling NHS Direct. This will lead to more been properly evaluated, and could compro- patients being sent to A&E, GP surgeries and mise the level of out of hours service that more ambulance 999 call outs, and could see patients receive, as well as pile extra pressure longer waiting times as these health services onto other NHS services such as A&E and are pushed to breaking point. GP surgeries. UNISON have been urging the Department of Nursing and Health advisors providing NHS Health to stop rolling out the 111 service until Direct helpline services to Nottinghamshire, it has been fully evaluated. It must also come Derbyshire, Northamptonshire and clean and publish its evaluation of the NHS Lincolnshire also held a similar work-in on 111 service. 5th July 2012 (NHS Day) - the 64th anniver-

These short accounts have been derived from several places, but a lot was lifted from

http://cohse-union.blogspot.co.uk/

and the Hayes People History blog, which compiles lots of radical/working class history in West London and further afield...

http://ourhistory-hayes.blogspot.co.uk/

As we have said above, this isn’t a comprehensive list, and more inside info about any of these actions or others would be brilliant; hopefully this dossier will go through several larger and larger editions... till the workers run not only the hospitals, but the world...

64 Occupy and win a manual for fighting hospital closures The following text is mostly reprinted from a round the fire... But there are also many use- pamphlet produced in 1984 by London ful and inspiring points here - a more Health Emergency; as a guide for hospital thoughtful update to the modern era might be workers on how - and why - to occupy hos- a useful project for the future. pitals to prevent their closure. The legal situation is also somewhat more The anarchist webspace libcom scanned and complex. Recent changes to squatting laws put this text online in November 2006; we in England & Wales haven’t completely lifted it from there, (this doesn’t imply total invalidated the legal advice that the follow- agreement with libcom’s ideas or practice). ing contains. Changes to the law in 2012 made squatting a criminal offence in residen- Some of the information contained in the text tial property, which should exclude hospitals. is now out of date. So, for example, the How police, management interpret the law unions mentioned have since merged, and might be a different matter however. For obviously politicians named in the text may more info on this, it’s always worth talking have moved on died etc! Past Tense have to the many reservations about the optimistic views Advisory Service for Squatters, of the authors on how useful Labour Party at Angel Alley, 84b Whitechapel High Street, politicians on Health Authorities etc might London, E1 7QX. be, and on the role of trade union structures They are open Monday - Friday 2.00 - 6.00 in supporting workers’ occupations. We now pm. live in very different times, where occupa- tel: 0203 216 0099 email:[email protected] tions and solidarity strikes are a distant mem- http://www.squatter.org.uk ory, old folk tales told by shrivelled lefties Contents: Why occupy?

