Louise Irvine

Louise Irvine (born 1957, full name Marie-Louise Irvine) is a British general practitioner, health campaigner, and parliamentary candidate. She unsuccessfully stood for election in the 2015 General election for the National Health Action Party in the constituency of South West Surrey.

Career

Irvine earned her MBChB in 1981 from Aberdeen University. She also holds a Diploma from the Faculty of Family Planning and Reproductive Medicine, a Diploma from the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, is a Member of the Royal College of General Practitioners, and has an MSc.^[1]

In 2012 she was elected to the Council of the British Medical Association.^[2]

Irvine works part-time at Amersham Vale Practice in Lewisham, and is also a practice trainer for GP registrars as well as a Programme Director for the Lewisham wide GP training scheme.

Charity Work

Irvine was involved in the work of Scottish Medical Aid for Nicaragua, raising funds for, and helping to set up a medical centre in San Juan del Sur.^[3]

She also founded Arts Lift, which for 10 years allowed people with mental health problems to gain access to arts classes.

She was named as one of The Evening Standard top 1000 most influential people in London.^[4]

Politics

In 2002, Dr. Irvine led a successful campaign for new state secondary school in Lewisham.^[5]

She was the chair of the Save Lewisham Hospital campaign, founded in October 2012, which defeated the Government in court, with a ruling that the Health Secretary had acted outside his powers when he announced casualty and maternity units at Lewisham Hospital would be downgraded.^[6] The Government appealed, and was again defeated.^[7][8]

Irvine was a candidate for the NHA Party in the 2014 European Elections,^[9][10] saying that

"The Conservatives and Liberal Democrats outrageously broke their pre-election pledges that there would be no top down re-organisation of the NHS and no NHS privatisation."

In September 2014, she announced that she would be contesting the parliamentary seat of South West Surrey for the NHA Party, the seat of Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary.^{[11][12][13][14]}

She cited the record of the current Health Secretary as her reason for standing in South West Surrey:

"I’ve faced Jeremy Hunt in the courts - and beaten him twice. Now I’ll face him at the ballot box.

"He needs to be held to account for what he’s doing to our NHS and the way in which he has bulldozed democracy, changing the law to push through hospital closures when he was beaten in court.

"I am very concerned that our beloved NHS is being run down, privatised, fragmented and underfunded.

"This is an issue that affects everyone in the country. If we don’t all stand up for it now, it will be destroyed."

She is also a campaigner against the closure of six elderly care homes by Surrey County Council.^[15]

In January 2015, she was nominated for the 2015 SMK campaigning award.^[16]

In March 2015, Queen guitarist Brian May launched the "Common Decency" campaign, naming Irvine alongside six already-serving MPs, saying: "We think you’re decent people, we think you represent your constituents and your conscience so we’re going to tell our people to try and cluster round and give you support."^[17]

Personal life

Irvine is married to a consultant community paediatrician. She is the mother of two children.

References

External links

• Official website