Doctors leaders have agreed a new deal with the government, raising hopes that consultant strikes over their pay will soon end.
The British Medical Association and the Hospital Consultants and Specialists Association have been given a better package by ministers than the one the consultants rejected by 51-49 in January.
Both unions representing doctors are recommending that their advisory members in England accept the revised offer. The advisors will vote on it separately between March 14 and April 3.
If they accept the deal, it will mean that consultants will no longer take further industrial action, following the nine days of strikes they took part in in July, August, September and October.
Saffron Cordery, deputy chief executive of hospital organization NHS Providers, said: “Trust leaders will be optimistic about this light at the end of the tunnel. It is good to see that politicians and the union have come to a new offer.
“But following a five-day strike by trainee doctors last week, when the total number of routine patient appointments and procedures postponed by strikes since December 2022 reached 1.5 million, there remains the worrying prospect of more disruptive industrial action in the NHS.”
The BMA said new negotiations in recent weeks with ministers, after advisers rejected the first deal, have yielded improvements, including more detail on changes to the operation of the Doctors and Dentists Remuneration Review Body (DDRB), which helps determining the remuneration for both doctors and dentists. professions. The changes will help the DDRB regain independence from the ministers it has lost, it added.
In what could prove a crucial change to the original offer, consultants who have been at that level for four to seven years will now receive a consolidated pay increase of £3,000, on top of the 6% increase for 2023-2024 that ministers have granted. all senior physicians last summer.
Dr. Vishal Sharma, the chairman of the BMA’s advisory committee, said the talks had made enough progress on issues not resolved in the first deal for the union to present this new package to advisors, this time with a recommendation that they would accept “and this will put an end to the current wage dispute and prevent further industrial action”.
The Department of Health and Social Care described the revised offer as “a good deal for doctors, a good deal for patients and a good deal for taxpayers”.
Victoria Atkins, Minister for Health and Social Care, said: “It paves the way for an end to industrial action by consultants after many weeks of constructive dialogue and represents a good deal for consultants, patients and the taxpayer.”