Newsletter – August 2016

Have you signed up yet? - National Conference Challenging the STPs Birmingham, Saturday 17 September, 11am to 4 pm at Carrs Lane Conference Centre B47SX. Come and discuss how to challenge the STPs at a conference that seeks to develop policy as a basis to strengthen and unite our efforts. Open to all, book now here.

KONP Crowd Funding Drive - A massive thank-you to those of you who have already supported our crowd funding drive. To increase the impact of our campaign to fight for a publicly funded, publicly provided and publicly accountable NHS we need funding for a policy and research officer. All NHS campaign groups will be able to use this research in the fight to protect the NHS, not just KONP. If you can support us in reaching our goal please visit our crowdfunder here.

KONP CETA Campaign - At the KONP AGM we passed a unanimous resolution to urgently campaign to stop CETA, the EU-Canada Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement. As part of this campaign KONP is asking local groups and individual members to engage with their MP on the this issue. As we are sure you know, CETA is just as bad as TTIP, but now a much more urgent issue - and will at some point come before the UK Parliament - probably before Brexit actually happens. Please find a letter to send to your MP here. If you get a response, or want help with your lobbying efforts please contact Keith Venables Co-Chair of KONP at [email protected].

The NHS is being starved of sufficient funding in order to justify shutting down essential services like A&E's on "safety grounds" with insufficient staff. If trusts can find enough staff, albeit agency staff, the watchdog NHS Improvement will punish the trusts for overspending. This excellent article by "The Secret Doctor" highlights the dangers that lie ahead if the Government continues to underfund the NHS, cut staff numbers and under-train the nurses and doctors that are employed.

John Lister has also written an excellent article (PDF) on this issue for the Health Campaigns Together Newspaper.