Tens of thousands will march on Saturday in defence of our National Health Service. With them will be Ian Allinson, the only 
workplace activist standing for Unite General Secretary.
Allinson said:
“I’m proud to be marching. And I’m proud Unite are backing this demo. Our NHS is a precious public service. Theresa May and the Tories have promised Donald Trump that the NHS is for sale to US multinational companies. We can’t let that happen.”
“As Unite general secretary I will escalate the campaign to defend the NHS. Unite is a union of 1.4 million members. All of us, whether health workers or not, have a stake in the provision of decent health care – we have to fight back”
“Junior doctors were absolutely right to fight against Hunt’s contract: we will need more strikes and more solidarity. There should have been nationwide demonstrations of support, but McCluskey left them to fight alone.”
“There’s another message that I want to bring on Saturday: immigrants built our NHS and it wouldn’t survive a day without them. In every hospital the compassion and expertise comes from all over the world. We cannot give an inch to arguments that say migrants are to blame for its failures. Underfunding and privatisation are responsible.”
“Many people know the Aneurin Bevan quote that the NHS will last as long as there are folk left with faith to fight for it. Fewer people know that Bevan railed against the right using the notion of health tourism to argue against the NHS. In 1952 he said that the Tories were trying to exploit the most disreputable emotions in order to discredit socialised medicine. We need to remember that today. We need unity, not scapegoating, if we are to successfully defend our NHS”.
ENDS
Notes to editors:
Information about the demonstration is here: http://www.unitetheunion.org/campaigning/events/its-our-nhs-national-demonstration/
Health workers supporting Ian Allinson have produced a leaflet for the demonstration, which is available at www.ian4unite.org/resources/
Ian Allinson is a workplace activist at Fujitsu in Manchester who previously served ten years on the union Executive. Ian comfortably secured the nominations to be a candidate in the Unite General Secretary election. The other candidates in the election are Len McCluskey, the current General Secretary, and Gerard Coyne, Regional Secretary for the West Midlands.
Voting takes place 27 March – 19 April.
Further information about his campaign is at www.ian4unite.org.
Ian is available for interview. Photographs are available at www.ian4unite.org/resources/
For more information, call 07985 438 553 or email ian4unite@gmail.com.
Ian has recently been on strike at his workplace. Information about the Fujitsu dispute is here: https://ouruniontest.wordpress.com/fujitsu-national-dispute/