The Good News

Hi,

Many, many apologies for the length of time between my 'weekly' blogs, (maybe that should read 'weakly' blogs) but it has been totally hectic at NUHT!!

The Treatment Centre contract has been awarded to Circle for another 5 years and this means that 100's of NHS staff will now be transferred out of the NHS to work for a private company, whether they want to or not!!

The Trust is continuing with it's plan to invite private companies to tender to run it's Estates & Facilities services and this could also mean 100's of staff being transfered to numerous private companies, again against their will!!

If that is not enough ,Medilink bus drivers now face being transfered to Nottingham Community Transport, as they will be running the service within the next few weeks!!

The Trust will reduce it's payment for this service from £1.115m to £600,000 per year. The Trust already makes £150,000 profit from car parking so this will immediately rise to a profit of £665,000.

Despite this the Trust Board has taken the decision to raise car parking fees for it's staff.

We aren't sheep so why are we being fleeced?

The Government tries to tell us that private companies running NHS services will benefit patients but how can healthcare be adequately by provided by companies who's sole interest is to make money?

So now for the good news....erm...sorry i haven't got any!!

LHS,

Bennie

'Market Testing'

Hi Blog Fans,

I have had lots of enquiries about the posting of my next blog, the delay has been caused by the large workload coming through to us since the turn of the New Year but here is the next installment.

When is privatisation not privatisation?

This is, of course, a trick question because privatisation is ALWAYS privatisation, whatever name management decide to give it!!

Our Trust is going through 'market testing' to find out if the in-house service is best value for money. This is happening throughout Estates & Facilities.
Unfortunately the Trust has decided that even if the in-house service is the best, private companies will be allowed to tender for the services which we currently provide.
This means that a host of private companies could be running cleaning and catering, or any other services that the Trust provides, within a few months.

This will have major repercussions for our members and for our patients.

History tells us that private companies running NHS services has not been a good.

They will be allowed to pay whatever they deem fit, almost certainly the National Minimum Wage, which is significantly lower than NHS pay rates.

Private companies will not have to abide by the same Sickness targets that the Trust is expected to meet.

Our 'unelected' Government is considering allowing private companies in the NHS to be exempt from paying tax on their profits... another example of 'all being in this together'!!

The Trust Board does have the power to ensure there is a level playing field during the tendering process and this must be exercised to ensure fairness and equity.

We will be making the opposition of privatisation at NUH our main priority in 2013.

On a completely seperate subject matter, can anyone answer the following question:
Scientists tell us that there is a 10billion to 1 chance that our DNA profile would be incorrect but there are only 7billion humans on the planet, so where do the other 3billion profiles come from?

LHS,

Bennie