hoolet issue 51

Spring 2007

Chris Johnstone Intro
Hamish MacLaren's Cross Words
What is Scotland For?
I Am Woman, Hear Me Snore
On Being Opinionated
NHS24 Under-5's Survey
The Dangers of Auto-inflation
Lost in Time
Lesley Morrison in Faslane
Kathleen Long Goes Under
Review: Bad Medicine

Enough and No More

By Chris Johnstone
Contact the editor by e-mail at christopher.johnstone@ntlworld.com

I had the privilege of attending a meeting in Glasgow recently to celebrate Julian Tudor Hart’s impending 80th birthday and the publication of his latest book. Over a hundred people gave up most of a Saturday to hear him and a variety of luminaries speak on the state of general practice and the NHS at the moment. It was intellectually rigorous and very stimulating, but also quite depressing. Depressing because I was in a room with what felt like like-minded people and most of what we stood for and believed in was being taken away in the ever-accelerating decline of health services under New Labour.

Julian Tudor Hart was a shining light to show that it does not have to be this way. Despite hearing of how PFI/PPP is putting us and our children in hock to the tune of billions, despite being shown that inequalities were worsening, despite being shown that GPs are not only cost-effective, but also need more time and resources, despite all this he gave hope that with determination and strength we change what the current direction of the NHSiS and possibly the whole of Scotland.

I was further privileged to take part in a campaign to stop a private company being the first in Scotland to run a GP practice. I attended three public meetings at Harthill and was astonished at the level of public involvement and knowledge of the local populace about the issues. They know that private firms mean lower wages, poorer services and worse working conditions. They know that the care they would receive would most likely get worse. At each meeting the public feeling was overwhelmingly against privatisation, but many people left and said to me that it did not matter how much they said, the Health Board was not listening. They felt defeated before they had lost. They feel that the government is not listening to the people, it has its own agenda and will bulldoze through its wishes without any real debate. But the Health Board did listen and the public got what they wanted. The people of Harthill showed that standing up and being counted can make a difference. So far no practice in Scotland has been privatised, yet.

During the run up to the vote about Harthill, I had the dubious pleasure of appearing on TV. The debate about Harthill was added to a programme about PFI in Lanarkshire and I got to say my piece to a wider audience. Many of my patients were then pleased to let me know they had seen me on the telly and how much fatter i looked than in real life.. More encouraging was the fact that everyone who spoke to me said that they agreed with what I had said. I had many conversations about privatising the health service and especially practices. My poor receptionists were driven demented as I ran even later than usual. People are well informed, unhappy about what was happening and feel powerless to do anything about it. I also work in a mental hospital for one session a week and again I was recognised by many of the staff as the GP on the telly. Again there was overwhelming support for what I had said and that what Labour was doing to the NHS is a disgrace. Many other GPs emailed me and asked how they could get involved.

One thing we can all do if we disagree with the present trend to move more of the NHS into private hands is to join Keep Our NHS Public. This growing group of activists is not attached to any political party and campaigns against privatisation and monitors what is happening around the country. Julian Tudor Hart writes about KONP in his new book as the type of movement which may actually hand power back to the people and make government look at how it is behaving and maybe change it, if not by changing its mind, maybe by changing who runs our country.

Our Parliament is much more democratic than down south and if a consultation paper gets turned into a bill and is supported by 17 MSPs it has to be debated. In Scotland a consultation paper is being prepared prior to the election. This paper is called ’Patients not Profits’ and I will put a link to it on the hoolet web site when it is published. The consultation paper proposes that the law which allows GP surgeries in Scotland to be run by private firms be changed, so that only Health Boards or GP partnerships can provide GMS or PMS services. This was the case up until our new GP contract when the BMA negotiated away our NHS right to run GP surgeries in exchange for out of hours and weekends. This change in who is allowed to run GP surgeries was never discussed publicly and is not wanted by the majority of the public, our patients. So if you want to get involved, speak with your MSPs and those standing to be your MSPs in our new parliament. Ask them what they think about the changes in the NHS and whether they would support a bill to stop private firms running GP practices. Let your patients know about the consultation paper and get them to let their MSPs know about it. If this is what we want we can make it happen. We just have to want it enough.

Patients Not Profits:
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/business/bills/pdfs/mb-consultations/PatientsNotProfitConsultation.pdf

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