NHS England is trying to defy the working class’s historic referendum vote to leave the EU by applying new EU rules to the procurement of up to £15 billion of specialised services contracts. The contracts are advertised in the Official Journal of the European Union in 278 contract lots, and any company anywhere in the EU can bid for a slice of the NHS.
Specialised contracts include services such as specialised cancer treatments, diagnostics, cardiac and renal care, secure inpatient mental health services, and treatments for life threatening genetic disorders. Provocatively, NHS England also notes that they might award contracts for longer than the normal two years – so they might run even after Britain has left.
Nine-year contract?
One example is a contract published today (27 October) for the administration of research and coordinating centres for the National Institute for Health Research. Worth an estimated £252 million, the contract is for a period of five years – with an option to extend for a further four years!
Simultaneously, Sustainability and Transformation Plans (STPs) are being finalised and published around England. Doctors, nurses and other health professionals hoped that STPs might be an opportunity to bring back some planning into the system, which has been prey to the anarchy of the market ever since the introduction of the purchaser-provider split.
The anarchy – with additional chaos from European contractors – might be with us for years more, if we allow it. We left the EU on 23 June. Its writ no longer runs.