March For the Alternative: Jobs, Growth, Justice

1st April: All Together for the NHS Day

m4ta — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 14:18:40 +0000

After 26 March, the next big date in the campaign calendar is 1st April. NHS supporters around the country will be lobbying their MPs, at local events and individually for All Together for the NHS Day.

The NHS as we know it is under threat from drastic changes contained in Andrew Lansley’s Health and Social Care Bill. The bill has now cleared the committee stage, and will soon be going on to its third reading in the Commons.

It’s vitally important that we engage with MPs now, to make them aware their constituents are worried about the bill.

We oppose these changes for five main reasons:

Opening up the NHS to private profit. Taxpayers’ money destined for NHS patients will be diverted into shareholder profits.

Broken promises: Before the election David Cameron said: “I will cut the deficit, not the NHS” yet this reorganisation could cost up to £3 billion. No one voted for this.

Longer waiting times: With no cap on the amount hospitals can earn from private patients, NHS patients risk being pushed to the back of the queue.

Postcode lottery: Under the proposals, the care patients can expect will vary from place to place, increasing costs and health inequalities and hurting vulnerable people.

The NHS is working: Public satisfaction with the NHS is currently at an all-time high.

You can help now.

Please get involved and help unions and campaigners to make All Together for the NHS Day a success.

Check out False Economy’s listings of events near you, and other actions you can take online.

And please take a moment to take our online action to email your MP, asking them to vote against the bill at the third reading.

Placard amnesty this Saturday

m4ta — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 13:58:16 +0000

Goldsmiths art students were out in force on the March for the Alternative, in a partnership project with the Museum of London.

Students handed out placards with historical protest imagery at the start of the march, took some great timelapse video of the day, and organised collections of placards and props at the rally, hoping to gather a record of creativity in popular protest, to use at the Museum.

Guy Atkins, one of the organisers of the project, said:

“Saturday was fantastic. We were completely blown away by the response to the project. Handing out our placards on Embankment, we met so many great people wanting to chat about the protests they’d been on. And then for people to give us their creations at Hyde Park was really special.”

The team had loads of placards donated on the day, but are still after more of people’s creative protest art. If you’ve got a placard you’d like to donate, they’ll be holding another collection at the Museum of London on Saturday 2^nd April. Drop them a line on saveourplacards@gmail.com or contact them on Facebook to arrange it, or to send in any photos you have of yourself with your placard on the day.

Lost property – calling Adrian from Birmingham and someone who’s lost their specs

m4ta — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 09:33:34 +0000

If you’re called Adrian and came to the march from Birmingham then we have your wallet with two bank cards and a library card. We suspect it probably had more in when you lost it but we can return what’s left. Please email us.

And if you’ve lost a pair of Eye Time glasses with metallic blue grey frames, we’ve got them too.

But if you’re a government minister, we’re afraid you can’t have your support back.

Photos from the March for the Alternative

m4ta — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 08:46:37 +0000

Thanks to flickr user Steve McInerny for setting up a flickr group for march photos – which now has over 1,000 pictures uploaded to it. We’ve used it to make this photo wall – Check out how people who were there saw it by scrolling the wall and clicking on the photos.

Here’s some coverage we liked

m4ta — Sun, 27 Mar 2011 13:28:27 +0000

Lots of interesting coverage and discussion of the march today and yesterday.

Here are some links we like (without necessarily endorsing all the arguments) – and of course there’s lots more good stuff that we won’t have seen.

Show us some respect: thoughts on the media and March 26 Stuart White at Next Left
A snapshot of the 26 March demo Newsnight’s Paul Mason (though he’s unfair about Unison)
Why we need to march for the alternative Brendan Barber writes on Left Foot Forward
The Big Society Bites Back Brilliant coverage from the Sunday Mirror
The despair doesn’t come from the marchers Nick Cohen’s thoughts in the Observer
Ignore the sneers. This march is a real alarm-clock moment Polly Toynbee’s preview from yesterday