NHS And The Transatlantic Trade And Investment Partnership

EDM number 871 in 2014-15, proposed by Roger Godsiff on 16/03/2015.
Categorised under the topics of Health services, International trade, North America and EU external relations.

That this House notes with concern that the NHS is still included in the scope of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) despite the risk of this leading to a privatised, fragmented service that is run for private profit rather than public wellbeing; recognises that only a complete and explicit exemption of the NHS from TTIP will protect the UK's health service from inclusion in the treaty; reminds the Government that the risks of not ensuring that the NHS is excluded from TTIP include increasing deaths from tobacco and higher costs for vital medicines; observes that the TTIP investor-state dispute settlement provision would allow companies to sue governments which bring in legislation to protect public health for billions of taxpayers' money as lost future profits; further notes with concern that this is already happening around the world under existing trade deals; further observes that allowing greater competition into the NHS would lead to further fragmentation and cherry-picking of profitable services, damaging the quality of healthcare available to citizens; further observes that the primary function of governments is to protect citizens' rights and wellbeing, including where necessary by defending them from the greed of global corporations; further notes that the Prime Minister has the right to insist that the UK's NHS is explicitly excluded from TTIP; and calls on him to use this right to protect the health and wellbeing of the citizens he was elected to serve, rather than the profits of private healthcare companies and their shareholders.

This motion has been signed by a total of 39 MPs.