Agenda item

National Health Service

It was moved by Councillor Geoff Smith, seconded by Councillor Mar Lea, that this Council:-

(a)       notes the recent report by the Kings Fund which provided a damming critique on the Government’s NHS reforms, claiming they have been ‘damaging and distracting’;

(b)       notes that this follows reports last year that the Government did not understand its own NHS reforms, which were described by Government sources as a “total car crash” and a “huge strategic error”;

(c)        regrets that:

(i)         despite promising no top down reorganisation, this Government wasted £3 billion on doing just that, funding which could have been spent on front line services;

(ii)        this Government has laid off 9,000 frontline NHS staff;

(iii)       this Government has cut 9,746 hospital beds;

(iv)       this Government has overseen a crisis in A&E with the worst waiting times for over 10 years; and

(v)        this Government has neglected GP services, with one in four people now having to wait over a week to see their family doctor; and

(d)       believes that Sheffield needs a fresh alternative approach to the NHS and supports the following proposals by Labour:

(i)         provide £2.5 billion additional investment per year into the NHS paid for through higher taxes on tobacco companies and a Mansion Tax on properties worth over £2 million;

(ii)        repeal this Government’s NHS Health and Social Care Act and reverse the damaging changes which have caused such chaos across the health service;

(iii)       recruit 20,000 more nurses, 8,000 more GPs and 3,000 more midwives;

(iv)       guarantee that you can get an appointment at your GP within 48 hours;

(v)        make sure the NHS is exempt from the Transatlantic Trade Investment Partnership, protecting local services from big American companies; and

(vi)       plans to integrate health and social care.

(Note: With the agreement of Council and at the request of the mover of the Motion, Councillor Geoff Smith, paragraph (d) sub-clause (v) of the Motion, as included in the Summons for the meeting, was withdrawn and the numbering of remaining sub-clauses was amended accordingly.)

Whereupon, it was moved by Councillor Roger Davison, seconded by Councillor Denise Reaney, as an amendment, that the Motion now submitted be amended by the deletion of all the words after the words “That this Council” and the addition of the following words:-

(a)       notes the difficult choices faced by the Coalition Government with regards to the NHS due to the previous Government’s irresponsible spending, including:-

(i)         wasting £12.7 billion of tax payers’ money on the national programme for IT, an IT system that was deemed ‘unworkable’ and had to be scrapped; and

(ii)        paying private healthcare firms £1.7 billion to carry out operations within the NHS, £250 million worth for operations that were never actually performed;

(b)       reminds Members of the current situation in Wales where the NHS is falling behind the rest of the UK in almost every measure due to mismanagement by the Welsh Labour Government;

(c)        believes that despite these challenges, the current Government has made remarkable achievements within the NHS, such as:-

(i)         increasing the availability of specialist cancer drugs through the Cancer Drugs Fund;

(ii)        introducing the first ever access and waiting time standards for mental health;

(iii)       increasing access to talking therapies, with £400m investment; and

(iv)       banning the Health Service from paying private firms more than it pays NHS hospitals to carry out procedures;

(d)       notes that in the event of a Liberal Democrat majority in the next Parliament, they would commit the £8 billion by 2020 required for the NHS to meet the increasing demand of population growth and people living longer, according to the Chief Executive of NHS England, Simon Stevens’ recent report; a pledge not yet matched by the Labour or Conservative Parties; and

(e)       welcomes the letter from EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmström confirming that the NHS will be unaffected by the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, specifically that ’there is no reason to fear either for the NHS as it stands today or for changes to the NHS in future, as a result of TTIP or indeed EU trade policy more broadly.’

On being put to the vote, the amendment was negatived.

Whereupon, it was moved by Councillor Jillian Creasy, seconded by Councillor Sarah Jane Smalley, as an amendment, that the Motion now submitted be amended by the deletion of paragraph (d) and the addition of a new paragraph (d) as follows:-

(d)       believes Sheffield needs a fresh alternative approach to the NHS and supports the following:-

(i)         an immediate increase in funding for the NHS to restore it to 2010 levels, followed by annual uplifts to keep pace with inflation and increasing demand, alongside a parallel investment in social care which would relieve pressure on the health service, both to be paid for largely by higher taxes on wealthy individuals and corporations;

(ii)        the NHS Reinstatement Bill which aims to reverse the marketisation of the NHS and restore publicly provided services run by local Health Boards;

(iii)       the creation of 200,000 new jobs in social care and a similar number in health care, with an emphasis on community based roles and mental health;

(iv)       increase the proportion of funding going into primary care and ensure that it is distributed to reflect the needs of the population served;

(v)        respect the NHS pay review body and bring NHS pay back in line with inflation;

(vii)      reject the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership in order to protect all public services, not just the NHS, from big American companies; and

(viii)     integrate health and social care at national and local levels.

On being put to the vote, the amendment was negatived. 

(Note: The Director of Legal and Governance advised that declarations of interest made by Members relating to the NHS pay review would apply in relation to the above amendment, which included a clause concerning the pay review body).

Following a Right of Reply from Councillor Geoff Smith, the original Motion was then put to the vote and carried, as follows:-