Who stands behind Circle healthcare?

from "Not so magic Circle", researched for UNISON Eastern Region (2011) by John Lister ...

Read the full item, and other breaking news

Reclaiming our NHS is a conference that will provide insight about the impact of the act and what people can do to campaign and protect the core principles of the NHS, locally and nationally.

• Listen to health experts explain the latest news about the government's NHS changes.
• Find out how the changes will affect you and your family.
• Join NHS supporters from across the country to discuss how we can work together to secure the local services that we need to protect our NHS.

Speakers include:

• Clare Gerada Chair of the Royal College of GPs
• David Babbs Executive Director of 38 Degrees
• John Lister health journalist and Director of Health Emergency
• Frances O'Grady TUC Deputy General Secretary
• Jacky Davis BMA council member and Chair of the NHS Consultants' Association
• Harry Keen President of the NHS Support Federation

This is a public conference for everyone who cares about the NHS. Please feel free to pass this invitation to anyone who may wish to attend.

Further details, including how to obtain your ticket, can be had from the NHS Support Federation.

New issue of Health Emergency

The latest issue of Health Emergency's campaigning tabloid is packed full of facts and articles including

• European health news
• McKinsey declares 16 hospitals non-viable
• NHS: a guide through the wreckage
• Hedge funds are the power behind Circle Healthcare
• Will GPs hold Lansley to the lies he told them?
• Anti social enterprises pave the way to privatisation

and much more ...

Download here

HeaRT - Health Reporter Training Project

Calling health journalists, working journalists, journalism students, editors and publishers. Top up your specialist skills and knowledge!

Training sessions available in London June 10-11, and in Coventry: contact John Lister for details.

Download a leaflet here.

URGENT: Watch these videos

DVD now available: details here



Click here to view online

Wake-Up Call - Episode 1
(Running time 20 minutes)

Dr John Lister provides a witty insight into the true intent of the government's plans to reform the health service - a privatised, unaccountable NHS.

Peppered with jokes and cartoons from the likes of Steve Bell, the film is an easily understood explanation of how the NHS, as we now know it, will be demolished, if these plans succeed.

With the danger of the reforms slipping through in a fog of jargon and marketing spin, John Lister talks us through why they will be disastrous for NHS patients and staff.

Produced for Keep Our NHS Public and for Health Emergency.

see also ...

Wake-Up Call Episode 2 - A Betrayal of Trust
Sugar Coating the Bitter Bill

Click here to view online

What are many local GPs really thinking about Andrew Lansley's Health and Social Care Bill?

Louise Irvine is a GP in the deprived area of Deptford's New Cross. She believes that trusted local GPs are being used to sugar coat a radical denationalisation of the NHS.

Dr Irvine explains, with compassion, how this bitterly unacceptable bill will harm patient care and break up 'the NHS family'.

If you want to know just why so many people in the NHS are in opposition to Lansley’s Bill, then take 15 minutes to watch this video.

A film by Anne-Marie Sweeney produced for Keep Our NHS Public and Health Emergency.

third in the trilogy ...

Wake-Up Call Episode 3 - The Return of Fear

Click here to view online

Giving reasons to be fearful, the film graphically shows how Lansley's proposals, despite amendments, will vandalise the NHS and lead to "A Return of Fear" - a fear removed by Aneurin Bevan when the NHS was founded.

Acclaimed thinker on health policy Professor Allyson Pollock joins with other leading health campaigners to show why we must rage now against these coalition plans, to avoid despair later.

The film shows the deadly parallels with other privatisations, especially the privatisation of elderly care.

It celebrates the exuberant resistance from the real "big society" as it unites to prevent assault from market forces on our vulnerable and sick.

The Return of Fear is essential viewing, the core values of the NHS, markers of a civilised society, face a shocking attack.

A film by Anne-Marie Sweeney produced for Keep Our NHS Public and Health Emergency.

Wake Up Call DVD

Now available - all three films on DVD

"This film should be seen by all who care about their NHS." - Allyson Pollock (Professor of Health Policy and Author of NHS PLC)

Show this DVD at meetings!

Further details here

Only £10 including postage. Order online via PayPal:

Special FINANCIAL Appeal

Help us campaign to save our NHS!

The NHS faces its biggest-ever threat: a 'double whammy' of massive cuts year by year to 2014, coupled with the Health and Social Care Bill that could wipe out all public sector provision of health services.

The ConDem government has no mandate to transform the National Health Service into a national health market. But if there is no public challenge, the Bill could be forced quickly through Parliament.

Hospital staff have everything to lose and nothing to gain from the proposals which could see tens of thousands of jobs axed, and hundreds of thousands pushed out of the NHS workforce, with new threats to their pay scales and pensions.

Every cutback that is accepted will just encourage desperate employers to come back for more.

It really is do or die for those of us who want to defend the NHS as a public service, and who value the staff who deliver services.

To build a successful campaign requires resources, publicity, time and effort: and until there is a broad popular campaign established with the support of the main health unions, much of the work will fall to organisations like London Health Emergency.

But right now, we don't have the resources to cope.

We need help to keep the issue in the media, and work with local campaigners to get the message across in meetings, protests and local publicity. Just producing and distributing the latest issue of Health Emergency newspaper (out early September) will cost £2000.

We urge any readers or supporting organisations that can do so to make a donation, as large as you can afford, to ensure we have the resources to keep on fighting to scupper Lansley's Bill, keep our NHS intact - and keep it public.

You can donate by cheque (to 'LHE', at BCM London Health Emergency, London WC1N 3XX), or online here.

Pressure group in defence of the NHS

Founded in the autumn of 1983, London Health Emergency is the country's biggest and longest-running pressure group in defence of the NHS.

With over 150 trade union bodies, campaigns and community organisations affiliated at local, regional and national level, and many more subscribers, LHE issues a tabloid newspaper Health Emergency which has a print run of 7,000 and a distribution reaching many parts of England, Scotland and Wales. Health Emergency carries news and comment on the full range of health service policy issues, with a special focus on acute hospital services, mental health services, care of the elderly, and the impact of the government's marketising reforms.

LHE continues to act as a vocal defender of health services in London and across the country. Our Breaking News service carries updates and flags up issues of concern to journalists as well as health activists.

Read more about LHE

Clarification

London Health Emergency was set up by the GLC in 1983, but has received no funding from local government since 1998. It is not linked with any political party or group.

To continue to resource our campaign work we need affiliations and donations from individuals and organisations who support our policies in fighting privatisation and market reforms in the NHS.

Click here to affiliate to LHE or to subscribe to Health Emergency

Keep Our NHS Public

A campaign involving consultants, academics, MPs, trade unions, pensioners groups and campaigners was launched in autumn 2005 to challenge the government's accelerating drive towards privatisation of the NHS.

London Health Emergency, alongside the NHS Support Federation, was actively involved in the launch of this campaign which has endorsement from prominent individuals and trade union organisations and is gathering momentum daily.

For more details, and to register your support online, check out the campaign's website www.keepournhspublic.com