Junior doctors in England will strike for the 11th time today over pay, amid concerns within their union that a strike so close to the general election is a “proprietary cause”.
Senior figures at the British Medical Association (BMA) believe the strike is pointless and ‘naive’ and risks irritating Labor, who are likely to be in power next Friday, and have asked the union to call off the strike blow.
Around 25,000 trainee doctors are expected to refuse to work during the five-day work stoppage, which starts at 7am today and runs until the same time next Tuesday, July 2.
By the end of this, trainee doctors will have gone on strike for 44 days since they first took industrial action in March 2023 to seek a 35% pay rise.
The previous ten strikes have forced the NHS to cancel 1.4 million outpatient appointments and operations and spend £1.7 billion to minimize disruption.
NHS England expects “widespread disruption to care” to be worse than before over the next five days as heat-related health problems increase pressure on many services. “This new round of strike action will again hit the NHS very hard,” said Prof Stephen Powis, the national medical director.
However, registrars – junior doctors just below consultant level – will continue to provide cancer care in London hospitals affected by the Russian cyber attack, after the BMA agreed to a request from NHS England to grant them exemptions to do so.
But members of the BMA’s ruling council have said the latest strike will achieve nothing apart from causing further problems for hospitals already under pressure.
One said: “Neither I nor any of the doctors I work with can understand what the strike hopes to achieve. There is no government to negotiate with. And the Opposition Health Minister has stated that his first priority in office will be to rectify this and has called on junior doctors to cancel it.
“Additionally, the willingness to sacrifice five days of salary without tangible gain does not necessarily suit a group of physicians who want a 35% raise so they can pay basic bills.”
A second councilor said: “There is a lot of concern about a strike just before the election and support (for junior strikes among consultants and GPs) is declining.”
Junior doctors will today select hospitals across England, including in London, Birmingham, Nottingham and Liverpool. They will also protest outside Friarage Hospital in North Yorkshire, close to the Prime Minister’s constituency office in Richmond.
They will hold a meeting outside Downing Street this afternoon.
Young doctors are seeking a 35% salary increase as ‘full reimbursement’ of their salaries, to compensate for the 26.2% drop in their income since 2008-2009.
Leaders of the BMA’s Junior Doctors Committee (JDC) today said they could call further strikes this summer if the next government does not hold talks in a “timely” manner.
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However, they have emphasized in recent months that they would like to see any significant progress towards their goal of “full wage recovery” phased in over a number of years. That has raised cautious hopes that the long-running and highly disruptive dispute will soon be over.
Wes Streeting, the shadow health minister, has said that increasing the salaries of trainee doctors should be a “journey and not an event”. He has also said he would not approve a 35 percent increase because if he did, “any union worth its salt” would demand the same amount for its members.
Dr. Robert Laurenson, the JDC co-chairman, said, “He’s talking about things like ‘travel, no event’. We’re happy with a multi-year salary deal. Apparently he’s heard that, and ‘travel, no event’ fits that bill.”
Dr Vivek Trivedi, the other co-chair, said: “The main thing I got out of the discussions (with Labour) is that there is a willingness to try and at least have constructive and meaningful (discussions).”
He added: “If talks are not concluded in a timely manner, our members will naturally expect us to call for a strike.”
But influential figures within the BMA say many consultants and GPs privately sympathize with their younger colleagues’ desire to secure a pay rise, but believe they have made a mistake by striking so often and therefore failing to gain clear ground .
One senior figure said: “They should have called off this week’s strike because it was strategically the wrong decision – like an own goal – because there is a new government coming in and they have indicated they would like us to call it off.
“They must call off this strike, agree to meet the new ministerial team and see if they can salvage a deal, albeit not at 35%. Given the state of the NHS finances, it is a give and take.”