• Why Occupy? Hayes Cottage and Northwood and Pinner • What is occupation? hospitals were both due to be closed on • Will the workers get paid? October 31 1983. They were occupied, and as • General Practitioners a result they are now still open, with a tempo- • Do you need to stay overnight? rary reprieve. Thornton View hospital in • The run-up to closure Bradford, occupied since last summer, now faces the imminent danger of a raid by • Building a campaign District Health Authority bailiffs seeking to • Spotlight on the DHAs implement the order for closure issued by • How do we actually occupy? Health Minister Kenneth Clarke; but had it • Unions not been for the occupation, Thornton View • Declaring the hospital occupied would already long ago have closed down, • Who runs the occupation? and its geriatric patients bundled off to other • Management; should they stay or go? hospitals. • Supporters One general rule stands out from the whole • Press/Publicity experience of fighting the health cuts: it is not • Relatives/Patients certain that occupying a threatened hospital • Supporting strike action will keep it open, but it is certain that if you • The law do not occupy, it will close. Hospital occupa- • Is it all worth it? tions are not new. In 1922 workers at the 65 Radcliffe Hospital in Nottingham occupied! to ensure new admissions if it is an acute gen- Since the late 1970s occupations have eral or cottage hospital. increasingly been used to defend the hospitals scheduled for closure. Workers who have Will the workers get paid? taken part in occupations have learned valu- able lessons about how to organise them and This is usually the first question which is how to anticipate some of the problems which asked. The answer is yes. As long as there are may arise. With the present round of financial patients in a hospital, the Secretary of State is cuts, hundreds of hospitals are faced with clo- legally bound under the Health Services Act sure. Since August 1983 there have been three to ensure that they receive treatment, there occupations in hospitals which are still open must be workers; ancillary workers, nurses, in 1984 and many cam- doctors, technicians etc. paigns have asked for Hospital doctors and par- information about how to ticularly consultants will organise them. rarely support an occupa- Every occupation is differ- tion. This should not be a ent, but there are things decisive factor in deciding which are common to all whether or not you should occupations and that is occupy. what this pamphlet is The obligation to treat the about. Good early organi- patient means that even if sation can help to ensure the regular consultant that an occupation is resigns, a locum must be strong within a short peri- appointed as long as od of time and makes it patients remain. much more difficult for Sometimes the consultants management to move will be hostile and delib- against it at the onset. erately try to frighten This is not a failsafe guide workers and the public. If or a list of easy answers. It a consultant says, for is a sharing of tactics and example, that a hospital is strategies, learned in long, hard and often bit- ‘unsafe’, it is potentially very damaging. It is ter struggles. It may not answer all the ques- worthwhile checking your consultants’ com- tions which apply to your particular hospital. mitments to private medicine, etc, as often Every occupation throws up new problems, they have a vested interest in a hospital clos- new questions and new answers, but it will ing - you can use the information in press provide a basic framework for you to follow. statements to show why the consultant is not backing the occupation. Indeed the medical What is an occupation? arguments are very often quite spurious; patient mortality during the St Benedict's An occupation means that workers in a threat- occupation fell way below the national aver- ened hospital take a decision to actively age, yet within six months of the end of the oppose the closure of the hospital by ensuring occupation 30% of the patients had died. that patients and equipment are not moved out Despite their hostility and lack of concern it is and by refusing to leave their jobs at the hos- important to try to keep a good relationship pital. with the consultants. Keep them informed of The main area where control is taken is in the what is going on and explain in detail what movement of patients. A hospital can only be the occupation means. closed if there are no patients in it. So the main goal of an occupation is to keep the patients it has, if it is a long stay hospital, and

66 General Practitioners they would be locked out when they reap- peared in the morning. This does not happen GPs are the doctors who feel the sharpest in a hospital occupation because there are still edge of the cuts. They sometimes spend end- patients in the wards. But it is usually neces- less time trying to find a bed for patients and sary to have someone involved with the occu- then following them up after a too early dis- pation in the hospital overnight on a rota charge. They are often very sympathetic to basis. (This question is discussed further any attempt to stop cuts and closures. Doctors under the ‘Organisation’ section) are organised in several different ways but the The workers in the threatened occupied hospi- more radical and militant GPs are usually in tal continue to come in and work their normal the Medical Practitioners Union which is part shifts. They may of course feel under more of ASTMS. GPs are particularly important to pressure, especially in the beginning, simply approach if you are fighting to save a general because they are taking a form of industrial hospital or a cottage hospital. Involve them action which is very different, and it may be from the beginning and get them to refer as unclear to them exactly what will happen. many patients as possible to the threatened Occupations do put extra demands on the hospital. They will often require much workers. There are extra meetings, pressure encouragement because they are often not from the media for statements and interviews, used to explaining themselves or their opin- extra time put in picketing, and dealing with ions to the public. management. Family life is often disrupted from its normal routine and it is important Do you need to sleep in the that people know this. But an occupation does hospital overnight? not mean that all the workers need to stay in the hospital day and night until it is saved. Hospital occupations involve mainly women workers. (75% of health workers are women!) What happens Women usually have heavy domestic commit- in the run-up to closure? ments and need to know how long they will have to spend at the occupation. The second Normally a threatened hospital is run down question normally asked is does an occupa- for a period either before closure - or, often, tion mean that we all have to stay there even before consultation on closure. At such a point the rundown has not been authorised by the District Health Authority, but is being done by an entirely unaccountable group of administrators and bureau- crats. Over the last five years there has been an almost identical pattern of management preparations for closures. Ancillary and nursing staff who leave are not replaced. Ancillary vacancies are left unfilled to ensure that there are fewer workers left to fight in defence of the hospital. There Pickets at Hayes Cottage Hospital, 1983 may be more agency nurses than permanent nurses. Maintenance and repairs are not carried out, overnight? The answer is no. In factory occu- making it virtually impossible to get routine pations, if all the workers go home as normal health and safety work done or replace obso-

