11.01.1996

Sectarian Communists?

There are two main points that need commenting on from Harvey Duke’s letter (Weekly Worker 123) regarding the Dundee Campaign against Hospital Cuts and Closures (DCHCC).

A campaign such as the DCHCC must not become the sectarian property of one group or organisation. It is essential to draw in as many working class activists as possible, either through trade union branch affiliations or as individuals, to transform it into an active, mass campaign that can achieve its aims.

I agree that the statement in Weekly Worker 119 - that “the CPGB continues to lead this campaign” - is misleading. The work put in by other organisations, in particular Harvey and his comrades in Scottish Militant Labour, needs to be appreciated. However there is nothing sectarian in organisations or individuals openly arguing their views on the best way to achieve the aims of the campaign. In fact this is a necessity.

We must not be drawn into some kind of perverse lowest common denominator ‘unity’. The bottom line of this campaign must be the fight for “healthcare according to need, not profit”, and if that means that some individual Tory voters want to get involved in the campaign while John McAllion and some Labour Party members and trade union bureaucrats don’t, then so be it.

While we are fighting for a health service that is run according to the needs of the people, then it must also be accountable to them, to patients (past, present or future) and health workers. Those that run the health service must be elected and recallable, not faceless bureaucrats or those hoping to make their pot of gold from privatised cleaning contracts or even an OBE. In conjunction with this we must fight to remove the profit motive from all healthcare provision. Yes, we do need to focus our attack against NHS privatisation and expose the trusts for what they are. However we should not believe that by abolishing the trusts the profit motive or market mechanism will disappear from healthcare.

Recent reports have indicated that one of the Dundee trusts is looking to drop the word ‘trust’ from its title. Unfortunately this does not signal a strategic turn in the war against the market. How many face lifts and name changes has the nuclear reprocessing plant at Sellafield had?

We have to be clear on the difference between form and essence. I believe that what we must fight for is a fully funded health service according to need, run by accountable and recallable democratic committees. The name given to these committees is a secondary question.

Nick Clarke
Dundee