Anger erupts on hospital closure hospital closure

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TOTAL uproar and chaos greeted the members of Wandsworth District Health Authority (DHA) as they prepared to vote for the closure of the South London Hospital for Women at their meeting on January 27.

They would have preferred to have taken the decision in the quiet and calm of the usual DHA meetings without having to answer to the people who will be affected when the hospital closes.

But the document proposing the "savings" was leaked, and in only two weeks a substantial campaign has built up to pressurise the authority to keep the hospital open. Petitions were presented with over In an effort to prove how reasonable they were the chairperson of the Authority three speakers to put views of why the of the authority which by ILEA rep on the committee hospital must now take a gave short shrift to firm stand against the immiWayland's arguments and nent rundown of the facilitsaid that the third option ies and build for a massive was to vote for St. George's, fightback from both the for the retention of the hospital and the community.

Bermondsey Labour Party urgently: need help with their by election campaign. Each ward in the Bermondsey constituency has been 'twinned' with several London Constituency Labour Parties. Contact your CLP (or phone Herbert Morrison House 01-703 6511) to find out which ward you are twinned with and mobilise members of your ward Labour Party to go to Bermondsey and help with the 27,000 signatures.

should stay open.

The chair (who was part recommenćed the closure of Benedict's) had opened the meeting by outlining te He was very pleased to say that the authority was at present £245,000 underspent, and by the end of the financial year. would be able to increase that to £694,000! He reminded the members of their statutory duty to keep within the cash limits set by the government.

Over 250 people had packed into the meeting to hear the arguments against closure. A consultant from the hospital, Val Wise, on behalf of the GLC women's committee and the secretary I ine campaign, given ten minutes to speak. They outlined the need for the services to be maintained and expanded, not cut. Their arguments were good, but it was obvious that they were falling on mostly deaf cats.

Priority

The real priority for the consultants, administrators and Tory members who make yp the bulk of the DHA is St. George's - a large teaching complex.

The members pushing for its expansion at any cost all admitted that it is more or less a white elephant. They said that if it was in the planning stages now, it would be a different story trapped there. The case for rapped there. The case for better housing, particularly setter housing, particularly for houses with gardens, i or houses with gardens, is very strong. ery strong.

So far as offices are So far as offices are concerned, we've already got too many offices - lots of them are standing empty.

Roads

All the main roads in the area have been taken over by offices, and shops have closed, doctors and dentists have gone. So the Labour Party is saying we don't want any more offices, we want houses with gardens and more shops.

We also have a lot of people living on pensions and social security. Over 25% ot the population is elderly, so the issue of better pensions is very important.

pensions this year. and nice "allowed' hospital closure and was not concerned that a very good daycare abortion unit will close and that women will then be referred to a hospital where the doctors have objections to carrying out abortions.

She also maintained that waiting lists would not grow as a result of the bed losses. Emergencies are now admitted within a week and that level will be maintained!

The meeting was summed up by Dick Muskett, a left member of the Authority, who said that the whole thing had been set up. The proposal put forward at the beginning of the meeting made it impossible to support more beds at St. George's and also to support the retention of the South London. The financial arguments in the paper when queried were found to be not quite accurate - "simplified for purposes of getting the paper out quickly said the District Treasurer.

The people attending the meeting were given a first hand show of exactly how 600 of those school leavers never had a job.

Labour's commitment to abolish tax on the dole, and our opposition the scrapping of earnings related supplement, together with a campaign for a major increase in unemployment are young who have decisions affecting their health are made - on trumped up statistics, false figures, on personal interests, and in support of a Tory government determined to ruin the health of the working class.

The most disgusting spectacle was Peter Wayland, a local Labour Party member, putting forward his reasons for supporting the closure.

He spent fifteen minutes justifying his stand. In his opinion there were only two choices: either close the hospital or resign from the authority because he would have gone against Fowler's dictum that cash limits must be adhered to.

Members of the Tooting Labour Party who were listening were furious and barracked him throughout his sneech. And Harris ARAU 1311=+J canvassing.

benefit is going important.

Do you have any particular plans for winning the votes of the young people of There is going to be a special Young Socialists leaflet prepared which will focus first of all on jobs and the problems of youth unemployment and also on the problem that so many young people have had to move out af Bermondsey in recent years because there are no jobs and no decent It is also important to attack the Youth Opportunities Programme for what it is - cheap labour and exploitation. It's a way of playing on the plight of the unemployed to get them South London and for the expansion of health care in Tooting.

If the Tories then decided to disband: the authority "so be it. If we are put in jail and surcharged then so be it." This is the kind of attitude that all Labour members on the DHAs should be adopting. It is not their job to do the Tories' work for them.

Local women who were