Women's Views on News |
- The need to talk about Jeremy Hunt
- Taking issue with blanket surveillance
- New book about early Labour women MPs
- Proposals for real gender equality
- Third NUS lad culture report: still sickening
| The need to talk about Jeremy Hunt Posted: 28 Jul 2015 09:36 AM PDT
The government’s response to petition 104334 of almost 200,000 signatures calling for a vote of no confidence in the Rt. Hon. Jeremy Hunt MP, Secretary of State for Health, is disappointing. The response plainly avoids the question at hand, making no mention of Jeremy Hunt or a vote of no confidence. Instead it focuses on seven day working, assuming incorrectly that this is the signatories' only concern. The Government wants to talk about seven day working It must first be made quite clear that NHS healthcare workers are absolutely committed to improving the quality and safety of NHS care on many fronts, not least better seven day working practices. On this we are in complete agreement with the Government. However, it is the detail of how reforms have been proposed and potentially unilaterally imposed that has caused serious concern. The Government response, as has been the case for much of their 'evidence' backing seven day working, is both flawed and misleading. The Government are deliberately using poorly evidenced, inflated figures to win headlines and generate fear. To fully understand it, the reader requires in-depth statistical knowledge. A lack of references leaves the reader unable to verify the accuracy and robustness of the statistics used. Weekend mortality statistics The Government claim there is a 16 per cent higher chance of dying if admitted to hospital at the weekend – this is misleading. The actual data show there is a 16 per cent increase in absolute risk of death if admitted on a Sunday instead of on a Wednesday. The figure for Saturday is 11 per cent. That is an absolute risk reduction on an absolute risk of death of 1.32 per cent. Thus the risk of death is increased from 1.32 per cent to 1.53 per cent. The authors of the original study did not describe how the severity of patients' illnesses were taken into account, potentially seriously confounding the results. The figures above demonstrate an association but do not explain the cause. There are likely to be many reasons for this difference in mortality, but these have not been fully explored. They may well include the fact that patients probably present with more advanced illness and so are more unwell at the weekend, though clearly more study is merited. In fact the original study found that in patients who were already in hospital, the chances of dying on a Sunday were 8 per cent less than a mid-week day. Ironically, they are more likely to be on longer stay wards and therefore much less likely to see weekend consultants than those newly admitted to acute care. Besides all that, using mortality is not an effective marker of care quality. The consultant opt-out clause The response is fixated on the consultant 'opt-out clause' of the 2003 NHS consultant contract. This clause covers non-emergency (elective) work only. The response's argument focuses on making hospitals safer at the weekend – this relates to emergency work and highlights the critical lack of understanding of what actually happens in the NHS. It is again emergency work to which the above mortality figures relate. There is no opt-out from emergency work, but it is critically underfunded and poorly resourced. A Freedom of Information (FOI) request responded to by 13 acute NHS trusts so far has revealed just one consultant opting out of a total of 3755 consultants (0.027 per cent). That's equivalent to just 12 out of the roughly 40,000 consultants working in the whole of England. This destroys the Government argument that the opt-out clause is a "major barrier" to a 7-day service. The opposite is true, it is no barrier at all. Furthermore, the response claims that the 'opt-out clause' allows doctors to charge for expensive out of hours payments. The FOI data shows that this is not the case. These extra charges are for additional work hours needed to fill existing gaps in staffing due to an overall lack of consultants, NOT because consultants are opting out. Consultant pay Naturally, the report moves to highlight consultant pay. It quotes an average consultant salary of £118,000. Where has this figure come, how was it calculated and what are we comparing it to? The NHS consultant pay scale for England is £75,249 rising to £101,451 after 19 years as a consultant. Can consultants work more? Most full time consultants work 10, 11 or 12 programmed activities a week (40-, 44- or 48-hour week) as a routine. On-call work happens on top of this. Therefore most consultants already work in excess of a normal 40 hour week from the outset to cope with the demands of the NHS even before on call commitments. For example, a consultant might work five days a week. Their on-call weekend occurs on top of this time. They still come back to work again the following week, often enduring a 12 day stretch. They don't have Monday and Tuesday off to compensate, and if they did who would do their elective work on these days? It is difficult to see how current working patterns of 40-48 hour weeks (plus on calls) have any space for manoeuvre. Police officers, firefighters (note: not firemen as per the government response) and prison governors who demonstrate admirable seven day working, are not expected to work in excess of 40 hours a week to do so. The NHS is in a state of chronic staffing shortage and this affects patient safety. Acute care had its worst winter