NHS: self-sufficiency is the answer [Print version]
Health services have relied on imported workers for too long. It is unethical and in the long term unproductive.
NHS
NHS
Hospital staff stop employment transfer bid
Unison, GMB and Unite members have stopped plans by a major acute NHS hospital in Berkshire and Surrey to transfer more than a thousand of its staff out of NHS employment.
Nursing shortages: the answer lies closer to home
Instead of draining other countries of their trained nurses, we should be taking steps to increase the number here who qualify – and the number who stay in the profession.
NHS training body still looking outside Britain
30 May 2019
The body responsible for educating and training the NHS workforce in England is still fixated on importing labour from abroad.
Outsourced hospital workers win rise after May Day strike
8 May 2019
Striking NHS catering workers at two Yorkshire hospitals won a victory on 3 May after a global outsourcing giant agreed a wage rise after walking out on 1 May.
Overdue questions for the NHS
Change is in the air in the NHS, with its most senior managers reportedly pressing for repeal of the destructive Health and Social Care Act. And there are new calls to stop looting doctors and nurses from abroad…
Reunite the NHS
18 March 2019
There are positive signs that fragmentation of the NHS in England is coming to an end. Professional bodies, unions and others are unanimous that the 2012 Health and Social Care Act should go.
NHS plan: still not fit for purpose
The government published its overdue NHS Long Term Plan for England in January. There’s significant spending – but several critical weaknesses…
The NHS at 70: all to play for
It’s been bruised and battered by cuts, reorganisations and privatisations. But little by little workers are ensuring that the integrated service is being put back together and there is a real prospect that it can be rebuilt…
Plan now for NHS workforce
For the first time in almost 25 years the health service in England has set about producing a Workforce Strategy.
Nurses: time to take charge
6 August 2017
There is certainly a nurse staff crisis in the NHS but it is not Brexit-induced – says one of the staffing agencies which are making a tidy fortune from the crisis.
With the single market, why train at all?
The EU Mutual Recognition of Professional Qualifications Directive – or MRPQ – is a fundamental component of the Single Market. It allows professionals to have their qualifications, obtained in one member state, recognised in another.
So why are we relying on EU healthcare staff?
Do British workers really not want to work in the NHS? No, they want to, but they struggle first to find the money to train, then to live on the wages. And have been reluctant to fight for pay…
Doctors fighting for the NHS
5 September 2016
Hospital doctors have begun a new phase of action in response to the government’s attempt to impose new contracts. Strikes planned for the autumn will take place unless the government halts the imposition and restarts meaningful talks.
'Almighty mess' of NHS privatisation
11 July 2016
The NHS’s Primary Care Support Services were privatised in April, transferred to multinational profit-sucker Capita, along with over a thousand workers – and things have not gone well.
The other referendum - junior doctors vote on contract
1 July 2016
Voting ends today (1 July) in the "Members Referendum" of junior doctors on whether to accept the terms negotiated by their union, the British Medical Association, to settle their long-running dispute with the government over seven-day working.
Energy - Grid turns to the NHS
National Grid, the company responsible for balancing supply and demand, is recruiting cash-starved NHS hospitals to fire up their emergency generators and turn down their air conditioning systems when power supplies are scarce.
Vote Leave to protect Newcastle's NHS, says former union official
14 June 2016
The former trade union official who led a key strike at Newcastle’s Royal Victoria Infirmary in the 1980s has contacted CPBML News calling on the staff and the public to vote to Leave – to save the NHS.
Cancer unit closure blocked
5 May 2016
Trade union Unison has managed to put the closure of a major cancer unit on hold – keeping, for the time being, a vital treatment centre run which serves over a million people.
Doctors united
2 May 2016
The dispute over the junior hospital doctors’ contract has escalated further, with well supported strikes on 26 and 27 April. All health secretary Jeremy Hunt managed was an ill-advised attempt to paint doctors as the aggressors.
Junior doctors carry on as government cracks appear
8 April 2016
Striking doctors have been manning picket lines and engaging with the public in the latest rounds of their battle against the imposition of new contracts.
Hospital HR passes the buck
28 February 2016
Under the guise of “employee relations advice”, King’s College Hospital Trust has implemented a glorious modern-day example of how to undermine a union.
Better ways of preparing the next generation of nurses
2 February 2016
The only good thing to have arisen from chancellor George Osborne’s plan to institutionalise debt for student nurses and other health students is a debate about what is wrong with the current system.
Hospital in deficit? Just work for free...
22 January 2016
With the Princess Royal University Hospital in Kent running a huge deficit, its ruling Trust has asked staff to volunteer to work for nothing
Ambulance emergency
In November the Care Quality Commission gave the London Ambulance Service its lowest rating. What’s going on? And what is the way forward?
Remnants of Primary Care Support Services handed to Capita
2 July 2015
NHS England decided at the end of June to transfer almost a thousand workers involved in the “back office” functions of GP services to private company Capita in September.
The NHS - for sale all over Europe
22 February 2015
THE NHS in England is now advertising across the private sector in the European Union to sell off the “back office” or administrative functions of GP practices.