News Beat
Doctors’ strike could be called off as Streeting makes last-minute offer
Health secretary Wes Streeting has accused the doctors’ union of “playing games with patients’ lives” by delaying a decision on whether to call off resident doctors’ strikes after he made the union a fresh offer to settle.
And he warned that a resident doctors’ strike over Christmas would have a “much different degree of risk” than previous strikes.
The British Medical Association (BMA) says it will survey members online on whether the deal is enough to call off planned walkouts next week.
Resident doctors, formerly known as junior doctors, are due to walk out for five days from next Wednesday in a long-running row over pay and concerns over training places.
The online poll will close on Monday, just two days before the next five-day strike is set to start.
Mr Streeting told MPs he could not think of “a single other trade union in this country that would behave this way”.
Concerns have been raised that the planned strike coincides with a “tidal wave” of illness sweeping the UK, including a particularly debilitating strain of flu. Two hospital trusts in the Midlands declared critical incidents this week due to high pressure.
The need for care is so high that thousands of patients are being treated in corridors, waiting rooms, doubled-up cubicles and ambulances.
During the five-day resident doctors’ strike in August thousands of patients had their NHS appointments cancelled.
The BMA, which is the doctors’ union, said the new offer included: new legislation to ensure homegrown doctors in training have priority for speciality training roles; an increase in speciality training posts over the next three years, with 1,000 of them to start next year, and funding mandatory examination and Royal College membership fees for resident doctors.
The union, which has been organising junior doctors’ strikes since 2023, said it would consult members on the government’s new deal to end the “jobs crisis” for doctors in England.
Mr Streeting said he offered to allow the BMA to reschedule strike action for later in January if members rejected his deal but that the union had refused to do that, so strikes still loomed.
“NHS leaders are going to have to start cancelling other doctors’ leave now to cover potential strikes, and patients will also experience unnecessary and avoidable disruption through some cancelled appointments and operations. That’s on the BMA.
“They didn’t have to do that, they have chosen to do that, I think that’s hugely irresponsible given the level of disruption that this will inflict at one of the busiest times of year for the NHS.”
He went on: “While I’m frustrated with the BMA, and I think they’re playing games now with patients’ lives and the lives of other doctors who will be forced to cover strikes, that doesn’t alter the fact that what we’ve put forward is a good deal for doctors.”
He issued an appeal to doctors to work with the government.
Mr Streeting told the Commons about a “gap between what the BMA is demanding and what the country can afford”.
Resident doctors had already received a 28.9 per cent pay rise, the highest in the public sector, he said.
But the union is calling for a further 29 per cent pay rise to address what it says is a 22 per cent decrease in real terms pay since 2008.
BMA resident doctors’ committee chairman Jack Fletcher said: “If members believe this is enough to call off strike action, then we will hold a referendum to end the dispute.
“But if they give us a clear message that it is not, the government will have to go further to end industrial action.”
Rory Deighton, acute and community care director at the NHS Confederation, said the strikes would come at the worst possible time, with rapidly rising flu levels putting huge strain on hospitals. “And despite NHS leaders working incredibly hard to prepare, we are concerned it could put patient safety at risk,” he said.
Daniel Elkeles, chief executive of NHS Providers, said strikes had been disruptive and distressing for patients and divisive for staff and had caused huge cost to the NHS.
“We urge BMA members to seize the moment and bring this damaging dispute to an end,” he said.
In the Commons, Mr Streeting accused his Conservative predecessors of creating training bottlenecks, as numbers of applicants for each training place surged.
He added: “It used to be the case that UK graduates competed among themselves for speciality roles. Now they are competing against the world’s doctors.
“That is a direct result of the visa and immigration changes made by the previous Conservative government post-Brexit.”