67 lete equipment. alone) the workers and local community must As a result, conditions for both patients and organise. It takes time for the implications of workers deteriorate. A steadily lower percent- closure to sink in. Most workers, although age of the hospital workers will feel commit- they are aware that other hospitals have been ted to defending such a hospital, regarding its closed, think it can never happen to their hos- closure as inevitable. Some sections of work- pital. But all health service facilities are ers may even be made vague promises of threatened by the Tory cutbacks: to think that alternative posts in other hospitals, promises if another hospital in your District closes designed further to divide and confuse the yours will be OK is disastrous. In workforce and weaken union resistance. Then, Wandsworth, five hospitals have closed since suddenly, the administrators announce that the 1978, and now the South London is ear- hospital is becoming “unsafe”. Having delib- marked for closure. Management use the fear erately created of closure and conditions to the false hope make the hospi- of saving one tal unsafe, they place at the then use this as expense of a pretext to jus- another to try to tify closing it pit worker down. These against worker. phase of “creep- All work neces- ing cuts” is the sary to close insidious pri- hospitals mary step An occupied ward at Bethnal should be Green Hospital, 1978 towards closure. blacked by the At each point it unions. must be resisted. Stewards should oppose three and six-month COHSE, NUPE and NALGO all have policies contracts which make it easier to assimilate of “no cover” for unfilled vacancies. Shop people from the hospital about to be closed. stewards should ensure that this policy is Usually a District will only issue “temporary” implemented. At St Mary’s, Harrow Rd, the contracts for a whole year’s run-up to closure. domestics were told to clean floors, when So, new staff are effectively sacked in order they had never done it before. Management that workers from the closing hospital can be were preparing the rundown of the hospital, “slotted in”. and did not want to hire new people. The The whole process undermines trade union domestics refused this additional job, and in activity and militancy and makes some work- so doing provided a focus for other workers in ers wary of even joining a union in case they the hospital who wanted to oppose the clo- jeopardise the renewal of their contract. sure. Workers in the threatened hospital must refuse even to discuss alternative employment with Building a campaign management. They should ignore any letters or demands that they get from supervisors Health and safety committees are particularly telling them to attend meetings (usually on important - at the South London Hospital the their own) to have preliminary discussions. Health and Safety committee forced manage- Health Service managers are now experienced ment to make major repairs that they were in the techniques of closing hospitals. They hoping to leave and use later as fuel for their try to do it quickly and quietly through arguments about the hospital being in a “run administrative measures and intimidation. down” condition. They do not like well-organised campaigns As soon as the word leaks out that a hospital with experienced people who know their tac- is threatened (there are dozens in London tics.

68 Building up support workers were given the same arguments about why we could only have a 4% increase in pay. The must successful fightbacks - EGA, St There was “no money” then; but suddenly bil- Benedict's, Longworth (Oxfordshire) and St lions were found for the Falklands War, and Mary’s - have involved workers and support- extra money was handed to the judges and the ers meeting together either weekly or fort- police. Money is available but the Tories nightly. Meeting in the hospital is best, refuse to spend it on health. because the workers will see people coming in every week to sup port them and the sup- Spotlight on the DHAs porters will feel part of the hospital (and know its layout). Health Authorities are weighted in favour of It may seem too frequent at first; but man- the wealthy and the ruling class; Norman agers work very quickly, and things can Fowler, who appoints them, sees to that. change on a daily basis. There is no need to However in several Districts in London there ask for permission for these meetings; man- remains a real possibility of DHAs taking a agement will almost certainly refuse. Just pick stand against cuts if only the Labour Party a room and have the meetings. It is unlikely representatives on the DHAs would vote that administrators will make an issue of it as against. Labour Party activists should get their they do not want to provoke action early on. General Management Committees to adopt a A public profile is essential. Everyone in the position that members of the Party who sit on community should know that their hospital is health authorities must oppose cuts, closures threatened. Leaflets, posters, petitions, pickets and privatisation. Health workers who fight and demonstrations are all good for attracting the cuts will be putting their jobs on the line. interest. Workers who are a bit frightened Any industrial action is likely to bring them about fighting management and are not sure up against the Tory anti-union laws. Workers about the levels of support they will get can will be fighting management, often the police, be bolstered by seeing a large demonstration and even some trade union leaders reluctant to or a lot of people turning up to picket outside take a stand. Workers face possible fines and the hospital. imprisonment for strike action and picketing. It is important to challenge management at The very least Labour Party and trade union every step of the campaign. The administra- members on health authorities could do is tors and consultants will constantly be putting argue and vote against closure. Yet at meeting out statements after meeting we have heard some of them about the terri- saying that they ble financial must stick within conditions, the Tory cash lim- weeping croc- its (because odile tears that Norman Fowler they have to says so); and close the hos- therefore they pital, and must make the claiming that cuts. This is a they really scandalous argu- have no choice ment. Let the since there is Tories try to make no money their own cuts. available. The task of the Workers labour movement Hackney District Health Authority officials try to ignore the banner should be and its representa- behind them at a packed Town Hall meeting to decide the closure of tives is to defend reminded that St Leonard's Hospital, 1984. in 1982 health the working class.

