march assembles
setting off (with PLO intruding)
happy birthday
waterloo bridge
RIP
barclays strand banner drop
downing street
chanting
home-made banners
whitehall
speakers
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at the end of april, a crucial lords vote (245 to 146) failed to throw out 'section 75' (of the health and social care act). this regulation requires the NHS to put ALL its services to tender unless the commissioners can prove there is only one provider capable of delivering (any such decision being open to costly legal challenge from private healthcare companies).
many believe that the legislation will lead to the gradual but wholesale privatisation of the UK healthcare system, and after 65 years of NHS it marks the retirement of public healthcare. additionally, the legislation has been devised and passed with little or no democratic mandate and in fact breaks firm promises and assurances that ministers have given. the full scope of the new act has received little analysis and coverage from mainstream media, and the unions, while offering lip-service to resistance, have failed to provide any real opposition to the government's plans.
yesterday then, marked a huge achievement for a small grassroots group calling themselves 'NHSdirectaction' who have brought together local health campaigns, doctors, trade unionists, concerned residents, and the 'occupy' movement, and managed mainly through social media to pull together a very impressive london march and rally in protest at the new legislation.
a little after midday, i guessed there were maybe a thousand people gathered behind the royal festival hall, but more and more kept arriving, and when the march set off across waterloo bridge at 1pm, it was clear that this was big. i waited more than fifteen minutes for the whole march to pass, and heard that the front of the march was already in the strand before the end had set off .
working my way through the crowd what was also clear was the breadth and scope of the protest, representing a huge range of ages and cultural backgrounds from all over london. the presence of many and varied local campaign groups showed how the cuts and changes are already impacting services all over the capital, signalled by the home-made banners mentioning dozens of different hospitals and other services.
on the strand, two protestors had targetted a barclay's bank branch by climbing scaffolding to attach a large banner 'barclay's - PFI bleeding the NHS dry'. with a megaphone, they were addressing the crowd, leading chants, and generally making a lot of noise. two police vans turned up, but the protestors later climbed down and were allowed to leave with no further action.
meanwhile, the front of the march arrived at downing street, and a small plinth and a van with sound system provided the stage for a variety of speakers while a massive 'save our NHS' banner was held up in front of the gates.
while the speeches took place, a petition was delivered to number 10.
the theme of many of the speakers was to build a grassroots coalition of local groups to resist the changes, while also calling on unions to wake up and provide national resistance.
a little after 3, the protest ended and slowly dispersed. policing had been fairly low-key, but there were two PLOs, (protest liaison officers) intruding and gathering information as they do, and some covert FIT (forward intelligence team) officers in attendance too.
nhsdirectaction can be followed on twitter @NHSDirectAction and upcoming events are viewable at
http://defendlondonsnhs.wordpress.com/upcoming-events/ for occasional live reports from london actions follow @indyrikki
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