NHS is working at 95% as turnout for junior docs’ strike plummets
Turnout for the resident doctors’ strike is down with the NHS operating at 95 per cent, its chief executive revealed yesterday.
Formerly known as junior doctors, the cohort of medics in England walked out at 7am on Friday in a row over pay and conditions, and will return to work on Wednesday.
But Sir James Mackey said there are ‘some really encouraging early indications’ that support in the ranks seemed to be slipping, with fewer resident doctors striking than in any of the previous 12 rounds of industrial action.
Health Secretary Wes Streeting has accused the strikers of ‘inflicting pain and misery on patients’ and holding them to ransom by demanding a further 26 per cent pay rise on top of the 28.9 per cent already received over the past three years.
In a letter to NHS leaders yesterday, Sir James thanked staff for their ‘heroic efforts’ to maintain services. He said the NHS was achieving its goal of delivering at least 95 per cent of planned activity during the period.
‘It’s a genuinely impressive response to everything you’ve had to contend with,’ he wrote, continuing: ‘While turnout is variable across the country, there are some really encouraging early indications that there have been fewer resident doctors striking than in any of the previous 12 rounds of industrial action.
‘We mustn’t become complacent and there is some really hard work directly ahead of us – but don’t lose sight of how remarkable the NHS response to all of this has been.’
The five-day action is the 13th walkout by doctors since March 2023, with the last strike in July estimated to have cost the health service £300 million.
Formerly known as junior doctors, the cohort of medics in England walked out at 7am on Friday in a row over pay and conditions
Wes Streeting has accused the strikers of ‘inflicting pain and misery on patients’
Resident doctors make up about half the medical workforce in the NHS and have up to eight years experience working as a hospital doctor or three years as a GP.
The last time they went on strike, more than 54,000 procedures and appointments needed to be cancelled or rescheduled, despite the NHS maintaining 93 per cent of planned activity.
On Friday, the BMA agreed to a derogation – where resident doctors are asked to leave the strike and work when patient safety is at risk – for maternity services in Nottingham.
Residents working on the labour ward at Queen’s Medical Centre and City Hospital were derogated for shifts on Friday, Saturday and yesterday.
It comes as specialist health workers who take patients’ blood have been striking for 236 consecutive days in what their union claims is the longest walkout in NHS history.
The 36 phlebotomists claim the clinical nature of their tasks means they should be on a higher NHS pay scale, worth an extra £1.09 an hour.
Bosses at Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust have refused to cede to their demands despite staff at other hospitals successfully arguing their case without the need for industrial action.
Union Unison say it would cost the trust £60,000 a year to regrade the affected workers – a quarter of chief executive Kevin McNamara’s annual salary of around £245,000.
It is understood there were 37 phlebotomists on strike when the walkout began March 17, with one having returned to work.
Their work at Gloucestershire Royal and Cheltenham General hospitals is being done by other staff, such as nurses on higher pay bands.
