South West Surrey met for a very fine curry

38 Degrees members in South West Surrey talked politics over poppadoms at a buzzy meeting last night at the Bengal Lounge in Wrecclesham, Farnham.

Some of our number have spent their entire careers in the NHS, proud of the service it’s offered. Now they are watching it being dismantled in front of them – with little thought for patients or staff.

Temperatures rose as we talked about TTIP: a dodgy EU-US trade deal, cooked up by corporate lobbyists in Brussels, that could allow US corporations to carve up our health service. With people keen to spread the word, there was a strong commitment to action on Saturday 18th April.

Social care was a big item on the agenda, with stories shared of personal experiences of treatment of loved ones.

Local MP Jeremy Hunt, the Secretary of State for Health, tweeted yesterday “We need to make sure that we can look after older people around the world with dignity and respect“, ironic that in his own constituency all the state run care homes have been recently condemned for closure.

Then at the end of the night, the superb staff signed themselves up and offered to keep petition sheets on the front desk. Let’s hope Jeremy Hunt has a read next time he’s in.