crisis for years with worse predicted this winter. There is a shortage of health professionals and a shortage of beds. Every day hundreds of unfilled shifts remain empty forcing already overworked professionals to do the work of far in excess of one person, compromising safety, quality and dignity. Discharging a patient requiring social care during the week is like wading through treacle, let alone at the weekend. The catastrophic cuts in health and social care mean that patients wait weeks for a care package or an urgent 'fast-track' palliative care placement as this cannot be done over a weekend. These, and emergency care are far more pressing issues for the Government to tackle, rather than picking a fight with doctors on an issue on which we all agree needs improvement. The determined Government focus on forcing consultant seven day elective working is not based on any evidence that the opt-out clause is any major barrier to seven day working. It is unworkable in isolation and may have catastrophic consequences for the NHS. Jeremy Hunt is focusing on the wrong entity; far bigger issues affecting patient care are being ignored and swept under the carpet. Why do NHS staff have no confidence in Hunt? If seven day service proposals and some belligerent remarks about doctors were all that had angered NHS professionals, there would be no petition. Jeremy Hunt has a track record of bad decisions, poor policy and failure to engage with professionals. This was the last straw. The NHS sat up, took note and decided enough was enough. Outlined below are just some of the many reasons NHS workers have signed to support a vote of no confidence in Jeremy Hunt: Co-authorship of a book advocating the denationalisation of the NHS; An enduring lack of engagement with NHS professionals and a refusal to involve them in shaping the future of the NHS; A non-existent understanding of what happens 'on the shop floor' and how the NHS really functions as a health service; A promise of seven day GP working services with no credible plans for addressing the GP workforce crisis; Suspension of the NICE safe staffing programmes focused on minimum safe nursing levels for inpatient wards; An acute care crisis with deteriorating accident and emergency performances, closure of inpatient beds and personal haranguing of NHS trusts repeatedly missing targets; A calamitous lack of understanding of evidence based medicine leading to the promotion of homeopathy as an evidence based intervention (it's not) and misleading information about drug advances such as dementia drug solanezumab; Lack of apology for patient breach of confidentiality despite his own introduction of Duty of Candour regulations – if this had been a health professional there would have been a disciplinary proceeding likely leading to a Fitness to Practice hearing; Persistent lies, propaganda and misinformation to the public about the NHS; Complete lack of experience in the healthcare sector; Closure of emergency services such as West London Accident & Emergency departments and attempted closure of Lewisham Accident & Emergency despite the A&E crisis; Overseeing progressive privatisation of the service which clearly does not work; Six-fold exaggeration of costs incurred by foreign nationals using the NHS and Public health budget cuts of £200 million despite a 'focus on public health and prevention'. Regarding Mr Hunt, the message is becoming even louder and clearer. NHS staff and the public have had enough. Dr Daniel Furmedge, Dr Benjamin Dean, Dr Hugh Harvey, Dr Natalie Silvey, Dr Mohsin Khan, Dr Zoe Norris, Miss Stella Dilke, Miss Stella Vig, Dr Clive Peedell, Mr Vimal Gokani and Mr Mike Henley on behalf of 196,900 signatories. Supported by GP Survival. To sign the petition, click here. And follow #iminworkjeremy #weneedtotalkaboutjeremy  |
| Taking issue with blanket surveillance Posted: 28 Jul 2015 09:02 AM PDT
In a letter published today in the Daily Telegraph, two Green politicians, Caroline Lucas, MP, and Baroness Jenny Jones, who are facing the government in court over an alleged breach of the Wilson Doctrine, urge the government to renew its commitment to the Doctrine which protects those who contact parliamentarians from being subjected to blanket surveillance. The Wilson Doctrine was brought in by the then prime minister Harold Wilson in 1966 to prevent phone tapping in the Houses of Parliament. It provided that no Member of Parliament’s telephone shall be tapped, unless there is a major national emergency, and that any changes to this policy will be reported by the Prime Minister to Parliament. It was extended, when Tony Blair was Prime Minister, to cover all electronic communications. Lucas and Jones have called for parliamentarians’ communications to be protected and for that protection to be extended to the Scottish Parliament, European Parliament and Welsh Assembly. Their letter follows a court hearing last week in which the government’s lawyers argued that the Wilson Doctrine is no longer viable in the era of mass interception – a claim dismissed by Jones and Lucas. The government's lawyers also argued that the ruling does not apply to MSPs, MEPs and AMs. Here is the letter: SIR – Last week, the Government tried to kill a policy that's been protecting the privacy of communications between parliamentarians and their constituents for almost half a century. The Wilson Doctrine, brought in by the then prime minister Harold Wilson in 1966 to prevent phone tapping in the Houses of Parliament, was extended by Tony Blair to cover all electronic communications. Now, in a case we brought to the Investigatory Powers Tribunal last