AT FIRST SIGHT it may be effectively hijack the Commhard to see why the Commons ittee's name to mount an Health Committee report on extraordinary, personalised and Binge to the crediin the NHS. published in mid-May, should have been greeted one of the sternest academic critics of PFI, Professor Allyson with delighe by Alan Milburn, and by the various banks, conThe three Labour members opers and service providers of the Committee who proooking to make profits from moted the paragraphs declare themselves "unimpressed" with Much of the report is at least much of the research preImplicitly, and sometimes sented by Professor Pollock and her University College openly, critical of government policy of steadily increas- London's Heath Potcy and Health Services Research growing NHS budget that finds its way But they present no documented argument moth tocke • to refute Prof Pollock's shareholders. committine which have been presented Kult minister eyes were focused on just five key - highly years or so, not only contentious - para- in detailed articles in acagraphs (65-69) of the Report.
bal evidence and an extensive 4,000-word written submission stooge Julia Drown, and adopted on the votes of just to the Committee itself.
To ensure that the political three of the Committee's I! members, with two voting Professor Pollock was made against, in tre tace of opposi tion from chair David clear, the three Labour mem.
bers explicitly argue that: "We found the lack of sound Under cover of Parlamentary analysis from the HPHSRU additionally worrying because it has been the source of advice for many groups including unions and professional associa tions, all of whom have used parts of the Unit's work as a justification for their antagonis. ac atacuoes towards the pri vate sector:" (para 68)
By attacking Allyson Polock, presenting any coherent alternative evidence or argument - to undermine every reacism of PFI, and every organisation which continues to uphold In part this clearly stems from a sense of weak. ness: whie Allyson Pollock's research has won the support of trade unions including UNIthe BMA, and has been published subject to peer review in academic joumals, the goverment has been unable to produce any comparable serious Not one article arguing the for money has been published in arry academic journal -Indeed the only substantial study endorsing PFI was a bla. tantly partisan piece by consulcanes Arthur Andersen, at a time when they were already making large sums of money by acting as advisors in PFI No substantial organisation representing health workers Despite the loud attempts by a minority on the •Committee to frighten off critics of PFI, the remainder of the report underlines widespread popular concerns with the way in which the government is increasing the role of the private sector within the NHS.
Even the section dealing with PF repeatedly cals - in the paragraphs preceding Julia ner and trauren: open.
ness and accountability for more investigation by the Department of Health and/or the National Audit Office, and questions key aspects of the process by which PFI deals nave been clamed to represene "value for money. In addition the opening sec. tion examining the use of pri. vate hospitals to treat NHS Concordat drawn up by Alan Milburn repeatedly questions whether such policies offer alue for money, or threaten to undermine staffing levels in NHS hospitals.
The Committee urges that he Concordat shouk be seen as no more than a temporary measure to bridge a gap in capacity unal his provision. can be expanded - asks Trusts to investigate whether they would find it more cost effec tive to use their own pay beds than buy in operations from private hospitals. dations have been brushed aside contemptuously by minis. cers: indeed Milbur has since stuck up two fingers to the Committee by insisting that the Concordat is a permanent arrangement, secure enough money and invest in extra The Report lends the Committee's support to the of Employment Model" under which most support staff in PFt hospitals would remain in NHS emolay ment, but workunder private management (a deal since conference and the GMB).
But the Committee does not what is supposed to be gained of management?
There is no evidence that this services or patient care, though the opportunity to manage sup. port services offers extra 'profit streams' for the PFi consortia. can be seen as signs of a toothless Committee on which some to be seen to be toeing the line of Labour ministers - in defiance of the warght of evidence before them.
The Report itself with the hallmarks of yet another exercise in control-freakery by minwin the argument. It is a missed chance to draw hard conclusions from a large body of hard facts. It will delight the workers.
new barbarism! Outlook In a stark reminder of the long-term choice for society - between a move forward to socialism or a lurch backwards into barbarism Secretary Geoff Hoon has nailed his Hoon's repeated insistence that Labour - going far further than any previous pared to use nuclear weapons in a preemptive nuclear strike, even on a country which docs not itself have nuclear weapons, will bring warm smiles among George boding to thinking people everywhere.
Hoon's first warning that a new emerging on what appeared to be a largely and almost academic question of the use of weapons originally designed during the cold war to counter an alcaca sovict nuclear "threat", came back in March.
Ouestioned by the COHEISES Committee, Hoon expressed fears that in four "states of concern" (Iraq, Iran, Noria norca) te тскнас ву nos oc acierca from mounting a chemical or biological weapons attack on Britain by the UK's stock of 185 nuclear missiles.
