Join Our Campain to Save Cornwall’s Health Services from Devastating Tory Cuts
- Save Our NHS – Sign and Share the Petition
- Leafleting event and Demonstration on NHS Campaign Day, Saturday 26th November in Lisekard
- Write to your MP or local Councillor urging them to support this initiative and to commit to building a better NHS
- Come to one of the public Meetings being held in Liskeard on @ 7.00pm on 5th December and Gunnislake on 6th December – details below
UNPRECEDENTED CUTS to our local health services are threatened by new Sustainability and Transformation Plans (STPs). The level of cuts required in Cornwall to eliminate the deficit is likely to be £277million by 2020/21. Several community health services have already lost funding and face closure.
Underfunding the NHS is a political choice: Government could choose to fund it in line with comparable developed countries.
Privatisation is costly: having a market in healthcare costs £4.5 billion a year. Without this there would be no need for cuts.
Together we can act: to stop these plans being drawn up behind our backs, because our elected councillors will be scrutinising them. Let’s make our voices heard and tell them we need more resources for community-based care, but not at the cost of cuts elsewhere:
- NO to closure of community hospitals
- NO to reduction in community beds
- NO to closure of minor injury units or GPs surgeries
- NO to reduction in access to treatment
- NO to job losses
WHAT YOU CAN DO
- These cuts concern everyone – please forward this post to your friends and share our events on facebook.
- Sign our petition and find out more at:
www.laboursecornwall.org.uk/save_our_nhs - Help make sure the public are aware: Join us leafleting in Lisekard. Meet at the Parade, PL14 6AH on Saturday 26th November between 10.00am – 2.00pm as part of Labour’s National Campaign Day or order leaflets for your local street or event
- Attend one of our public meetings:
Liskeard – Eliot House Hotel, Castle St, Liskeard
Monday 5 December, 7pm with speaker Dr. Jan Macfarlane
Gunnislake – Tamar Valley – Methodist Centre, Albaston, Gunnislake
Tuesday 6 December 7pm with speaker from Save Our Hospital Services - Join our protest outside the NHS Kernow meeting in St Cleer on Tuesday 6 December, 9.30 – 10.30 am
- Write to your MP or local Councillor urging them to support this initiative and to commit to building a better NHS
More info on STPs and this campaig can be found at:
- Resource Pack produced by joint health campaigns
- Save Our Hospital Services website – North Devon campaignCornwall Council are due to publish the Outline Business Case of the Cornwall STP and start a public consultation on 28 November. It should appear on this page. You can respond to the consultation direct – or contact your local councillor.
May Election Results Confirm Labour Revival Now Underway in South West
RESULTS IN THE elections held last week confirm an upsurge in the Labour vote across the South West Region. Commenting on the outcome, Local Branch Secretary, Phil Spurr, said: “It shows the extent of Labour support across the region despite the appalling treatment the Party has received from the media in the run up to the May elections.”
Outstanding election results for Labour in the South West
Spurr added: “Labour successes included an outstanding campaign by Gareth Derrick in the Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) election where he came within 1% of winning and a Labour landslide in the Exeter City Council elections.” In Plymouth Labour outperformed all expectations although not gaining an overall majority.
Posts flooded in on Gareth Derrick’s facebook page congratulating him on the result. Labour supporter Cerys Hartt enthused: “Gareth you are an absolute Labour Hero. You came within a hair’s breadth of taking this against the Tory. This is a wake up call for everyone who thinks we have no chance in rural areas.”
Gavin Derrick polled more that 65000 votes across Devon and Cornwall and election agents have indicated that the share of the vote in Cornwall was dramatically up.
Phil Spurr also thanked: “local Labour Party members and supporters who worked so hard leafleting and persuading others to vote Labour, helping us to achieve such an outstanding set of results.”
Vote Gareth Derrick – Vote Labour May 5th 2016 Police & Crime Commissioner Election
LABOUR POLICE Commissioner hopeful, Gareth Derrick, urges the public to turn out to vote on May 5th in the Police & Crime Commissioner (PCC) election as he:
“passionately believes this election is crucial for the people living in the South West.”
At a recent campaign event in Plymouth, Shadow Home Secretary Andy Burnham MP, stated Devon and Cornwall need a police and crime boss who will “stand up” to the Tory government.
Shadow Home Secretary with Gareth Derrick on the campaign trail
The Labour Party campaigns to protect police numbers and the resources available to policing, against the backdrop of Tory cuts to police services up and down the country.
On the role, Derrick emphasises the PCC: “does not just allocate money to the police. He or she can commission services from many different sources, aimed at crime reduction and improving community safety. This gives the PCC the chance to reform and to innovate, working across the criminal justice system, and with the voluntary sector for example.”
“An effective PCC will be able to toughen up crime prevention measures, by working to reduce re-offending, supporting young adults and ensuring that responses are available where needed, and so much more” he added.
