06 January 2024 , 19:31
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Junior doctors going to Australia to earn more money for fewer hours have left the NHS unable to “provide the care patients deserve”, medics have warned.
Health Secretary Victoria Atkins has been urged to return to the negotiating table with an improved pay offer for junior doctors, who this week walked out on the longest strike in the history of the health service.
Ms Atkins this week expressed “extreme disappointment” that junior doctors announced strikes before a final offer had been proposed. But she refused to return to negotiations unless the BMA called off the strike.
Ms Manirajan said years of real terms pay cuts had left the NHS struggling to retain staff, with many heading down under for better pay and conditions. An NHS junior doctor works an average of 48 hours a week - with second year trainees paid around £16 an hour.
But in Australia, junior doctors work just 35 hours a week on average and earn up to £55,000 a year - which amounts to £30 an hour from basic pay alone. And they can command up to £100 an hour for locum work.
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“Some of the best doctors I’ve worked with have gone to work in Australia,” Sumi Manirajan, the Deputy Chair of the British Medical Association’s (BMA) Junior Doctors Council told this newspaper. “And I don’t know if they’re ever coming back.”
Ms Manirajan, a junior A&E doctor from London said: “If we get to a point where we are paying our doctors adequately, we’ll be able to retain the doctors currently training at medical school - and bring back some of those doctors that have left to go to Australia as well. That means we will have enough doctors to provide a better NHS. Waiting lists will go down, patients will be seen quicker in A&E and the population as a result will become healthier.”
Ms Manirajan added: “The Health Secretary said there’s an offer that she’s withheld from us, because we’re on strike. If it’s a credible offer, which I’m hoping it is, we’ll call off the strike. The strikes don’t need to continue. Not another patient needs to have an appointment or operation cancelled. She has the power to stop this, and I can only hope she will negotiate.”
On Thursday, Ms Atkins said the NHS "doesn't just belong" to the BMA's junior doctors' committee.
She said the health service "cannot be switched on and off on whim" as she warned that the walkouts are having "very serious consequences" for patients and NHS workers. Ms Atkins promised to start talks in 20 minutes if the strikes were called off.
Some of the best doctors I’ve worked with have gone to work in Australia, and I don’t know if they’re ever coming back.
By Sumi Manirajan, A&E Junior Doctor and Deputy Chair of the BMA’s Junior Doctors Council
Sumi Manirajan works as a junior doctor in A&E in LondonI WORK in A&E, so I see patients who have been waiting hours in agony and distress all the time.
Patients on trollies in corridors. Patients who have been put in corridors because we don’t have enough space. But one really stuck with me - and exemplifies why I’m on strike.
A woman came in to A&E with chest pain - a really serious symptom, and something people should always get checked out because it could indicate you have something wrong with your heart. While talking to her, I asked why she hadn’t come in the day before, when the pain started. She told me she had. She’d been waiting more than 12 hours to see a doctor, and I was the first she’d seen.
It really hit home, because in 10 or 20 years’ time, my parents are going to be more reliant on the NHS, and it breaks my heart to think about my parents needing help, and waiting 12 hours or longer to be seen. Research by the Kings Fund has showed if you have a heart attack or stroke in the UK, you’re more likely to have worse outcomes or die compared with other European countries.
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I think most people think of us as a developed country that provides good care, but it’s simply not the case any more. We aren’t giving the care that patients deserve, and that’s because we don’t have enough doctors.
Where are they going? More often than not, Australia. Some of the best doctors I’ve worked with have gone to work in Australia, and I don’t know if they’re ever coming back.
I was shocked, but not surprised, when one doctor I trained with told me he was leaving after his first year of working in the NHS - meaning he wouldn’t be able to come back and finish training here. But I look at him now, at the level of pay he’s getting and the quality of life, and it’s such a stark contrast with what I have here.
An NHS junior doctor works an average of 48 hours a week. In my second year I was paid around £16 an hour. Later this year as a Specialty Trainee that’ll go up to £21 an hour. Doctors in Australia work an average of 35 hours a week - and earn up to £55,000 a year. That amounts to £30 an hour. They’re paid much more for less work.
If we get to a point where we are paying our doctors adequately, we’ll be able to retain the doctors currently training at medical school - and bring back some of those doctors that have left to go to Australia as well. That means we will have enough doctors to provide a better NHS. Waiting lists will go down, patients will be seen quicker in A&E and the population as a result will become healthier.
Victoria Atkins, the Health Secretary said there’s an offer that she’s withheld from us, because we’re on strike. I would urge her to come to the table with the offer today. If it’s a credible offer, which I’m hoping it is, we’ll call off the strike.
The strikes don’t need to continue. Not another patient needs to have an appointment or operation cancelled. She has the power to stop this, and I can only hope she will negotiate.