week, it has been revealed that ministers want to get rid of this protection. The case comes on the back of revelations by CIA whistle-blower Edward Snowden, which showed that everyone's communications were subject to blanket surveillance by GCHQ. Government lawyers are now arguing that it is the Wilson Doctrine that should be re-examined, rather than the bulk interception regime. For us, as parliamentarians who often speak to whistle-blowers – from campaigners whose groups have been infiltrated by the police to those exposing corruption in government departments – this policy reversal is deeply worrying. Our job is to hold the executive to account, and to do that effectively it's crucial that people feel they can contact us without their communications being monitored. The Wilson Doctrine must not be undermined; indeed it should cover MSPs, AMs and MEPs too. People's privacy is just as sacred now, in the age of the internet, as it was in 1966. It's time that the Government stopped attempting to undermine our parliamentary democracy and instead gave people the right to communicate freely with us without fear of being monitored. Caroline Lucas MP (Green) Lucas, Jones and former Respect MP George Galoway said MPs’ communications with the public are being intercepted as part of the Tempora mass data collection programme exposed by former US intelligence analyst Edward Snowden. Galloway filed a separate case against the government, but it has been incorporated with that of Lucas and Jones. The government's (secret) Tempora programme, operated primarily by GCHQ, monitors and collates, on a blanket basis, the full range of electronic communications data produced in, or transiting through, the United Kingdom – and numerous other countries. The communications it intercepts includes emails and other internet traffic as well as telephone calls. The politicians want an independent judge to sign off any surveillance that does take place. Speaking today, after the publication of the letter, Jones said: "Last week's revelations were shocking. "Rather than rethink the pervasive surveillance regime we have in this country ministers are attempting to undermine a key policy which protects those who contact parliamentarians. "My job is to hold ministers to account, and they know full well that they are undermining our parliamentary democracy by cutting away a key protection for people who require discretion when contacting me. "The revelations in court last week were deeply troubling. "Caroline Lucas and I will be pursuing this case to very end. "In a democracy there is absolute no excuse for people who contact parliamentarians to be subject to blanket surveillance by the security services." And Lucas said: "Last week's court case saw the Government attempt to hack away at our parliamentary democracy. "It's essential that my constituents can contact me in private – yet the Government is undermining their right to do so. "The Government has tried its very best to sweep Edward Snowden's revelations under the carpet. "The court case last week further exposed Ministers’ priorities – proving that they are happy to subject citizens to blank surveillance, even when they are contacting their MP. "For those of us who believe that a right to privacy is a mark of a free society this latest manoeuvring by the Government is deeply concerning. Baroness Jones and I will be working closely together in the coming months to ensure that the Government is held to account as it attempts to undermine my constituents' right to contact me in private." "There are, of course," she added, "exceptions to the doctrine – such as when an MP or Peer is suspected of a serious crime – and we'd certainly support judge approved interception in those exceptional circumstances."  |
| New book about early Labour women MPs Posted: 28 Jul 2015 08:36 AM PDT
The first three Labour women MPs took their seats in 1923. They were Margaret Bondfield, Dorothy Jewson and Susan Lawrence. And in 1929, Margaret Bondfield, MP for Northampton, became the first woman to be a British Cabinet minister. Bondfield was Minister of Labour in Ramsay MacDonald's National Government after a long career in the industrial wing of the Labour movement. Mary Honeyball’s book ‘Parliamentary Pioneers: Labour Women MPs 1918-1945′ is a compelling account of the trailblazers who laid the foundations for women having an influential voice in the House of Commons. Parliamentary Pioneers tells the story of the issues these first MPs championed, the challenges they faced and the lives they led. Their story is told through the prism of key contemporary issues, such as working-class women's fight for birth control in the 1920s and 30s, and with chapters on work, welfare, peace and internationalism and the Labour Party in the House of Commons, this book brings to life the little known history of the first Labour women to sit as MPs. It was not until the Labour landslide of 1997 that over 100 Labour women were returned to the House of Commons and fair representation for women at Westminster is proving to be an ongoing slog. Currently Labour MEP for London and an authoritative spokesperson on women's rights and gender equality, Honeyball read Modern History at Oxford University's Somerville College and went on to have a career in the charity sector before entering politics full time. She has been a Member of the European Parliament since 2000 and is Labour spokesperson on the European Parliament Women's Rights and Gender Equality Committee, a position she has held for over 10 years. She also has a long record of activity in the Labour Party women's organisation, having been chair of the London Labour Party Women's Committee and Treasurer of Emily's List, which aimed to get more Labour women into Parliament. Baroness Joyce Gould of Potternewton, former Labour Party Chief Woman Officer and National Agent, said of the book: 'At a period when women are still so underrepresented in British politics Mary couldn't have chosen a more prescient time to publish Parliamentary Pioneers. 'This is an important reminder not only of the early struggle following the suffragette movement, but of how these tough women worked so hard to dismantle entrenched views on gender and risked being ridiculed in the process.' ‘Parliamentary Pioneers: Labour Women MPs 1918-1945′ has so far been published in hardback and for Kindle.  |
