Resident Doctors in England to Launch Five Consecutive Day Walkout in November
Medical professionals in England are set to begin a five-day walkout next month, due to disputes regarding jobs and pay.
Walkout Information
The BMA announced that junior physicians will strike for five consecutive days from 7am on 14 November to 7am on 19 November.
Resident doctors, who constitute nearly 50% of all medical staff in the National Health Service, are taking this action after failed negotiations with the health department.
Causes of the Walkout
The chair of the BMA’s resident doctors committee stated, “We did not want to reach this point. We have spent the last week in talks with officials, pressing the health secretary to end the crisis of unemployed physicians.”
“We know from our own survey half of second-year doctors in England are struggling to find jobs, their skills going to waste whilst countless individuals endure long waits for care and shifts in hospitals remain vacant. This is a situation which cannot go on.”
He added, “We talked with the government in good faith, keen for the health secretary to see that a agreement including options to gradually reverse the cuts to pay over several years, providing newly trained doctors a raise of only £1 per hour for the coming four years.”
“We trusted the government would see that our demands are not just reasonable but are in the best interests of the public and our patients and would also help prevent our physicians departing from the NHS.”
About Resident Doctors
Junior physicians have anywhere up to eight years’ experience working as a hospital doctor, based on their field, or as many as three years in general practice.
More details will follow shortly.
