On 1 March a meeting of the Eastern Health Board was held to decide if the new children’s hospital was to be built under PFI. This followed a previous joint meeting four weeks earlier by senior management from the RVH trust and union activists where the decision was made to reject the introduction of PFI into the Royal Hospitals.
It was clear at 1 March meeting that PFI was to be included, with the staff to be retained within the NHS under the retention of employment model. However, this could be over turned by the newly in-coming Health Minister at any stage.
What was beyond belief was when Sinn Fein’s Tom Hartley, a senior party activist and non-executive member of the health board, voted in favour of PFI. This is in stark contrast to SF’s declared public position of opposition to privatisation of the NI health service.
When challenged at the meeting by UNISON activists, he refused to comment other than stating PFI would be good for the NI economy. The question remains for Sinn Fein to answer, are they privately in favour of privatisation of the health service while securing working class votes by publicly saying something different to the electorate?
Of course it is not just Sinn Fein who are in practice supporting privatisation. All the main parties, behind closed doors support the decisions outlined in their 2002 Strategic Re-investment and Reform Initiative, which includes privatisation.
The PFI initiative in the Royal Hospitals is only the beginning of the attack on the public sector. We will see the Royal Hospital paying a private company an average lease of £35 million per year for 25 years. This is more than would have been paid if the RVH had borrowed the money itself.
In all there are ten proposed PFI projects for the health service, involving a massive £300 million.
For health workers the consequence will be job losses and low wages as the PFI contractors drive down existing employment conditions and also offer subcontracts to their own subsidiaries.
It is imperative that socialists, grassroots trade union activists and community groups begin to agitate and increase awareness in their workplace and community. This can be done by organising a region–wide cross community campaign that would include mass protests as well as industrial action to halt the privatisation of our public services.
