Unite believes Andy Burnham should be congratulated for his decision to ensure that the NHS is given ‘preferred provider’ status, as it shows he has listened to the professionals that the NHS, not the private or not-for-profit sector, is best placed to provide health services.
He has listened to the dangers presented by a healthcare system that is fragmented into a myriad of organisations competing for contracts, rather than cooperating to provide the best care for patients.
As well as representing staff in the NHS, Unite represents workers in the not-for-profit sector. So we know that the not-for-profit sector cannot provide the stability needed for health provision due to the short-term nature of its funding, its high staff turnover, and its race to the bottom on staff pay and terms and conditions.
As we have seen in the provision of services for children, charities do not share best practice as they compete with each other over contracts.
There is also no guarantee that, where not-for-profit organisations win contracts at the beginning of this outsourcing process, they will hang on to those contracts next time round. We are then left with the very real danger of American health care multinationals honing into our health service to extract maximum profits.
We believe that charities do have a place in the health service, but as add-on services such as MacMillan Nurses. Healthcare should be provided by a publicly accountable and comprehensive NHS.
Andy Burnham has turned his back on the dogmatic approach that says anything is better than the public sector. He should be applauded for that.
Yours sincerely,
Rachael Maskell, National Officer, Not-for-profit
Karen Reay, National Officer, Health sector