Today, the Green Party will launch a powerful bid to influence the health agenda towards the next general election.
The Green New Deal for the NHS proposes an extra £500m a year for maternity servces, plus £1.8bn a year for dental care. Most of this would be paid for by savings of £1bn on getting rid of Independent Sector Treatment Centres, and a further £1bn or more saved by scrapping the health care market.
There would be one-off costs of £1bn for reorganisation and at least £12bn to buy back the private finance initiatives, but liberating the NHS from PFI payments would save £1bn a year. So the Green New Deal for the NHS would pay for itself in the medium term, say the Greens.
On maternity services, the Greens' £500m stimulus would create a single-tier approach for all mothers:
* A wider range of birth choices - including home birth for all women who want it.
* All women to be entitled to support from a single midwife throughout each pregnancy.
* A major recruitment drive for midwives.
* Medical interventions to be significantly reduced.
* Culture change throughout the NHS so that birth is treated as a normal event - not an illness - in which mothers are empowered and able to be in control.
The extra £1.8bn a year for dentistry would restore the principle of dental care free at the point of access, with an end to the severe difficulties many people are now facing in attempting to find an NHS dentist.
Dignity, compassion and accountability
But improving the health service isn't just about wise spending and better access to services, say the Greens. The Green New Deal for the NHS would also improve the accountability of those services, along these lines:
* The NHS to be accountable to local government and thus to local people.
* An end to the purchaser/provider split so that public health, service planners and providers of care are under local government.
* The NHS to have centrally-defined minimum standards and national agreement on which treatments are available.
* Local people and clinicians to have a real say in how and where these services are delivered.
Finally the Green New Deal for the NHS would restore and develop a culture of dignity and compassion in the UK's health service, the Greens say:
* Health services must meet the needs of patients, not the needs of the market and corporate shareholders.
* Maternity care must meet the needs of women and their babies.
* Patients suffering with poor mental health must get a real say in the way they are treated. They must be told their diagnosis and must be able to set advance directives that spell out what type of care they want when they are ill.
* There must be legislation to prevent discrimination against people with mental illness.
Caroline Lucas MEP, Green Party leader - who is widely tipped to become the first Green MP at Westminster in the next general election - said today: "We need to protect and improve the National Health Service, and we need to stop it being used as a vehicle for private profit. We believe the public wants this too. So we're throwing down the gauntlet to the other parties, to match the Green Party's commitment to the NHS."
Note
1. The report can be found at [http://www.greenparty.org.uk/reports][1]
New Green Party policy report to reveal some startling new figures on NHS dentistry:
* 55% of NHS practices are not taking new patients
* Little more than two-thirds of children visit NHS dentists - and it's getting worse
* Access to NHS dentistry is down to "geographical accident"
A new policy report to be launched this week by the Green Party will reveal startling new figures on the state of NHS dentistry, based on Freedom of Information Act research.
And the new report - A Green New Deal for the NHS - will show that just £1.8 billion a year would make NHS dentistry "a service that Britain can be proud of."
The report will show that:
* Between 55% and 60% of NHS practices are not taking new NHS patients.
* Access to NHS dentists can range from 1 dentist per 1,000 people - to as little as one-quarter of that, depending on where people live.
* Some Primary Care Trusts have no NHS dentists taking on new patients.
* The percentage of children who visited NHS dentists fell from 70.7% in March 2006 to 69.0% in June 2008.
* Less than half of the adult population is accessing NHS dentistry, and the numbers are continuing to decline.
Green Party health spokesperson Stuart Jeffery said today:
"The dental service received £2.1 billion of direct funding in 2007/08. If the current NHS dental service was provided free at the point of use, the total cost to the NHS would increase by £531m to a total of £2.6 billion.
"If the NHS wanted to provide free dentistry to 75% of the population (from the current 50%, assuming that some people will want to remain private), the total level of funding would need to increase from £2.6 billion to £3.9 billion. As the NHS currently provides £2.1 billion, an increase in funding of £1.8 billion would be required for patients to have dentistry free at the point of access.
"It seems little to ask to restore NHS dentistry to what it should be - a service that Britain can be proud of."
The full report _A Green New Deal for the NHS_ will be published later this week.
URL: http://www.greenparty.org.uk/news/2009-04-13-dentistry.html
Published and promoted by Tracy Dighton-Brown for the Green Party of England & Wales, both at 1a Waterlow Road, London N19 5NJ.
This is from the excellent NHS Support Federation:
From NHS Support Federation, a founder organisation of Keep Our NHS Public
NHS services are now to be provided by a wide range of organisations all competing within a market. The new Co-operation and Competition Panel for NHS-funded services is to help deliver the supposed benefits of competition. It will investigate potential breaches of the Principles and Rules as defined by the Department of Health. It will also advise the Department of Health and the foundation trust regulator Monitor. The Co-operation and Competition Panel is a misnomer as its remit is weighted so heavily in favour of promoting competition, whilst neglecting the considerable benefits of cooperation.
We need your help to respond forcefully to the Panel's current consultation and to lobby MPs. Please write a letter objecting to the imposition of competition and commercial values on the NHS and raising the crucial questions listed below. Send your letter to the Co-operation and Competition Panel at the address below and a copy to your MP.
NHS Support Federation
