The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has shocked and impacted us all and is exacerbating the deep-seated inequalities in our society, meaning those who already face disadvantage have been hit the hardest.
However, as we recover from this virus we, as a country, are faced with an opportunity to respond to those inequalities and disadvantages in the long term.
Since 2011 People’s Health Trust has supported people with great ideas to create fairer and healthier places to grow, live, work and age. Now, as these communities face greater challenges than ever before, we must do more to support their work now and in the months and years to come.
As part of this, the Trust is supporting the Build Back Better campaign launched by The New Economics Foundation. The campaign calls for a coronavirus recovery plan that builds back better, urging society to not go back to ‘normal’. The campaign is asking for a new deal that protects public services, tackles inequality in communities, provides secure well-paid jobs and creates a shockproof economy which can fight the climate crisis. In a recent poll commissioned by the campaign, it was revealed that just 6% of the public want things to go back to how they were before the crisis, demonstrating the widespread support for doing things differently.
The campaign is built around the key principles:
- Secure the needs of everyone in the UK now and into the future
- Protect and invest in our public services
- Rebuild society with a transformative Green New Deal
- Invest in people, not just big business
- Build solidarity and community across borders
People’s Health Trust believes in a world without health inequalities. We work to ensure that where you live does not unfairly reduce the length of your life, or the quality of your health and so we are supporting the aims of the Build Back Better campaign to address inequalities in Great Britain.
In our manifesto, published in December 2019, the Trust called for a robust health inequalities policy which sets out clear legal targets for closing the health inequalities gap, mechanisms for long-term investment in neighbourhoods and communities where residents experience the highest levels of disadvantage across England, Scotland and Wales, Health equity in all policies and for the creation of a community wealth fund.
The Build Back Better campaign is calling for similar actions, and the Trust will be supporting the campaign going forwards as we all slowly come out of lockdown, and begin to take a look around us at the changed world. As the Build Back Better campaign says, this is the chance to rebuild the world the way we want to see it.
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