What they are fundamentally doing today is forgetting the three words that should be at the forefront of every doctor’s minds every day which is ‘do no harm’.
Health Secretary Wes Streeting has accused the British Medical Association of ‘harming patients’ as resident doctors begin strike action.
Streeting has also held firm and warned that the country will not be held to ransom, as junior doctors begin five days of strikes from today.
Resident doctors began their strike action at 7am today, with BMA members manning picket lines across the country.
Streeting told BBC Breakfast: “When people, particularly those who are waiting a long time for care are left waiting even longer through strikes, they do come to harm.
“And however much the BMA try to sugarcoat it, what they are fundamentally doing today is forgetting the three words that should be at the forefront of every doctor’s minds every day which is ‘do no harm’. What the public cannot understand, what other NHS staff cannot understand is how after having had a 28.9% pay rise and a government willing to go further on improving the working conditions of doctors they are still trying to lead their members out on strike.”
Resident doctors have been given a 5.4% pay rise for this financial year, following a 22% increase over the previous two years.
However, the BMA says wages are still around 20% lower in real terms than in 2008. It said in a statement: “Doctors have spoken and spoken clearly: they won’t accept that they are worth a fifth less than they were in 2008. Our pay may have declined but our will to fight remains strong.”
Streeting has also said that the strikes undermine the trade union movement, and wrote in an article in the Guardian: “No trade union in British history has seen its members receive such a steep pay rise only to immediately respond with strikes – even when a majority of their members didn’t even vote to strike. This action is unprecedented, and it is unreasonable.”
Basit Mahmood is editor of Left Foot Forward
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