A RETIRED GP has mobilised 150 local people to join a national campaign urging the Government not to sell off the NHS as part of a US trade agreement.
The People's NHS has been lobbying people up and down the country to join its movement to convince the Government to veto the NHS from the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership trade agreement.
People from Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Avenues in Chelmsford have joined the group, displaying 150 signs between them in their gardens and asking local MP Simon Burns to lobby the Prime Minister on their behalf.
The pleas come as NHS services in Essex have been buckling under the strain of increased patient numbers and staff shortages, with Broomfield Hospital begging patients to seek alternatives to A&E recently, Colchester A&E last month declaring a major incident, and news that Springfield walk-in centre will close next year.
"The campaign's success in Chelmsford is demonstrated by people's willingness to display the boards in their gardens", explained Ron Singer, 66, a retired GP, who is part of The People's NHS and was asked to support the Chelmsford campaign.
"Local and national campaigns are both important and we support each other where we can. There is a network right across the country. The boards have been in hundreds of places in the UK."
TTIP is being negotiated between the EU and the United States. It is the biggest bilateral trade deal ever negotiated and could open up the NHS, as well as other public services, to companies from the United States.
This could mean the privatisation of the NHS, and could give US multinationals, or any firm with American investors, new rights to sue the UK Government if it ever tried to take privatised health services back into public hands.
"There is a real resonance on the doorstep, for people to have these boards on their property is amazing, with just two or three weeks of door-knocking," Mr Singer continued.
"When I was in Chelmsford, people thanked us for taking an interest. When you explain that the NHS is essentially being put up for sale, people are shocked and the preparedness to advertise our banners is that they had not been informed of any of this."
