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• Unite to announce result of BA cabin crew ballot
• BA cabin crew vote overwhelmingly for strike action
• Birmingham Tory council's 2,000 job cuts ‘a body blow to the city's public services and economy'
• Unite welcomes bus-build motion for Alexander Dennis
• Unite raps NHS plans to shut screening unit as more women take cancer tests thanks to the ‘Jade Goody’ effect
• Staff ‘victory’ as Tower Hamlets backs down over NHS social enterprise plans
• BA strike-breakers misguided say Lufthansa pilots
• Unite's ‘pack less’ campaign bears fruit as HSE agrees to look at risks for baggage handlers
• Tory sums don't add up and the party’s policies don't make sense
• Stop using Cadbury's workers as a political football, Unite tells Midlands Tories

Staff ‘victory’ as Tower Hamlets backs down over NHS social enterprise plans

25th February 2010

Plans by NHS Tower Hamlets to hive off NHS services into a social enterprise have been withdrawn, following large-scale staff protests.

Unite, the largest union in the country, hailed the move as ‘a victory for common sense’ and a tribute to the united stand taken by the employees. The union now wants to work constructively with the trust’s management to strengthen NHS services in one of the most deprived areas in the country.

The trust’s project board informed a staff side meeting that they would be approaching the London Strategic Health Authority and Department of Health to request that the trust remains a direct provider for the next two years.

Unite national officer for health, Karen Reay, said: ”This is a victory for common sense and a tribute to the staff’s united opposition to breaking-up the provision of NHS services. We now wish to work constructively with the management to ensure that NHS-provided services continue to meet the health needs of the ethnically diverse population.“

Unite and other staff side unions will be holding a rally when the trust’s board meets at Aneurin Bevan House, 81 Commercial Rd, E1 at 4.00pm on Thursday, 11 March in support of the decision to remain in the NHS.
 
The decision of NHS Tower Hamlets to row back on its plans for a social enterprise - which are commercial organisations, one step removed from the NHS - comes after the Department of Health’s announcement that the NHS should be ‘the preferred provider’ of choice.

This means that outside providers can only be asked to tender if a trust is deemed to be failing and has not taken remedial measures.

Karen Reay added: ”We will be monitoring how the situation develops in the coming months, as we believe that fragmenting NHS services to organisations, such as social enterprises, will be a disaster for the NHS.”

ENDS