69 Nor should District Health Authorities be come in and work and can be won over to allowed to make their cuts in a quiet room supporting the occupation. with only a few people there. Members of the It is often domestic workers who take the ini- public are allowed into the meetings. Many tial action, with very passive support from people do not know this. Indeed DHAs in nurses. But once nurses see the hospital still many cases hold their meetings in rooms too running “normally” as far as patient care small for more than handful of observers to goes, and see management powerless to stop get in. This can and must be challenged. In the normal running of the wards they may Oxfordshire, persistent mass lobbying and the increasingly give active support. invasion of DHA meetings forced them to Workers will naturally be worried about being begin holding meetings in large, public ven- sacked, victimised, struck off or blacklisted. It ues: a small but significant blow for democra- is important not to dismiss these fears, but to cy and accountability. Make sure that there have a frank and honest discussion with them. are a lot of people at the meetings where cuts Nobody has ever been struck off the nursing are being discussed. You are technically not register for supporting an occupation. Even allowed to speak: but why should a totally the Royal College of Nursing has given tacit unelected and unaccountable body be able to support, usually instructing its members to ruin the health of the community in silence? “stay with the patients”. Disruption of DHA meetings has proved valu- The fear of victimisation is more difficult to able in the past, and it shows the administra- dispel. The strength of an occupation lies in tors that they will not have an easy time try- collective action. The more staff who are ing to close the hospital. involved, the more difficult it is to victimise But the real way to win and to save hospitals anyone. Decisions are made collectively. But is by united industrial action, focussed on it would be dishonest to say that there is no occupation. There have been several success- possibility of anyone being victimised. ful hospital occupations since 1977. Unions must be pushed to demand no victimi- sation, and to give assurances that they will How do we actually occupy? fully back any member who is threatened, with strike action in other hospitals if neces- The decision to occupy is not taken overnight. sary. There needs to be preparation. If you are thinking of occupying your hospital, contact Unions someone who has done it. Get her/him to come to the hospital and talk to people, Many workers who have occupied their hos- answering questions and explaining directly pitals have not been in a union at the start of what an occupation means. the action. It is important that the workers in Sometimes it is only a handful of workers the occupied hospital do join a union and that who decide that they will not let the hospital there are stewards elected on site. The union close. They take the initial action and bring full-timers should be informed as soon as the the other staff along with them throughout the occupation has been declared and be asked to course of the occupation. This happened at make the action official. NUPE, COHSE, Hayes Cottage in Hillingdon and also at TGWU, GMBATU, and ASTMS have poli- Thornton View in Bradford. cies of supporting occupations and will usual- In other occupations there have been mass ly make them official immediately. meetings with ballots. This happened at Although they will give you official support, Northwood and Pinner Hospital. All three most full-time union officials do not have have been successful occupations. Obviously much knowledge or experience of occupa- the more staff who are involved the better. tions. They should be pushed to provide prac- However, experience has shown that even tical support from the beginning - money for when only a small number of workers take the leaflets, posters, stickers, duplicators, paper, initial action other workers will continue to equipment, etc. You should also ensure you

