Press release. For immediate release 02.07.2025
Ahead of the NHS’s 77th Birthday on Saturday July 5, trade union branches from across Leicester and Leicestershire have put their name to a public statement opposing the Labour government’s policy of growing the private sector within the health service.
The statement, written by Save Our NHS Leicestershire which represents campaigners in Leicester City, Rutland and Leicestershire County, lays out serious concerns that “increasing the role of the private sector will cause more problems than it solves” and that it serves as a “serious drain on public resources”.
Unions representing thousands of workers in the city and county, including branches of UNISON, Unite, GMB, University and College Union, and Leicester and District Trades Union Council, have backed the statement.
Tom Barker, Secretary of Save Our NHS Leicestershire, said:
“One year on from a Labour government being elected on a programme of ‘change’, we have to ask if they have lived up to this when it comes to the NHS.
“Unfortunately, we have to say the answer is no. Waiting times are still stubbornly high despite the best efforts of staff, funding so far, while improved, is inadequate to bring about transformative change, and the workforce is still overworked and underpaid.
“The reason the government has been unable to turn the NHS around is that some of the government’s policies are not solutions at all.
“Increased funding for the private sector simply redirects urgently needed resources away from our NHS. it puts money into the hands of companies whose first interest is profit, which is why they tend to take on the simplest and cheapest procedures, leaving the NHS to do the more complex and more expensive work. Rather than using so-called spare capacity in the private sector, public money is being used to expand it.”
“The NHS is 77 years old this Saturday. if we want the NHS to survive, we need to fund it directly, not the organisations that, knowingly or unwittingly, are contributing to its demise.”
ENDS
- The public statement has been agreed by the following trade union branches: Leicester City UNISON, Unite Community, GMB Leicester, Unite Community Leicester, UCU East Midlands Retired members, and Leicester and District Trade Union Congress
- For interviews, contact: tom.p.barker@googlemail.com
Public statement supported by aforementioned trade union branches:
After more than a decade of mismanagement and inadequate funding by successive Tory-led governments, NHS waiting lists have reached their highest levels on record, with around 6.4 million people waiting for 7.5m treatments.
This situation is having a profoundly negative impact on society, including on millions of trade union members, our communities and our families, and it urgently needs addressing.
The government has proposed to remedy the waiting lists by expanding the private sector, which is proposed to take on an additional one million appointments on top of the five million appointments and treatments it currently provides each year.
While we share the government’s desire to cut the waiting lists, we are extremely concerned that its proposals will cause more problems than it will solve.
NHS campaigners, health unions and many others have repeatedly argued that the private sector serves as a serious drain on public resources.
Analysis by The Guardian suggests that if the amount spent on private providers is increased proportionally from the latest total (£12.3 billion in 2023/24) it could add up to an extra £2.5 billion flowing out of the NHS into the private sector.
In addition to drawing real funding away from the NHS, the private sector also contributes to a structural detriment to the NHS because it only treats the least complex and most profitable elective cases, leaving the NHS saddled with the most complex and expensive work.
The private sector is dependent on NHS staff, so further expanding its role in elective care provision will mean more staff are pulled from the NHS to work on less serious cases. This will further diminish the NHS’s opportunities to treat patients with more complex health needs, leading to even longer waiting times for those with more demanding needed.
Additionally, the government’s focus on Community Diagnostic Centres (CDCs) and surgical hubs as a means to cut the waiting lists will likely cause further disruption by fragmenting the already under-staffed NHS workforce into smaller scattered units.
This is a recipe for inefficiency and chronic staff shortages. Diverting more patients with the most minor conditions to private sector providers also means diverting more money and staff away from the main NHS providers which have to cope with the full spectrum of health needs.
Profit has no place in public health. What is really needed is massive injection of funding onto the NHS, with annual increases restored to pre-2010 levels, restorative pay rises for its workers to end the recruitment crisis, and for the full nationalisation of public health in the UK.
saveournhsleicestershire.uk 
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