NHS staff will march between east London hospitals to protest cuts

NHS staff, student nurses and patients will march between two east London hospitals tomorrow to protest against NHS funding cuts.

Protesters will gather outside the Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel Road at 5pm before marching to Barts in West Smithfield, taking a “symbolic” route through the City, according to organiser Jim Fagan, 60, of the Keep Our NHS Public group.

Alongside the Hands Off Our Public Services, Right To Work and Unite the Union campaign groups, the march is designed to highlight funding cuts which are set to see a reduction of 635 posts in the Barts and the London NHS Trust.

It will be the second protest outside the Royal London Hospital in less than a month, after the same groups marched along Whitechapel Road on February 11.

Bed closures are also a concern for protesters - there will be 100 fewer beds in the Trust under proposed changes.

Mr Fagan, a retired community nurse who worked in Tower Hamlets, said: “In the last few weeks a lie has been exposed that the NHS is protected from cuts.

“This government has done a U-turn on selling off the forests and the NHS is held in equal if not higher regard by the public.”

A Trust spokeswoman said last month that no compulsory redundancies among frontline staff were expected.