70 are able to contact an official at all times. son in this hospital; If you can contact someone who has had prac- • THAT any entry into this hospital without tical experience of occupations to be at the our permission is a criminal offence as any- hospital for the first few days it will be an one of us who is in physical occupation is advantage. opposed to any entry without their permis- District Joint Shop Stewards Committees, sion; where they exist, should be actively involved • THAT if you attempt to enter by violence or from the beginning. If there is not one in exis- by threatening violence we will prosecute you. tence then a meeting should be convened of You may receive a sentence of up to six all the NHS stewards in the District in order months imprisonment and/or a fine of up to to get support. It is essential that workers in £1,000. the other hospitals know what is going on and • THAT if you want to get us out you will have give their support to the occupation. to take out a summons for possession in the County Court or in the High Court. Declaring the hospital occupied Once the occupation has been made official by the unions add “THAT this is a trade dis- When a hospital is declared occupied there pute and is an official trade union occupa- are some things that need to be done immedi- tion.” Have this notice already written out ately. and put it on the office door, the hospital a) An office entrance and on the gates of the hospital It is almost impossible to run an occupation immediately. without access to an office and a telephone, or a room in the hospital to be used as a base. In b) Telephones planning the occupation, you should decide in If there is a switchboard, talk to the operators advance which office immediately, prefer- is best to take over. ably with their union Often it is the steward present. If Administator’s or they have not been Nursing Officer’s. involved in the plan- This has the added ning stage explain to advantage of displac- them exactly what is ing the people most happening. Ask likely to try to intim- them to keep on giv- idate and disrupt the ing you lines. If occupation in the management are still first few days. in the hospital it Arrive prepared to may be necessary to change the locks on have someone - a the door. This gives steward, official, or you possession and occupation commit- means that management have to go to court to tee member on the switchboard to keep man- get the office back. You will need to put up a agement Out and stop any harassment of the notice which informs people of your rights. operators. As long as you have not done any damage to Contact the Post Office Engineering Union the property for example breaking a window (POEU) immediately. Tell them what has hap- or door to get in - you have a right to be pened and ask them to black any instruction there. Put up the following notice: to cut off the phone. Tell them you will be LEGAL WARNING applying for a new line the next day and ask (Section 6 Criminal Law Act 1977) them to give the application top priority. Get Take Notice an application form in for a line independent • THAT at all times there is at least one per- of the hospital. This has been invaluable in

71 recent occupations. It ensures that you cannot who have not been involved in the planning be cut off, If you do not know the local and the timing of the occupation. Reassure POEU rep, either contact the Trades Council, staff that what they should do is continue to or ring the operator and ask for the engineers work as normal. It is often useful to have a to ask them for the name of the steward. sympathetic nurse on hand who has been c) Support from the Ambulance Service involved in an occupation. If a meeting is not Contact the local ambulance service stations. possible, go around to all the wards and Talk to the stewards and tell them what you departments and explain what is going on. are doing and ask them not to cross the picket This is essential in order to bring people who line to remove any patients without prior con- are unsure, frightened or hostile into at least sultation with the occupation. If you are occu- passively supporting the occupation. pying an acute general hospital with an acci- Prepare a leaflet for distribution the day after dent and emergency department, ask them to the occupation begins. Also prepare a press continue bringing patients into the hospital statement. unless instructed not to by the occupation Regular bulletins for staff are essential committee. If you are trying to keep an A&E because of the shift patterns and the impossi- open it will require very close consultation bility of getting everyone to a meeting at the with the ambulance drivers and with the casu- same time. It is also important to change the alty clerical officers, to ensure a continued in- exterior of the hospital. Fences should be cov- flow of patients. London Ambulance Service, ered with posters and banners proclaiming the unlike that in many rural areas, has a long his- occupation, displayed in prominent positions. tory of support for occupations. At least 50% Make sure every passer-by knows that a of London Ambulance workers are in NUPE. struggle against health cuts is going on. d) Pickets| If you are occupying a long stay hospital, lock Who runs the occupation? the front gates with a padlock and put a picket there to let staff, supporters and visitors in, It is the workers who must make the decisions but to keep management and the police out about how the occupation will run. If there is until the occupation is secured. Bring the pad- good unionisation then the Joint Shop lock and locks with you on the day you Stewards Committee may be the occupation declare the occupation committee. If, as is quite and make sure that there often the case, the hospi- are enough people tal is weakly organised, around to cover all the then there will need to be immediate jobs that need an occupation committee to be done. set up with representa- A twenty-four hour pick- tives of all departments et may be necessary from and all staff. It does not the beginning. Ensure have to be the same peo- that pickets know the ple all the time. As many rules and regulations, are The Hayes Cottage Hospital Occupation office. staff as possible should well-informed and have be encouraged to attend. up-to-date information It is useful at first to have on who is to be let in, who is to be kept out, someone at these meetings who has experi- etc. Make sure that someone capable of mak- ence of occupations and who can answer ing quick decisions and who is reliable is in questions that arise. But any decision must be the office. made by the workers themselves. Patient care continues The committees may need to meet every day e) The Staff during the first week or two and then it should Get a meeting together to explain exactly meet as regularly as the staff think necessary what has happened for the benefit of staff (once a week is usual).

