The best birthday present the NHS could have had this year is the NHS Bill, written by Professor Allyson Pollock and Peter Roderick, to restore it to a full public service, after 30 years of incremental steps to privatisation.
The NHS Reinstatement Bill Group were expecting Eleanor Smith, MP for Wolverhampton South West to table the Bill in the House of Commons on 11th July 2018. Eleanor Smith, an NHS nurse for 40 years before she became an MP in 2017, is passionate about this issue.
Yesterday morning she informed us that this will not now happen. We understand that this was the result of the shadow health team vetoing it.
Chair of the Group and co-author of the Bill, Professor Allyson Pollock said:
“We are deeply disappointed and somewhat shocked that the shadow health team is not backing the bill. It was voted for unanimously as policy by Labour Conference in 2017 and has been supported for a number of years by Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell. The Health Select Committee has suggested that primary legislation is needed for the NHS, so surely this is the moment for Labour to be championing a public service bill. Otherwise we are at risk of government legislation bringing in the US-style organisational structure of Integrated Care, which NHS campaigners are vigorously opposing.”