Junior doctors threaten new NHS strikes as Tories refuse to start pay talks
Junior doctors are reballoting for more NHS strikes over the summer after the Tories refused to restart pay talks.
The British Medical Association announced the new vote after receiving no invite for negotiations from Government a fortnight after its last strike ended. Health Secretary Victoria Atkins repeatedly promised she would be round the table “in 20 minutes” if they cancelled strikes, but insisted she would not negotiate while industrial action was planned.
The reballot by the BMA’s junior doctors committee could renew their right to strike, which expires at the end of February, until September 2024.
In a joint statement, committee co-chairs Dr Robert Laurenson and Dr Vivek Trivedi said: “In the two weeks since our last strike ended, we have been waiting for ministers to come back to the table, something the Health Secretary said she could do in “twenty minutes” if no strikes were called. But no such offer of talks has been forthcoming.
Junior doctors could take further strike action (PA)“It is clear the only way for the Government to move its position on pay restoration, and to finally start to grapple with the worsening workforce crisis, is to continue with industrial action - which has forced ministers to move their position, however slowly, towards accepting the need for a fairer pay settlement.
Teachers, civil servants and train drivers walk out in biggest strike in decade
"A vote for a further six months of action would show them that there is no use in further delay. Instead of waiting out another round of strike action, the Government might instead see the urgency of simply coming to the table with a credible offer and trying to end this dispute once and for all.”
It follows the longest single strike in the 75-year history of the NHS by junior doctors from January 3 to 9. The walkouts have been repeatedly blamed by ministers on their failure to keep Rishi Sunak’s promise to reduce NHS waiting lists in England during 2023.
Critics have argued the Tories could now use ongoing industrial action as an excuse not to keep the pledge and blame militant unions as they go into a General Election.Unions involved in disputes have to reballot their members every six months on whether to continue with industrial action.
While if passed the reballot would extend junior doctors’ mandate to strike, no further strikes have yet been scheduled and announced by the BMA.
Co-chairs Dr Laurenson and Dr Trivedi added: “It is disappointing to be in the position of re-balloting our members for another six months of strike action when this dispute could have been resolved over a year ago if the Government had been willing and reasonable by coming to the table to make us a credible offer on pay.”
Last summer the Government awarded junior doctors in England an average rise of 8.8%, but the BMA said the increase was still a real terms pay cut for many medics. They are looking for a longer term commitment to address 15 years of below-inflation awards.
The junior doctors committee has benchmarked inflation of 11.4% which was the Retail Price Index measure at the end of the 2022/23 financial year. The committee says any 2022/23 pay rise offer from Government below 11.4% would be another real-terms pay cut. It is looking for a multi-year commitment to above-inflation pay awards - similar to that agreed in Scotland - to return real-terms pay to 2008 levels.
A spokesman for the Department of Health and Social Care said: “Strikes have already had a huge impact on patients - with over 1.3 million appointments now rescheduled due to industrial action and over 100,000 during January – and further industrial action would compound this.
“We want to focus on cutting waits for patients rather than industrial action, and if the BMA Junior Doctors Committee come to the negotiating table with reasonable expectations, we will sit down with them. November was the first month without strikes for over a year and we reduced the total waiting list by more than 95,000– the biggest decrease since December 2010, outside of the pandemic.”
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