72 Management: should they stay of stewards and they can contact them if they want. or go? Be firm and polite. The legal notice is clear. At some point in nearly every Occupation, Neither an administrator nor a nursing officer, management have been barred. The time to do nor even a police officer has any right to enter it depends very much on the strength of the without permission If the administrators say occupation and the role of the managers. that they are worried about the patients, tell There are no hard and fast answers to this them that they can ask a doctor of their choice question but some norms can apply to most to come in and check on the patient care. occupations In almost every instance adminis- The recent pattern has been that senior man- trators will be working to break the occupa- agement who are not normally based at the tion as quickly as possible. They may appear hospital, come back for the first three of four friendly, paternalistic and nice but their role is days demanding to be let in. Then they tend to regain control of the hospital in order to to give up, go away and try to think of anoth- close it. Do not trust them. er way to harass the occupation. The lesson which all of us involved in occu- Once the more reticent workers see that very pations have learned, is that hospitals run per- senior managers have been turned away but fectly well without senior administrators and that no-one has been sacked for it, and there managers. has not been any action taken, they tend to get You will have to decide when to ban the hos- a bit more confident in supporting the pital administrator and nursing managers; but activists. a general rule is that any manager who does The occupation committee should discuss and not normally come to the hospital or who is monitor the position or any management nor- not involved directly in patient care should mally on site; administrators are usually easi- not be allowed in. As soon as the occupation er to ban than nursing officers. In many occu- begins you will have district and sector pations the senior nursing officers have been administra- allowed to stay tors and nurs- but they have ing managers been “shadowed” appearing at by a supporter or the gates or member of the front door occupation com- demanding to mittee. This rein- be let in. forces the impres- Refer them to sion that the the legal workers are in notice, tell control and mak- them the hos- ing the decisions pital is run- in the hospital. It ning as nor- also prevents mal, the these people from patients are not at risk, the workers are in undermining the control and that they cannot come in without occupation by intimidating staff individually. permission The whole question of what to do with nurs- Both management and police - if they arrive - ing officers is very delicate and should be dis- will ask who you are, whether you work in cussed fully with the nurses before any deci- the hospital, who is in charge etc. You are not sions are reached. But always be wary of obliged to give your name to anyone and you back-door agreements, and refuse to have should not give it. Don’t mention names of anything to do with them. They can only anyone ‘in charge’ or connected with the undermine your base and endanger the poli- occupation. Management will have the names tics of the occupation. 73 Supporters should be allowed on the site during an occu- pation. Health workers are not used to ‘out- Occupations need a lot of help to run smooth- siders’ walking around hospitals. Management ly and to win. It is essential to get as much will inevitably play on this, trying to discredit outside support as possible. Hospitals belong pickets who are not staff members. to the community and they will want to help Everyone has a right to defend their hospital defend their local hospital. There should be a that is why people come to support occupa- rota set up for pickets which will include both tions. Staff at occupied hospitals are doing staff and supporters. Factories and other their normal job - often physically and emo- workplaces, tenants organisations, Labour tionally exhausting. They are also taking an parties and community groups all need to be active role in running the occupation and so approached for help. cannot keep the pickets going on their own. If There should be regular supporters’ meetings they are women, they are often under intense so that everyone knows what is going on, pressure at home because of their increased there should be good liaison and communica- commitment. They need support. tion between supporters and the occupation The labour movement was built on solidarity; committee. Regular bulletins are good for and that is what occupations are about. This sharing information. Tory government has no conscience about An occupation diary should be kept in the bringing in its own outsiders to run down the office. Pickets should be encouraged to read it NHS - Griffiths, a grocer from Sainsbury’s, is when they come advising them on how the in for their stint, NHS should be run! Private and to write up outside contractors are look- details which they ing to increase their profits feel to be of use. by getting NHS contracts. Get names, We should make no apolo- addresses and gies for taking advice and telephone num- help from people prepared to bers of anyone help save hospitals. who offers help. Get them to give Press/publicity a regular commit- ment to picketing. Get the local press on your Begin to work on side. Management will try to developing a tele- discredit the occupation by phone tree, which saying that patients are at is a system of risk. Have a press conference contacting people as soon as possible. Issue a by phone in an press statement as soon as emergency. It usu- you have occupied. Invite ally works by the press in to film or photo- three people tele- graph the occupation and let phoning three them see for themselves that other people who everything is running well. in turn phone three people until all the sup- Patients will usually gladly give their permis- porters are contacted. sion to be filmed if it means good publicity The important point for supporters to remem- for the hospital. Delegate someone to he the ber is that the hospital is running as normal, press officer and make sure that whoever as far as patient care is concerned. Patients’ speaks on behalf of the occupation is autho- privacy is a top priority. No supporters should rised to do so, and that reporters know who to be allowed in the ward areas. No drinking ask for. A sympathetic story in the local paper 74 is worth more than a thousand leaflets. dancy and cuts by threatening them that if the Always stress that “patient care” is being occupied hospital is saved, their hospital will maintained. be cut. Such claims have to be dealt with very quick- Relatives/patients ly. Every cut, every closure makes each sub- sequent one easier for management to accom- Get the relatives involved immediately. Let plish. Every victory against cuts and closures them all know what the occupation means. A makes it more difficult for Districts to make leaflet should be produced and a relatives more cuts, because it encourages others to meeting organised as soon as possible. fight. That is why promises of supporting Workers in geriatric hospitals in particular action are so essential. They break down the have had great success in getting relatives to isolation of occupations, and make them a take an active part in supporting occupations. focus for broad resistance to the cuts. Get the patients involved if possible. They Experience has shown that while trade unions will be the most affected by the closure. At St will give quick recognition to occupations, Benedict's, patients joined in with picketing, union officials will not build for supporting and in Thornton View they have given radio strike action. In some cases they have deliber- and television interviews. Try to get relatives ately worked against it, defusing and diverting to make a supportive press statement in the the issue, and making the workers occupying first few days of the occupation. think it is impossible to win supporting action. It is by no means easy or automatic: Supporting strike action but it is certainly not impossible. Don’t leave the work of building for supporting strike Occupations cannot win without support. In action in the hands of union full-time offi- order to avoid the kind cials. Get stewards and of raids which ended the workers from the Hounslow, St Benedict's, occupation in every Longworth and Etwall branch to raise the occupations, it is neces- issue, ask for support sary to get sufficient out- and to explain why side support to make the support from other District Health Authority workers is so vital. hold back from sanction- ing a raid. This has to be The law done by getting other workers in the District Increasingly the law is and the Region to pledge being used against supporting strike action trade unionists, and the immediately any piece of health service is no equipment or patient is exception. Injunctions forcibly removed from were used for the first the hospital. time during the St It is not easy to get these Benedict's occupation, pledges, and they must and have been used in be worked for from the several occupations first day of the occupa- since then. The law is tion. Management tactics complex and has been are to divide and rule used in different ways health workers. They know the importance of in different occupations. The best thing to do strike action, and that is why they try to is to contact your local law centre, and ask exploit other health workers’ fears of redun- one of the solicitors to come to the hospital to

