Cllr Mark Ladbrooke is currently a substitute representative on Oxfordshire’s Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee and is leading a review of the council’s work to promote the Oxford Living Wage. He was formerly Chair of the Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust Joint Union Committee and was a founder member of the Oxfordshire Keep Our NHS Public branch.
“I don’t have to be convinced of the evils of privatisation – I’ve seen first hand the mistreatment of outsourced workers managed by Carillion. As acute beds are cut around us we also see the collapse of primary care and health and social care. There is a false narrative around of cutting acute care and sending patients to ‘care’ in or nearer home. In fact in many cases patients are being sent to neglect in the community. Cuts, privatisation and marketisation continue to bleed the NHS dry.
Despite the welcome level of health funding from the last Labour Government huge and highly damaging concessions were made to the market. Never again!
Our half million strong Labour Party needs to focus on stopping the cuts and renationalising the NHS. We must put resources into building mass protest as well as parliamentary action.”
Mark is currently the Trade Union Liaison Officer for Oxford Labour Party and a member of GMB. He grew up in in south Wales and worked in the NHS for 22 years.