Category Archives: Social fairness

NHS on highway to hell? Conflict of interest question hangs over £515m ambulance contract

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A key employee at West & South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw Commissioning Support Unit is at the centre of allegations that the CSU has failed to uphold public service values. Together with a private company whose director also works for the WSYBCSU, the CSU is commissioning a £515m 5 year urgent care ambulance service.

Sarah Fatchett, who has been Chief Operating Officer at the CSU & has led the CSU’s IT services since the CSU was set up, is also a founding director of 365 Response Limited, a company founded in 2012 to manage urgent care ambulance services. As of August 2013, it had £300 capital.
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National crisis in A&E is being felt in Calderdale and Huddersfield hospitals

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At its meeting on Thursday 14th November, Calderdale Clinical Commissioning Group’s Governing Body faced questions from the public about A&E.

Presenting his Report, the Chief Officer, Dr Matt Walsh, said that the national crisis in Accident and Emergency (A&E) is being felt in the Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust (CHFT).
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Public Meeting of NHS Calderdale Clinical Commissioning Group 2pm, Weds 14th November.

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Calderdale Clinical Commissioning Group’s Governing Body will meet will in public, 2-4pm on Wednesday 14th November at Dean Clough,  Shibden Meeting Room.

This is on the 5th floor of F Mill, Dean Clough, Halifax HX3 5AX.

Members of Calderdale NHS 38 Degrees will attend, as usual. Calderdale NHS 38 Degrees are meeting at 1pm on Thursday 14th November, one hour before the CCG meeting, in the little cafe next to the the NHS headquarters at Dean Clough.

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New NHS head Simon Stevens is key player in private healthcare network

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Simon Stevens, the new NHS England head, is one of the key folk who’s been responsible for driving private healthcare companies’ capture of UK governments and the NHS.

Simon Stevens was formerly president of US/global private healthcare company United Health. Before that, he was involved in the private health care advocacy think tank Kings Fund, and was central to New Labour‘s NHS privatising reforms.

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Coalition seeks to change law so it can shut A&E and hospitals without consultation

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Reposted from OpenDemocracy under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 licence.

Commenting on the article’s report that last-minute amendments to the Care Bill would allow the Coalition government to shut down A&E departments and hospitals without proper public consultation, Ken Cheslett, Chair of Calderdale 38 degrees NHS campaign group said,

“This is reminiscent of this goverment’s high handed approach to the huge opposition to its Health and Social Care Act, whereby the wishes and needs of local people are overruled in favour of the profit motive.”

 

CAROLINE MOLLOY 16 October 2013

The government is trying to push through a last minute change to the law to make it far easier to shut down A&E departments and hospitals without full consultation.

Amendments tabled yesterday to the Care Bill – due to have its third reading in the Lords on Monday – give the government or Monitor the right to order any hospital they like to ‘reconfigure’ – in other words, close  – with little consultation, to benefit neighbouring struggling hospitals.
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Does Labour really plan to reverse NHS privatisation?

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What exactly is the Labour Party’s position on safeguarding the NHS as a publicly owned service that provides universal health care free at the point of need?

This is going to be a crucial issue in the 2015 General Election.

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NHS England knows nothing of Care UK contracts for Todmorden and Halifax walk in health centres

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NHS England says it does not have information about the Care UK contracts for Todmorden and Halifax Walk In Health Centres.

When I put in a Freedom of Information request to Calderdale CCG last July, they passed much of it on to NHS England. This was because Calderdale CCG had inherited the Care UK contracts from the Calderdale Primary Care Trust but, unaccountably, didn’t have information about them and thought that NHS England would know.

NHS England has now replied that they too know nothing about the Care UK Contracts for the Tod and Halifax Walk in Health Centres, and has suggested that I contact the legacy team at the Department of Health.
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#BMI Healthcare funds private #NHS policy seminars at #Tory and #Labour Conferences

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Yesterday, Changing More Than Lightbulbs reported that private healthcare company BMI has funded a private, invitation-only NHS policy seminar at the LibDem conference. This led us to conclude that a vote for the LibDems was likely to be a vote sold to private healthcare companies.

Today, thanks to info from a CMTL contributor, we can report that BMI is also funding private, invitation-only NHS policy seminars at the Labour and Tory Conferences. So in the interests of fairness, it is only right to conclude that a vote for Labour or Tories will also be a vote sold to private healthcare companies.
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