75 explain the legal position. If you don’t have a out and closing the hospital. There had been law centre try to find a sympathetic socialist no pledges of supporting strike action; and so lawyer in the area. management had felt confident that they Injunctions can be issued to named individu- could move. But the public disgust at the als and to “any others”, to demand that they methods used and the closure of the hospital comply with certain conditions. Management provoked such a backlash that it was another may take out injunctions early on; or maybe three years before that health district has even not at all. The fewer names they know the suggested that another hospital should be better. When they are applying for injunctions closed. Hayes Cottage, Northwood and Pinner you will be informed. Contact the law centre and Thornton View hospitals are all still open solicitors and/or the union legal officers more than six months after they were due for immediately. closure, thanks to determined occupations. If the injunction is granted, it must still then Remember, it is not certain that occupying be served. During the Hayes occupation, your hospital will keep it open - what is cer- administrators were only able to serve one out tain is that if you do not occupy it will close. of three injunctions, and eventually they just It is also certain that every time we fight a cut gave up. or a closure, the ripples are felt. If there had The use of the law is a frightening and intimi- been no resistance to the closures in the past, dating process for people who have never we would be facing even more devastating come up against it. It is important that the cuts than the Tories are now proposing. Every workers involved in occupations have things time a hospital, ward, or department is occu- explained to them by someone who knows pied, it is a clear sign to the government that what the current legal position is. The main they cannot easily cut our services. thing to stress is that an occupation is not a Occupations are never a waste of effort. They criminal offence and is not “illegal”. Recently, politicise workers very quickly. Health work- in the Hayes and Northwood occupations, the ers are locked into a very hierarchical system law was used for the benefit of the occupa- which is extremely undemocratic and oppres- tion. This was an unusual and exceptional sive. Decision-making is entirely out of our event! It is always worth pursuing any legal hands. Occupations give the decision-making points which may help an occupation, but the back to the workers. A cleaner who stands at a law is not usually on the side of people fight- gate telling an administrator to go away is in ing cuts and should not be seen as a substitute control. The hospital is running, ‘under new for action. An occupation should never be management’, under workers’ control. The called off pending legal action or a court whole process of occupying shows workers action. The Hayes occupiers themselves that they can make major decisions about declined to take part in the legal action their hospital, and that when they are in con- against the DHA, preferring to rely on their trol it usually runs better and smoother. base of support in the working class rather It makes us think about the reasons for the than trust the courts. cuts and closures. Where does the money go? Why can’t we keep the services for local peo- Why should we occupy when ple and cut out the vast profits that go to the drug companies and other suppliers and con- other occupations have not tractors? Why do health authority accounts kept hospitals open? have to be so secretive? Why can’t health unions and other trade unionists examine the This question is always asked. There is no books to expose the details of how the District easy, sure way to keep a hospital open. allocates its money? Workers at St. Benedict's spent ten long, Occupations rally whole communities around exhausting months occupying to see, at the defence of health care. For the first time, ordi- end, a vicious raid by private ambulances nary people go to Health Authority meetings with the help of the police, taking the patients and see the scandalous group of non-account-