| Proposals for real gender equality Posted: 28 Jul 2015 06:35 AM PDT
Labour leadership contender Jeremy Corbyn has today released Working with Women a document outlining his proposals for real gender equality. Corbyn proposes bolder strategies to promote greater equality between women and men. These include moving towards a system of universal free childcare. He calls for an urgent end to the cuts to public services and welfare that drive more women and more families into poverty, including the cuts to women's refuges and services for domestic violence. And he argues that companies should publish mandatory equal pay audits as an essential step towards equal pay for equal work. He also holds that all those in work are given equal protection from discrimination from day one, with no employment tribunal fees to bar the poorest from accessing justice. The Working With Women document also outlines more investment in skills training and high quality apprenticeships, with an emphasis on challenging outdated stereotypes. Corbyn also argues for the need to challenge everyday sexism by promoting Personal, Social Health and Economic (PSHE) education in schools, including sex and relationship education. He also plans to proactively ensure that laws on sexual assault and protection from harassment are implemented, to ensure that women do not feel ashamed or belittled by reporting behaviour they find intimidating to the police. Corbyn also commits to establishing a 50 per cent women shadow cabinet, should he make party leader, and to work towards ensuring that 50 per cent of Labour MPs are women. “Women face abuse, mistreatment and persistent discrimination, and they face it in work, at home and on our streets,” Corbyn said. “Yet they disproportionately shoulder our unpaid care work, the daily grind of surviving on low pay, and the pain of cuts that have closed domestic violence shelters and left them with no safe haven. “The time for timid measures is over. “Women deserve fair pay, fair chances and unflinching support in the face of violence and abuse. “Today's proposals would go a long way towards building a society where women and men exist as equals and flourish.” Corbyn has also set out proposals for a National Educational Service to enable workers to improve their skills throughout their working life; set out two costed proposals for scrapping tuition fees and restoring maintenance grants for students and outlined his vision for a modern, more productive, fairer economy for everyone. Newly-elected MP Kate Osamor is working closely with Corbyn to promote the equality agenda. She has welcomed this policy initiative. “I’m so glad that Jeremy Corbyn has opened up a big discussion about the role women would play if he is elected leader of the Labour party – and setting some pointers of the kind of agenda for women we as a party would have,” she said. “…We can't change the world everything overnight, but we can do much more together to achieve greater equality and opportunity for everyone. “One of the main things that I like about Jeremy's approach to his leadership bid is it's not all about him – he knows that the model of the suited and booted media star leader is over. “People are no longer interested. "Instead Jeremy is about getting everyone together and working collectively. "The days of waiting for policies to be passed down from a Westminster elite are over,” she added,”or should be.”  |
| Third NUS lad culture report: still sickening Posted: 28 Jul 2015 05:50 AM PDT
Hidden Marks, a study of women students' experiences of harassment, stalking, violence and sexual assault, was published in 2010. That's What She Said, a report on women students' experiences of 'lad culture' in higher education was published in 2013. Both these exposed the true extent of the pervasiveness of lad culture at universities – but it seems that little has been done. And now The Lad Culture Audit has been released; ‘the NUS's most comprehensive analysis of lad culture policy and practice undertaken to date’. The aim of the report was to understand what, if anything, is being done to tackle lad culture. It also wanted to identify strengths and weaknesses in current policies, to examine the quality of care given to victims and to find examples of good practice. And it recommends ways of supporting students' unions (SUs) and higher education institutions (HEIs) in addressing lad culture. But the findings reveal a startling lack of provision, training, and support in both universities and their students' unions. One of the key findings of the report was that many students' unions and academic institutions do not have a policy which directly addresses lad culture. Equality and diversity (E&D) and bullying and harassment policies were in evidence in the majority of institutions, but many were ill-defined, were often not relevant to lad culture and at times