Resident Doctors in England to Stage Five-Day Strike in November
Doctors in the UK are preparing to stage a five-day walkout in November, due to disputes regarding pay and employment.
Strike Details
The BMA stated that resident doctors will strike for five consecutive days from 7am on 14 November to November 19 at 7am.
Resident doctors, who make up nearly 50% of all medical staff in the National Health Service, are proceeding with the strike after failed negotiations with the government.
Causes of the Walkout
The chair of the BMA’s resident doctors committee stated, “This is not where we wanted to be. We have spent the last week in talks with government, urging the health secretary to resolve the crisis of doctors going unemployed.”
“We know from our own survey 50% of second-year physicians in England are struggling to find jobs, their talents being unused whilst countless individuals wait endlessly for treatment and hospital shifts remain vacant. This cannot continue.”
He continued, “We talked with the government in good faith, hoping the health secretary to see that a deal offering solutions to slowly restore the cuts to pay over several years, giving newly trained doctors a pay increase of just a pound an hour for the coming four years.”
“We hoped the government would see that our demands are not just fair but are in the best interests of the community and our patients and would also help stop our physicians leaving the NHS.”
About Resident Doctors
Junior physicians have anywhere up to eight years’ experience working as a hospital doctor, depending on their specialty, or up to three years in primary care.
Further information will follow soon.