76 able, appointed people who make life and death decisions with no thought for what we A note on unions have to say about it. People start talking about not only defending A number of trade union mentioned in what we have, but demanding what we want. these accounts have since merged. Occupations are not easy. They require a lot of hard work, a lot of commitment, and can So the main unions for workers in the be exhausting. The alternative is to let succes- National Health Service though the sive governments ‘rationalise’ the health serv- 1970s and 80s were: ice right out of existence. At the moment the National Union of Public there are three hospitals which would have Employees (NUPE), been closed in 1983 which are still open the Confederation of Health Service because the workers occupied. Those three could be multiplied by hundreds. The possi- Employees, or COHSE, (representing bilities of keeping hospitals open exists. That mainly nursing staff), and is a good enough reason to consider occupa- ASTMS, the Association of Scientific, tion of your hospital. Technical and Managerial Staffs (rep- resenting paramedical staff).

Originally published by London Health NUPE and COHSE joined NALGO (the Emergency, 1984 local government workers’ union) in forming UNISON in 1993. The ASTMS, after various mergers in between, forms London Health Emergency was set up in 1983 part of the modern Unite union. to co-ordinate opposition to hospital closures in London, and still exists today. As well as The Post Office Engineering Union, campaigning they have a large numbers of mentioned in ‘Occupy and Win’, has resources that can be useful for people since joined forces with other communi- organising to prevent cuts to health services. cation workers unions to form the mod- http://www.healthemergency.org.uk ern Communication Workers Union.

77

Occupational Hazards

Occupying Hospitals: inspirations and issues from our history

A past tense Dossier

Between 1976 and 1994. more than twenty hospitals in the UK were occupied either wholly or partly by either staff who worked in them, or by local communities, or both; usually to prevent threats to close or merge them, cutting services and slashing jobs. Some were successful, some were not, but work-ins or occupations were a widespread and accepted tactic.

With the looming threat of ‘re-organisations’ and further cuts and closures in the NHS looming, could occupations and work-ins be back on the agenda? Occupational Hazards documents some inspiring tales from the past, and asks some questions about some of the issues and problems arising from taking over a hospital.

past tense