National Health Action Party
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National Health Action Party
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| Leader | Dr Alex Ashman |
| Founded | 14 May 2012 |
| Headquarters | Kidderminster |
| Colours | Blue |
| Website | |
| http://www.nhap.org | |
The National Health Action Party (NHA) is a political party in the United Kingdom.
The party grew out of the movement opposing the 2012 Health and Social Care Act. It campaigns for renationalisation of the privatized parts of the English National Health Service, reductions in outsourcing as well as improvements to NHS funding, service provision and staffing. Despite focusing on health, the party has a range of policies in areas such as the economy, housing and education. These include opposition to austerity and a call for political reform.
Having stood candidates in local and European parliamentary elections in 2014, the party contested 12 seats in the 2015 general election, coming seventh in England according to the popular vote. Surgical registrar Dr Alex Ashman was elected as the party's leader in December 2016 following the resignation of co-founder Clive Peedell earlier that year.
The passage of the Health and Social Care Act in March 2012 prompted the party's co-founder Clive Peedell, a cancer specialist doctor, to co-write an open letter to The Independent alongside esteemed medical signatories. The letter was highly critical of the Liberal Democrats for their role in the passage of the Act and stated that the signatories would "form a coalition of healthcare professionals to take on coalition MPs at the next General election, on the non-party, independent ticket of defending the NHS and acting in the wider public interest". Two months later, on 14 May 2012, Peedell co-founded the NHA Party with retired doctor Richard Taylor, who had twice been elected as MP for Wyre Forest on an 'independent health' component to his local hospital party name. The party officially launched in Westminster in November 2012.
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