MORE DETAILS and analysis of NHS crisis and campaigns INSIDE pages 4-5 sation" of A&E services on the condemned crumbling site of Watford General, now that plans for a £550m super-hospital have been binned. • In Bolton 132 medical and nursing staff face the axe as health chiefs opt to divert work from the plans. • We have health staff being asked to work for nothing, thousands more losing their jobs, older people told they have to travel much further to access emergency care, specialist mental health services savaged - and platoons of private management consultants laughing all the way to the bank with fat cheques from the NHS in their wallets.
Union leaders, hiding behind their weakest branches, have failed lamentably so far to tap in to the rich vein of public anger that is developing across the country: but despite the inaction at the top, local resistance is beginning to show some results and force delays and retreats on cuts and closures. We have seen important local strikes and strong campaigns that have forced health chiefs to take notice and postpone or scrap some of their
March 3 will reach a peak of what can be achieved at this level of localised mobilisation: but any wider and larger protest requires the backing and resources of the major health unions.
UNISON and other union leaders must be pressed on all sides to build now for a massive national demonstration this summer to give a real idea of the opposition to New Labour's plans. July 5 is the 59th birthday of the NHS: it's a Thursday.
Why not stage another day of action based on NHS workplaces that day, followed by a national march through London on the Saturday? If the unions make the call now, it could be huge.