even unclear on what is meant by sexual harassment and assault. Meanwhile, both students' unions and institutions were shown to have 'gaps' in policy that specifically targets lad culture: just half of the institutions (51 per cent) had a formal policy on sexual harassment and only 1 in 10 had a policy that covered the display of sexist and discriminatory material. Even less clear were the policies institutions had set up regarding complaints procedures, many of which put the onus on victims to try and resolve matters 'informally' first. One institution's HR handbook even said: "Speaking to the person who is causing you distress is always an informal option and an approach preferred by many in delicate circumstances. "This is because sometimes individuals are genuinely not aware of the offensive effect of their behaviour and will naturally stop when it is brought to their attention." There is a real danger that these so-called policies are forcing victims rather than institutions to take responsibility for addressing difficult situations. But if institutions fail to provide clear or sufficient information on the victim support programmes which are available, the situation may be even further compounded. Worryingly, the existence of lad culture training and education programmes was shown to be minimal in students' unions, with only one in ten (11 per cent) providing training and just 32 per cent providing sexual consent workshops. The issue of consent was shown to be even less of a consideration in institutions, just 6 per cent of which counted consent as part of their curriculum. The report presents the results from an audit conducted between December and February 2015. The findings are based on information from the 35 student unions that responded to the survey and the 20 student unions that sent through supporting policy documents for the audit. Lad culture is defined as a group or pack mentality found in activities such as sport clubs and nights out and what is called 'banter' which was often sexist, misogynist and homophobic, while sexual harassment ranges from verbal harassment or catcalling, to physical harassment and sexual molestation. This audit also highlights that without proper support and direction from the education sector, the scarcity of training and policy evidenced will continue to foster a critical lack of awareness and action among staff and students. Despite the audit's evidence that many students' unions are now beginning to wake up to the challenges inherent to tackling lad culture, they cannot make the required changes alone. It is now incumbent upon institutions to work with their unions and other places of learning in order to create a national framework and combat sexual violence and harassment. In a further step in that direction, nine university students' unions have volunteered to take part in 'the Lad Culture Pilot Scheme'. The nine are: University of Bradford, Cardiff University, Kings College London, Leeds University, LSE, Queen Mary's University London, Oxford University, University of Sussex and University of Warwick. This scheme was launched on 27 July, and will see the students' unions working with the NUS to begin looking at how to build their own Lad Culture Strategy and to share best practice with other unions, NUS staff and representatives and people and groups who have a vested interest in tackling lad culture. In turn, the NUS will be learning more about the pioneering campaigns run by the pilot students' unions in order to learn how lad culture is already being tackled on campuses. The NUS's Women's Officer, Susuana Amoah, said: "We, the student movement and society as a whole, are no longer in a position where we can continue to allow the issues women face on campuses across the UK and beyond to be ignored. "Yes – women can participate in education, work and social activities, but that doesn't mean that these spaces are accessible to all women or that women are treated fairly and respectfully. "In fact, harassment, violence and blatant discrimination can make education and other spaces inaccessible for many students, not just women. "I am proud of students' unions and the student movement for their ongoing support and the hard work they are doing on the ground to combat this, but we need more and NUS and students' unions cannot fix this problem alone. "In order to really challenge this issue and change it, we need the education community, as a whole, to get behind us and support us in embedding a framework that will not just deal with these issues, but actually stop them from happening. "This is our call to you to join us and challenge Lad Culture, sexual harassment and violence on campus and make education and other spaces accessible for women and many other students." Dr Alison Phipps, Director of Gender Studies and Reader in Sociology at the University of Sussex, said: "[The] NUS has been breaking new ground in developing and supporting initiatives to address 'lad culture' and sexual violence against students. "This audit has been a fantastic tool in helping students' unions to understand these problems, how they are being dealt with on their campuses and what more needs to be done." She was, she continued, full of admiration for individuals and Students' Unions who were tackling the issues, sometimes in what she called ‘very unsupportive institutional contexts’. "I hope that Universities UK and other relevant organisations will meet us in our efforts, specifically through pressuring more universities to take action at institutional levels," she said. We do too.  |
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