"In those kinds of states, the wishes and and interests of citizens are Clearly much less regarded, and we cannot rule out the possibility that such states would be will. ing to sacrifice their own people to make such a gesture."
Hoon made it clear that in such circumwould be willing to sacrifice those innocent lives on their bebalf:
"They can be absolutely confident that in the right conditions we would be willing to use our nuclear weapons."
H oon's promise to match and exceed the disregard for human displayed by Collowed after the announcement the State Department that the US will now against non-nuclear states which are claimed to be contemplating the use of weapons of mass destruction.
But just a few days after MPs heard the new British policy, the shaky and unreliable basis on which such attacks might be justified was exposed. The alleged "biological and chemical weapons laboratory" Street briefings claimed had been found in and which were used as the New Defence Mad bc. nber: Geoff Hoon Libya and "For that to be Government must be able to express their view that, extreme self defence, nuclear weapons would have to be used." So what, asked Diane Abbott, was "extreme self defence"? Hoon's reply again restated the willingness to push the nuclear button: * accent that sucre are cause whom may well be sitting on the Labour Benches this is not the position of the Government or of the Labour Party. *It is therefore important to point out that the Government have nuclear weapons availconditions to which 1 have refered we would be prepared to use them. Given yet another chance by Tony Lloyd in Saddam the Commons on June 17 to make clear that obediently he was not talking about a preemptive strike, Hoon again refused to do so: 'I have made it clear before how important it is to recognise that they would be used only in what are described as extreme conditions of self defence. does not help the deterrent effect of nuclear weapons to spell out precisely what those circumstances might be. Worse, Hoon went on to claim that "nuclear weapons would be used proportionately and consistenty with our obligations in interna al-Qaeda, tional law:" course not explained. followed with nuclear annihilation. a deterrent, a British ultimately, and in conditions of generation of smaller some of bunkers. who do not believe in the use of in any circumstances, but action. in certain specified activist used to know? blast would blind I want to emphasise that it Exactly how Hoon imagines that the mass slaughter of a nuclear strike can e carried our "proportionately" is of The legality of the threat is also in doubt: under the UN Charter, both pre-emptive action and even retallatory action to isolated attacks are illeThe nuclear non-proliferation treaty also hinges on the joint pledge made in 1978 by the US, Britain and the Soviet Union never to use nucicat weapons against non-nuclear states. But George Bush is into tearing up tienes Consta Way ors new, fearsome US war-drive that has on the September 11 events. ane Aba Ircaty bas occh scrapped to make war for the "star wars" project, which in turn would (if successful) enable the US radius? with impunity to threaten any other country Washington has openly threatened war and possible nuclear A while nuclear scientists are bard at work on a new casual use against "hardened" targets like Afghan caves or Saddam's Trailing behind the US offensive comes Tony Blair's fawning team of lap-dogs, cager for an invitation to be part of any military spineless Some of today's Labour ministers have in recent memory been members of CND: some like foreign office minister Peter Hain, still are. As they allow themselves to be pulled by Hoon and Blair into an indefensible policy, can they all have forgotten the gruesome facts that every CND unions, Can they be unaware that even a one mega- work, the vatonise cycty living being for a six mile radius? That the light from the people and animals for ten drive, The huge firestorm that will follow the explosion, the radiation burns and subsequent sickness that will spread and kill tens of thousands under the fallout zone, carried by the wind for hundreds of square miles puise that will wipe out electric power supteam packed their bags and headed infrastructure over an even wider To use nuclear weapons is to unleash genocide - and wreak indescribably environmental damase for generations to come.
nuclear strike can never be a "proresponse to anything. There can he no mustification for using such weapons cither preemptively or as a retaliation. How does Hoon imagine British and other ministers can hope convince the governments of india and Pakistan to set aside the threat to use these instruments of barbarism while the leading western powers are openly Socialists can't sit idly by in the vague hope that good sense will prevail, or that hitherto Blairite ministers will return their CND past and challenge this latest Labour Party members need to fight this hijacking of the Party to embrace a crazy, irresponsible policy that nobouy bus cret been asked to vote for. We need to raisc now, within the trade wider and in and-war campare demand that ministers renounce Far from stoking the fires of the US war international labour movement should be secking to build links with US workers to oppose the star wars programme, nuclear weapons rescarch and Bush's massive mintary burra-up Hoon's line shows that if this fight is not stepped up, New Labour really could unleash unspeakable horrors on the world.
81% said Labour had falled to