Derrick calls on Labour Members and the community as a whole: “to turn out to vote next Thursday May 5th” and: ‘”send a clear message to Westminster: Stop messing with our Police Force. Stop cutting budgets at Westminster that put our families at risk. Vote for your Labour PCC candidate – Gareth Derrick”.
Local Labour Party Member Slams Devon Tory MP’s Support for Unpopular Government Policy
LETTER recently published in the East Cornwall Times written by a local Party member JE Harris, expresses criticism of Geoffrey Cox, Torridge and West Devon Conservative MP’s support for the Chancellor’s recent budget and the Government’s forced academisation programme.
COX’S CONUNDRUM
I wonder which parallel universe Geoffrey Cox (Torridge and West Devon MP) inhabits when extolling the merits of the latest budget (ECT – 24.3.2016). It would be more accurate to simply say that it was a shambles. Within two days the grossly unfair cuts to disability benefits had to be quickly dumped. Ian Duncan-Smith, hardly a man noted for his left-wing views, called the budget unfair and resigned.
The Office for Budget Responsibility & the Institute for Fiscal Studies both suggest that the shuffled cuts & taxes between one year and another is an anodyne attempt to balance the books and enhance their appearance.
The Capital gains tax relief will award the richest 0.3% a further £30k roughly equating to the amount that the disability benefit cuts would have generated.
The Lifetime ISA is unlikely to be taken up by many under-40’s.The vast majority are too busy worrying how to payback their student loan or pay their rent or mortgage, that is if they are lucky enough to be in that position .
The tax on sugared drinks, which most people would probably agree with, will not however be implemented for two years, presumably while the Tories ‘sweeten’ the very powerful drinks industry.
But the real issue which he squeaked in was full ‘academisation’ of all English schools by 2020.As the realities unfold it is patently obvious that this puerile, political gesture is backfiring big time. The equivalent experiment in the USA-the introduction of charter schools (which receives government funding but operates independently of the established public school system in which it is located) has come in for serious criticism for both its management and finance but particularly for concentrating almost exclusively on SATs scores in order to enhance their profiles. The experience of privately subsidised charter schools in Chile which predates the USA model has spectacularly failed.
Senior Tories with responsibility for schools in Oxfordshire, Hampshire, Yorkshire, Leicestershire & Kent have lambasted the proposals to make all schools academies & to abolish parent governors.
Over the weekend we have seen overwhelming opposition in the response of the teaching unions. Nicky Morgan (why do they insist on such lightweights in such important offices?) patronised the NASUWT conference into wholesale heckling and derision. In one stroke, George Osborne’s budget has eliminated the public’s role in education where we live. Join up this stimulation of teacher’s frustrations with the ongoing disputes over junior doctor’s new conditions and they have seriously alienated two professions that deliver our most precious commodities; education and health. A recent Mori poll has suggested that more than 60% of the electorate are dissatisfied with Osborne. I suspect that a similar percentage within the Tory party feel the same. Perhaps Mr. Cox, when he re-engages with reality, might explain just where this budget ‘has put forward long term solutions to long term problems’
J.E.HARRIS
Clare Moody, South West Region MEP to Address Pro EU Meeting in Liskeard
South West Labour MEP Clare Moody speaking at a public meeting earlier in the year
LABOUR’S EUROPEAN REFERENDUM campaign to remain in the EU comes to Liskeard, Cornwall on Friday April 1st at 7:00 pm.
Clare Moody Labour South West MEP will be leading the public meeting involving debate and a Q & A session taking place at Liskeard Public Hall.
The MEP enthused about her role in the Labour In for Britain Campaign that involves: ‘Speaking to as many people as I can across the South West about why I think it is so important that Britain remains firmly in the European Union.’
Emphasising some of the many benefits EU membership brings, the MEP explained: ‘There are very strong reasons for our support. These include improved rights at work, better prices and protection to consumers and greater protection of the environment to name a few.’
According to Clare MEP: ‘Meetings have been well attended and involved lively debates showing that people really want to engage with the subject’. Adding: ‘People understand how important this referendum is to the future of the U.K.’
The meeting is open to all members of the public. Participants will be invited to contribute to a question and answer session with the MEP as part of the event on Friday 1st April 2016 at Liskeard Public Hall. Details also available on Facebook.
Member update: Change of date of next meeting to Wednesday the 2nd March @ 7 pm
Meeting focus:
Discussion topic will be the NHS led by John Tilbury and Jan Parker.
Meeting location:
Tamar Valley Methodist Church in Albaston, Gunnislake,
All members and those interested in joining welcome.
Welcome to Tamar Valley Labour Party
WELCOME to the website of the Tamar Valley Branch of the Labour Party. As Labour Party members we’re working to create a better, fairer and stronger community in Cornwall. We want you to join us in our work supporting improvements to public services, making life easier for business and creating a fairer, more equal society free from discrimination.
On this site you’ll be able to find out more about the work the local Labour Party is doing to make our area a better place for everyone to live in. We encourage you to look around and we welcome comments and suggestions. And we’d be very happy to welcome you as a member of our growing and vibrant local party.
Tamar Valley Labour 
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